screen.brussels takes stock of its first-year results
- The firm’s first year has allowed it to accompany Brussels’ burgeoning audiovisual industry, comprising 400 companies and 15,000 direct and indirect jobs
After a full year of operations, the screen.brussels regional investment fund is congratulating itself on having been able to contribute to the growth of Brussels’ audiovisual industry, which is able to draw on more than 400 companies. These firms are growing just as strongly in the traditional sectors as they are in more innovative ones (cinema, TV, gaming, transmedia, series, webseries and so on), as well as according to their respective areas of expertise (production, post-production, virtual reality, funding, broadcasting...). screen.brussels groups together all of the regional support services for its audiovisual industry under one umbrella: funding for audiovisual productions; helping companies during their phases of creation, growth and internationalisation; logistic support for film shoots; and structural funding for growing Brussels-based audiovisual companies, in the form of conventional or convertible loans.
The Brussels audiovisual co-production fund has a co-production budget of €3 million per year. A total of 73 files were submitted in 2016, and 26 were able to benefit from the fund’s backing: 13 fiction features, three animated features, four TV series, four documentaries, one series intended to screen on SVoD and one webseries. They include Erik Van Looy’s De Premier [+see also:
trailer
film profile], a Flemish film that proved to be a hit in late 2016, and Blind Spot [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Nabil Ben Yadir
film profile] by Nabil Ben Yadir, which has just gone on general release. And we are eagerly awaiting several more titles over the next few months, such as Le Fidèle by Michael Roskam (see the news), Tueurs [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: François Troukens
film profile] by François Troukens and Jean-François Hensgens (see the news), Drôle de Père [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Amélie van Elmbt
film profile] by Amélie Van Elmbt, and plenty of others besides...
In 2016, more than 1,000 days of shooting took place in Brussels. Every day, three films, short films, adverts, music videos, TV shows or series are filmed in the region. We also observe a significant rise in the number of series, while the Belgian capital served as the backdrop for 27 international features last year, including The Danish Girl [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Paco Delgado
film profile], Eternity [+see also:
trailer
film profile], Raid Dingue [+see also:
trailer
film profile] and Les Visiteurs – La Révolution [+see also:
trailer
film profile], as well as the series Salamander II, Occupied 2, Le Bureau des Légendes [+see also:
interview: Frédéric Lavigne
series profile] and Ennemi public.
(Translated from French)
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