06/12/2005

The cream of the French cinema and audiovisual industry met in Paris last night for the first Techinical Creation Industries Night, an event organised by the Federation of the Cinema, Audiovisual and Multimedia Industry (Ficam) to shed "light on a part of the Cinema and Audiovisual industry that is too often left in the shade". Among the personalities present were the Minister of Culture Renaud Donnedieu de Vabres, director of the National Film Centre (CNC), Véronique Cayla, president of the Chamber Of Unions of Film Producers (CSPF), Jean-François Lepetit, his counterpart from the National Federation of French cinemas (FNCF), Jean Labbé, and the trio from the = Cannes Festival: Gilles Jacob, Thierry Frémaux and Catherine Démier. One of the highlights of the evening was the Ficam trophy for Invention handed over by Roman Polanski to Jean-Marie Lavalou and Alain Masseron, the two creators of Louma.

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Regrouping 120 enterprises and 10 000 staff, the Federation presided over by Thierry de Segonzac also announced the creation of a Foundation for short film, a strong sector in France (1000 shorts produced per year, of which 400 were authorized by the CNC) at the heart of the renewal of talents artistic and technical talent. Also, Ficam used the occasion to reaffirm its attachment to tax credit for cinema and audiovisual applicable in France for two years and which has contributed to the re-localisation of more than half the productions which would have left France in 2004 and 2005, generating150 000 extra work days (more than 300 shooting weeks, thirty features and twenty telefilms). Ficam, according to whom these measures of incitement to re-localisation can aid other European film industries, foresees tax credit destined for international productions.

(Translated from French)