08/01/2003

The excellent performance in French theatres of Aki Kaurismaki’s The Man Without A Past, drew attention to the National Film Centre’s (CNC) Direct Help scheme. In 2002, Direct Help, which was created especially to give financial backing to non-French language films, contributed a total of Euros1.3million to 13 foreign films by directors like Manoel de Oliveira, Youssef Chahine, Elia Suleiman and Abbas Kiarostami.
A special commission whose members include Jean-Claude Lamy and Daniel Toscan du Plantier, respectively the presidents of “Avance sur recettes” (or Box Office Advances) and Unifrance, Moufida Tatli, head of the Southern Fund and Gilles Jacob, president of the Cannes Film Festival, as well as a representative from the French Foreign Ministry, meets twice-a-year to decide just which non-French films will receive around Euros120,000 each.
Since it was set up six years ago, 59 films have benefited from Direct Help. The system is based on the Avance sur Recettes, the only difference being that it helps non-French films that would otherwise struggle to complete their budgetary requirements. The criteria for eligibility could not be simpler: the projects must have a French producer aboard and cannot be first-time efforts.
In 2002 Direct Help came to the aid of the forthcoming releases by Romania’s Lucian Pintillé, Russia’s Pavel Lounguine and Portugal’s Joao Cesar Monteiro, as well as two foreign language features made by French directors Pierre Assouline and François Lunel.

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(Translated from French)