10/03/2006

Gaetano Blandini, General Director of Cinema for the Ministry of Culture, has responded to the data published in recent days by ANICA, the Italian Association of Cinematographic Audiovisual and Multimedia Industries (see news from March 3).
He told the Adn Kronos Agency: "It was with surprise and bitterness that I read ANICA’s 2005 data on Italian cinema, data that is not explained and is oddly interpreted, which is transformed into headlines such as ‘State Funding Cancelled’ or 'Only 22m Invested in 2005'. In this way, besides misinforming citizens, all efforts, institutional and otherwise, against the 2006 cuts (which, yes, are grave, as I myself have often stressed, along with Minister Buttiglione) are thwarted, along with the requests to reinstate the funds ".

According to Blandini, the ANICA data was based on erroneous assumptions: "They went over the Italian films released in theatres in 2005, they extrapolated those funded by the state (without checking in which year they were funded, 2002 or 2003) and they passed a verdict: 22 million! If they had been as patient and serious as some others, they would have discovered that already in December of 2005, on the General Direction for Cinema website, we published, with a rightful transparency that had never before been applied, a long, detailed and illustrative report, from which it can be easily deduced that 101 films were financed in 2005 (35 features, 26 first or second films, 40 shorts and 15 funds for the development of original screenplays) for €73.98m".

(Translated from Italian)