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PRODUCTION Spain

TVE becomes major financer of Spanish cinema

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TVE’s managing director Santiago González has announced that during 2010 the broadcaster will help finance 93 audiovisual projects, including 44 big-screen features (11 more than in 2009), for a total amount of approximately €43m (20% more than last year).

Among them are some of next year’s most highly-anticipated films, including new works by Pedro Almodóvar (The Skin I Live In, a “horror movie without screams or frights” – see news), Álex de la Iglesia (Un Día de Suerte) and Fernando Trueba (El Artista y la Modelo, set in France during the Second World War). Other titles are Mientras Duermes (“While You Sleep”), directed by Jaume Balagueró ([Rec]) and starring Luis Tosar and Marta Etrura (see news); Vicky Sherpa by Iciar Bollaín (Even the Rain – see news); the first film about Tejero’s 1981 coup d’état: Chema de la Peña’s 23 F (see news); Montxo Armendáriz’s Don’t Be Afraid; José Ramón Ayerra’s adaptation of popular television series Red Eagle (see news); and Javier Fesser’s Mortadelo & Filemon 3D.

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This confirms Spanish state TV’s increasingly important role in local production, which in recent months has seen reductions in funding from both the ICAA (which will soon announce the extent of cuts) and private television networks (whose compulsory investment in cinema decreased from 5% of their income to 3% – see news).

With the new legislation, TVE, which stopped broadcasting advertisements in January 2010, has an obligation to invest 6% of its income in film. Pedro Pérez, president of the Audiovisual Producers Association FAPAE, has claimed that “on the new audiovisual scene, TVE has become the essential pillar of the Spanish independent audiovisual industry”.

This support for Spanish cinema takes the form of both financing and the broadcasting of locally-produced features on its channels. Up to this August, TVE broadcast 228 Spanish films, around 90% of the total number shown on all state networks. “Spanish cinema is the backbone of the new programming”, insisted González.

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(Translated from Spanish)

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