Ben Ammar makes pledges on preserving industry diversity
Given that he now controls all the French film laboratories since the buyout of Eclair in December 2007, Tarak Ben Ammar has responded to concerns from professional organisations about the way in which this merger could threaten the diversity of production.
The head of Quinta Industries (who now control Eclair, LTC, GTC and LNF) has in fact made formal pledges to the ARP (Civil Society of Authors, Directors and Producers), the SRF (Society of Film Directors) and the SACD (Society of Dramatic Authors and Composers) in a letter dated February 22.
Ben Ammar highlights the need to rationalise the digital and photochemical post-production sector in view of "technological changes (…) that demand increased investment in technical industries, and in view of the competition which is now on a European, indeed international scale", but he nonetheless says he shares the belief that "companies that develop within the film sector cannot be considered companies like all the rest”.
He says that “beyond the practices of good management and performance, such companies must assume their cultural responsibilities".
Quinta Industries thus pledge to "lead a policy of preservation, of film heritage management, entirely focused on France"; to "organise an annual gathering for the heads of the different entities of the merger and industry professionals"; and to "maintain and develop links between the different players in the digital and photochemical sector, whether they belong or not to the new entities of the merger".
Finally, and above all, Ben Ammar says that he will endeavour to ensure that “the new entities of the merger pay particular attention to those films with the most fragile budgets and more generally to the film production sectors that need the support of the technical industries in order to survive".
(Translated from French)
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