05/02/2003

The end-of-year data for Italian cinema reveal a steady but positive trend, with an increase in box office takings and more investment. The financial world is showing more interest in cinema and the papers are full of articles about the appeal of Italian films (even the smaller ones) abroad. A small injection of trust that indicates the indubious ability of of the Italian film industry for recovery.

Only last July, when the season officially ended, Italian cinema realised that it was, yet again, “in a crisis”. According to Cinetel (a theatrical monitoring service run by Agis that covers 74 per cent of all Italian cinemas) were inequivocal: After taking Euros83m at the box office between June 2000 and June 2001, Italian cinema only managed half as much over the following 12-month period: Euros 41m.

The New Year brought a welcome surprise with it. In January 2003, Anica, the Italian film producers’ association, published their traditional end-of-year report for 2002 and announced: “Italian cinema’s getting better.”
The best news was the amount of Italian money being invested in national productions: Euros277.6m, fully Euros67m more than in 2001, and a 28.98 per cent increase. “This is the very first time that we have broken the Lire500,000b barrier,” said Anica’s president, Gianni Massaro.

130 Italian films were made in 2002, 27 more than in 2001. Box office takings, co-productions included, rose to Euros116m, a 24 per cent increase and Italian films took a 22.2 per cent share of the Italian market, an increase of 2.8 per cent on 2001.

Is Finance a part of the film industry?
Just as a leading Italian newspaper lists the names of the Italian directors aged forty or under, considered to be the “best next things” of the forthcoming season and writes about “a new generation of filmmakers” that is more in tune with public, a leading trade publication like “Box Office” ran the headline: Finance is already a part of cinema: “... important banking conglomerates, multimedia colossi, venture capitalists and merchant banks have entered the film and audiovisual arenas, in the face of talk about the alleged fragility of the Italian industry.” According to Box Office, three recent events sent out a strong signal of this new joint venture.
1. The De Agostini publishing group is investing part of the vast amount of money it took on selling Seat in the audiovisual sector, and is making no secret of this- After buying 10 per cent of the Cattleya production company and 33 per cent of Albachiara, in 2002 De Agostini became the majority shareholder in Mikado and underwrote joint ventures with Italian and international partners.
2. Franco Bernabè, the former MD of Eni and Telecom Italia, has been President of the Venice Biennale for a year. His ambition is to relaunch the stagnant festival and reposition it on the international scene in order to attract new sponsors and investments.
3. Italy’s Minister for Culture, Giuliano Urbani chose a leading venture capitalist to be the new MD of Cinecittà Holding, the group charged with promoting Italian cinema: Ubaldo Livolsi, the man who oversaw the quotation of Mediaset on the Italian stock exchange.