The event celebrated yesterday was more than the usual public presentation of a study by the Fundació Catalunya Europa. The presentation of Good Practices on safe European cinema financing provided know-how about the Sofica, a system of tax incentives to promote cinema that works envidiable in France; but above all to show the will that also happens in Catalonia.
"We have to talk with producers, with TV3, with the government ... whatever it is, we have to get it", commented hopefully to the first of Paco Poch, a Catalan producer and publisher coordinator. Poch preceded with these words the intervention of Pierre Forette, French producer promoting the Sofica, who made a brief decalogue of its operation in France. Sofica (Sociétés de financement de l’industrie cinématographique et de l’audiovisuel) are investment companies aimed at the collection of private funds exclusively dedicated to the financing of cinematographic and audiovisual production. "They were born in 1985, but it is in 2003 when we create the first company directly for producers, and not for public televisions. This marks a before and after, because at the moment that producers make it theirs, money is allowed to arrive to author productions, with more personality", said Pierre Forette.
Speaking of numbers, the French Ministry of Finance allocates 63 million euros each year to between 10 and 12 Soficas, of which it recovers 21 million. "This is an open system, which works because it generates a lot of economic activity." Investors get a tax cut of 36% of the total of their contribution, and they typically recover it up to 90% in a maximum of five years, so the profit turns around 25%. A fundamental fact, in the words of Forette, is that "the mechanism is maintained even if the color of the government changes". Another important feature is, according to Nico Villarejo, producer and co-author of Good Practices, the ability of the Sofica to reconcile private interests with the public.
"A Sofica is a financial partner that accompanies you in the creative process," Paco Poch summed up before a debate began with those attending on how to establish a similar model in Catalonia. The contributions were numerous and diverse, but if something had in common is that it will not be an easy process, that there is someone who leads it and that there is a reduction in market expectations that we have in Catalonia. In this sense, Juanjo Puigcorbé, actor and councilor of the City Council of Barcelona, ??proposed that the% that already work in France be respected, but adapting them to the Catalan market.
Everything points to the fact that yesterday's presentation opened a small door to a Catalan cinema financing process that could be launched for the first time in Catalonia. Max Vives-Fierro, director of the Catalunya Europa Foundation, was willing to participate.
