Translated material
The fate of money
Producers discuss how Russian cinema will continue to live
On Thursday evening, in the collegium hall of the building in Gnezdnikovsky, according to the old habit called “Goskino,” an event occurred that could change the fate of the Russian film industry. But, really, if professional guilds played the same role in our country as they do in Hollywood (many people probably remember what happened when the American Screenwriters Guild decided to go on strike). This is still a long way off, and even the most influential guild, the production guild, is not able to force the Russian film market to develop along its chosen path. Nevertheless, many leading Russian producers gathered at the open meeting of the Producers Guild in Gnezdnikovsky, led by the president of the guild and also the person in charge of the film industry in the government, Deputy Minister of Culture Alexander Golutva. And those who could not come asked their colleagues to voice their point of view. Noteworthy was the absence of Ruben Dishdishyan (Central Partnership), Leonid Vereshchagin (Nikita Mikhalkov's TRITE studio), Karen Shakhnazarov (Mosfilm), Dmitry Rudovsky (Art Pictures Studio), as well as Konstantin Ernst and Alexander Rodnyansky.The passions among those gathered were in earnest. “Isn’t this really like the movie Garage?” - one of the participants asked, leaving the meeting. The event was indeed somewhat reminiscent of the famous film by Eldar Ryazanov. Well, a question that was discussed was no less pressing: the fate of the money that the state allocates for the development of cinema. How many are there, how and into whose hands will they now fall? But in order to understand the essence of the current discussion (and this is a very soft word to define the “exchange of views” that Golutva had), we must first understand what it means for Russian film production in general - state support.
Why doesn't cinema pay for itself?
The state has always financed domestic cinema: both under Soviet power, when no one really knew the word “producer”, and the state, in fact, was the main and only producer, and when Soviet power disappeared, and after it the distribution system died . And when the box office began to come to life again, but only Hollywood filled the screens, and when Russian films began to make their way to the top lines of the box office indicators. This is where the fun began. “Why allocate money to the film industry, everything is fine here, what millions are collected!” - some government officials were perplexed when they learned about the impressive box office figures of “Watches” and “9th Company”. “So, 50% of the proceeds go to cinemas, another 15-20% goes to distributors, and what is left for producers, especially if you take into account advertising costs?” - the filmmakers patiently explained their point of view to the press, and through them to the community. But this information did not reach everyone. In addition, the box office successes of some films were greatly exaggerated by interested parties - this is not so difficult to do, since, unlike America and Europe, we still do not have a single electronic ticket, that is, a computer record of tickets sold for film shows.
Moreover, if the box office of single films has reached record numbers in recent years, the box office mark of more than $50 million was broken by “The Irony of Fate. Continuation”, then the cost of production still grew faster.
The serial boom has inflated salaries in the industry, therefore, the production budget of the film has also increased, there are not enough filming stages, rental prices are high, and the increase in prices for promoting the film has made the costs of releasing films completely unaffordable. Nowadays, it often costs even more to put a film on screens and conduct some kind of advertising campaign than to actually make the film. “Even Channel One, which previously was dismissive of the possibility of receiving state support, has now changed its position,” Alexander Golutva noted at a meeting on Thursday. Everyone already understands that without government support a film cannot be made at all, although the state, as a rule, does not cover the entire budget, but only part of it.
Who is cheaper and faster?
However, after the recent introduction of a tender system into cinema, obtaining government support has become extremely difficult. Now the money is distributed like this: thematic lots are created like “Romantic Comedy about Students”, “Film about Youth”, “Film about Street Children” (I give the names conditionally), several scripts are “pulled up” to each lot, and they compete with each other to receive government money. Which in itself looks idiotic. But even worse is that the evaluation criteria are dominated by such factors as speed and cheapness, rather than the artistic quality of the film. The less money you ask for and the faster you promise to produce the film, the greater your chances of receiving federal funds. Well, then these obligations may not be fulfilled.
What is the result? As a result, the country produces about 200 feature films a year with state support, but a huge part of them is unknown to anyone. And they don’t appear in cinemas, and don’t even reach television screens. In other words, public money often just goes down the garbage chute. Naturally, this suits few people.
Separate conspiracy or reasonable choice?
In search of a way out, a film community forum met in July, worked in sections for several days, discussed the problems and how they could be solved, and drew up a final document - a voluminous report on the state of the industry, according to which the government could make the right decisions. solution professionals' point of view. Whether this report influenced anything is unknown, but something else is known for certain: all spring and all summer, a group of leading Russian producers went to the Kremlin for consultations. “We discussed a lot of problems,” says one of the participants in these meetings, the head of the STV company, producer of the films “Brother”, “War”, “Cuckoo”, “Sisters”, “Mongol” and many others, Sergei Selyanov. “They talked about the need to introduce a single electronic ticket, and about how the tender interferes with the work...” The order to introduce a single electronic ticket, according to Golutva, was given by Vladimir Putin back in the spring. The tender issue has not yet been resolved. But the news of another result of the “high-level negotiations” spread throughout the professional community with the speed of lightning: it was allegedly decided to draw up a list of six or seven large studios and give them priority in the distribution of state support funds. This news, which circulated at the level of rumors, was confirmed by a publication in the Kommersant newspaper dated September 2, 2008, which stated that “Kommersant had at its disposal the “Proposals on promising directions of state policy in the field of cinematography” prepared by the Ministry of Culture, sent in mid-July to the government. The document was prepared in accordance with the instruction of the President of the Russian Federation No. Pr-778, which appeared in response to a letter from the former head of the presidential administration of the Russian Federation Sergei Sobyanin dated April 24, 2008.” The Ministry of Culture proposes to conduct an experiment on separate financing of four (according to other sources, seven) large production companies, selecting them according to criteria such as “film attendance over the previous two years (more than 1 million viewers), as well as the forecast of the audience coverage of a given film.”
The expected list of recipient studios also became known quite quickly behind the scenes. Some of them did not raise any particular doubts. Some of them were very doubtful. But that's not even the point. Many were outraged by the very fact of separate negotiations between several major producers and the authorities. Those gathered at Golutva demanded, if not blood, then at least an explanation.
“There were no separate agreements! - explained Sergei Selyanov and Igor Tolstunov (general director of the film company "Profit", producer of the films "Thief", "East-West", "Peter FM", etc.) - The authorities showed interest in the problems of cinema, naturally, they consulted with experts. They talked to us, they talked to Fedya Bondarchuk, did we have to shout at every corner: “We go to the Kremlin, that’s what we are!”
Alternative options
At the guild meeting, Alexander Golutva explained the need for the measures taken by the possible expansion of Hollywood studios: Hollywood doesn’t just supply us with its films from overseas, branches of the largest studios open here, and they have enough money, and this is already a threat to national security. “Is this the movie “Waiting for a Miracle” a security threat?! - Alexander Atanesyan (director and screenwriter of the film “Bastards”, producer) was perplexed. - Yes, they create additional jobs here. And great!” Pavel Lungin, who, as you know, is not only a director, but also a producer, the head of his own studio, spoke about his experience working in the French commission for the distribution of public money and offered to adopt the most valuable things from the French model. Sergei Chliyants (producer of the films “Boomer”, “Alive”, “Tuner”), warning that he was speaking on behalf of a group of like-minded people, agreed with the need for targeted support for studios, and not individual projects, which, naturally, will only be possible in the event of cancellation tender. But he proposed not to draw up lists of several production companies, but to carry out certification, a kind of licensing, as happens with banks allowed to work with the population’s money, which would give the opportunity to participate in the fight for budget money for small and medium-sized companies with a good reputation and would cut off only obviously dishonest. “Why do you have to measure everything with large spoons? - asked Chliyants. - Let someone apply for five projects, someone for two, someone for one. And it is necessary to create an examination of the output - to evaluate how effective the use of budget funds was.”
The idea of certifying studios was supported by director and producer Alexey Uchitel (films “Prisoner”, “Walk”, “Space as a Premonition”) and proposed creating a core of guild representatives to conduct a professional examination.
“What is the general logic of support? asked Atanesyan. “Does the state want to support talent or support the market?” “They scold us on both sides,” answered Golutva. - Both from the arthouse side and from the market side. As long as there is no threat of the death of cinema as a business, the state needs to go into art. But now there is such a threat. Funds will be distributed in the fall of 2009. Before that, a concept needs to be developed.”
What exactly will they share?
What kind of means are we talking about, exactly? The answer to this question was given by Golutva very clearly. In 2010, the state will allocate 4 billion rubles to support cinema, which will be distributed in the fall of 2009. 1 billion - for targeted financing of especially socially significant, patriotic projects (who exactly will receive this government order is not yet being discussed). Another 1 billion will go to studios that will be on the priority list. But this does not mean that the state will finance their activities entirely. 25 million rubles are allocated. to the film. If a studio has five projects, it receives 125 million rubles. and adds the required amount from your own funds. The third state billion goes to finance the projects of those studios that were not included in the list of selected ones. The principle is the same - 25 million rubles. to the film. And another one, the fourth billion - to support areas that are traditionally priorities for the state: animation, documentaries, debuts, arthouse.
“Finally announce the whole list!”
Such shouts and demands were heard throughout the entire meeting. But the list was not announced. Moreover, towards the end of the event, Selyanov, Tolstunov and a representative of the Red Arrow studio (Swing, Vice, SSD) Vadim Goryainov said that in fact there was no list. There is only the state's intention to create it - on a competitive basis. But how and by whom the competition will be held was not explained. I asked Sergei Selyanov privately this question about the competition when the discussion came to an end. He began to answer quite loudly, rightly believing that this question was of concern to many. But the reaction of those gathered was unexpected: “Stop it! We're not having a press conference here! Why is there a press at all!” I had to contact Selyanov by phone later. “There really is no approved list yet,” he assured. — Where did the idea of six or seven studios come from? From arithmetic. In total, a billion rubles are allocated for these large studios, which are capable of stabilizing the market and producing four to six projects a year. A million dollars are allocated for each project, so we get a list of six to seven players. These studios will be selected on a competitive basis, but who and how will conduct this competition is still unknown. If practice proves that the list is incorrect, it will be corrected. But the main thing now is to abolish the tender system in cinema. Without its cancellation there will be no changes at all. We actually already agreed on this with the authorities, but at the last moment everything fell through. Now the negotiations are going on again.”
If Sergei Selyanov is one of the initiators of this direction of reform, then Sergei Chliants spoke at the meeting on behalf of the group, relatively speaking, the opposition. Therefore, I also turned to him for comments. To what he had already said publicly, Chliyants added that supporting not individual projects, but studios in general was initially his idea. After all, it is the studio that is the most qualified expert and is able to correctly distribute efforts and funds between projects. When he came up with this idea a few years ago, it was laughed at. Now they agreed, and thank God. But he and his like-minded people strongly disagree with the idea that state support should be distributed primarily among several large studios...
“The life of a producer is not measured in one year,” explained Chliyants. - The life cycle of a project is three to four years. Therefore, at any given moment, it is impossible to objectively measure the status of a studio for inclusion in the select list. Tomorrow, one of today's leaders may turn out to be a giant with feet of clay, and someone about whom nothing has been heard at all in recent years may receive two prizes at the Venice Festival. As it happened now with Tema Vasiliev, who worked with German Jr.’s project for three years... But supporting studios cannot be a goal, it is a means. The goal is the film. It is the film that is able to attract the love of space, to hear the call of the future...”
By the way, Pavel Lungin also spoke about the significance of the film at the meeting (though in a less poetic form): “The film moves cinema, justifies its existence.” “One real film really justifies the existence of cinema for a whole year,” Sergei Selyanov agreed with Lungin in this case. And this, perhaps, was the only statement that no one raised objections. Even the greatest living Russian director, Alexei German, agrees with him, who was not at the meeting, but he sent a letter - an appeal to the community and the government - about the fact that the initiative that several major producers have come up with today is capable of ruining the Russian cinema as art.