Romania

[RO] Rules for Film Project Subsidies

IRIS 2010-2:1/30

Eugen Cojocariu

Radio Romania International

The contest for film project subsidies organised by the Centrul Naţional al Cinematografiei (National Cinematography Centre - CNC) in 2010 will be run under almost the same Regulation as in 2009, despite the criticism of Romanian filmmakers with regard to the conditions of the contest.

The Regulation has been slightly modified only to be in line with the amended Legea cinematografiei nr. 303/2008 (Cinematography Law no. 303/2008; see IRIS 2009-1: Extra). The Ministry of Culture changed five articles of the Regulation through an Order published in the Official Journal on 30 December 2009.

The only amendment with regard to the organisation of the contest was to split the projects in competition into three sections instead of two: full-length fiction and short reel films, documentaries, cartoons. Until now documentaries and cartoons were in the same section. The new jury for cartoons will be composed of 3 members and will join the two existing juries for fiction (5 members) and for documentaries (3 members).

The filmmakers have criticised the way the members of the juries mark the projects without being obliged to argue their decisions and along the discretionary way of calculating the budgets of the projects with direct effects on the results of the contest. The first session of film project subsidisy will probably be launched at the end of February 2010.

In addition, the CNC announced the results of the subsidisy session for other kinds of cinematography projects organised from 1 January to 30 June 2010 (i.a., organising or attending domestic/international Film festivals, support for cultural or cinematograhic education programmes, publishing of cinematographic specialised works). The CNC granted subsidies for 19 projects and rejected 12 projects. The total amount of subsidies is RON 2,956,982 (about EUR 704,000). The biggest subsidy amounts to RON 690,000 (about EUR 164,000) for the organisation of the well-known Festivalul Internaţional de Film Transilvania (International Film Festival Transylvania).