Eurimages: Amendment of current support regulations for 2020/21

IRIS 2020-2:1/19

Léa Chochon

European Audiovisual Observatory

The Board of Management of Eurimages has made a number of changes to the current Eurimages support regulations, most of which will enter into force in 2020, with more to follow in 2021. Eurimages is the Council of Europe’s cultural fund which, with an annual budget of EUR 26 million, runs five support programmes devoted to film co-production, theatrical distribution, exhibition, promotion and gender equality.  

In 2020, a set of exclusion criteria will be included in a new declaration that production company owners and/or managers will be required to complete in order to apply for support. In particular, these criteria exclude any person or company that has been convicted by a final judgment, is bankrupt or is in a situation of conflict of interest, etc. Requests for a shooting derogation will be removed, so producers will simply have to provide the shooting dates and shooting plan in order to demonstrate that no more than 50% of total shooting days (80% for documentaries) take place before the Board of Management meeting. Co-production projects will need to comply with national legislation and with bilateral or multilateral treaties in force between the co-producing countries. “Adherence to the values and objectives of the Council of Europe” has been added to the existing selection criteria for co-production projects. The distribution support programme in its current form will end on 31 March 2020, and Eurimages will launch an independent study on the pertinence of distribution support. Co-production participations of 90%–10% will be eligible if they comply with the Council of Europe Convention on Cinematographic Co-production (revised) or a bilateral treaty (provided their budget is above EUR 5 million).

Meanwhile, from 2021, co-production support awards less than or equal to EUR 150 000 will be considered as grants rather than as conditionally repayable loans. Co-production support will be paid in two instalments instead of three. Markets hosting the Eurimages Co-production Development Awards will be selected through a call for proposals. Eurimages Lab Project Awards in their current form will end on 31 December 2020, and an independent study will be launched on the relevance of prizes awarded to non-conventional projects and the means by which they could be awarded at artistic and/or audiovisual events. Support to cinemas will also become automatic.