31 December 2007

DUBAI: Major international film festivals are dual purpose. While providing audiences and festival programmers with a showcase for new work, they also have a significant film industry component, dedicated to bringing the various pieces of the filmmaking puzzle together.

The industry side of the Dubai International Film Festival (DIFF) saw considerable growth in 2007. DIFF's industry office oversaw several coaching seminars for producers as well as "speed dating" sessions to bring creative talent together with industry professionals.

DIFF also took its first step toward a co-production market for documentary and feature films with Dubai Film Connections. DFC selected 15 film projects and brought the filmmakers together with producers, financiers, film fund spokesmen, distributors, sales agents and broadcasters, then awarded grants of $15,000 to the three scripts judged to be best and accredited them to attend Cannes in 2008.

DIFF's industry office is being developed by Jane Williams, an old hand in the business with experience at several festivals, including the International Film Festival in Rotterdam.

"I think the people who came had more reasonable expectations than I did," she laughs. "Most weren't expecting miracles, but I think they appreciated being able to meet some new people, particularly the North Americans.

"We had success with the usual suspects - like [Rotterdam's] Hubert Bals Fund, France's Agence Intergouvernementale and the World Cinema Fund, who always contribute. I was also happy the Arab broadcasters joined discussions. It's important to let them know that they can do business here, that they're coming isn't charity. We'll have to wait a couple of months to see the cinemart's results but there are some projects I'll be following up on.

"It was also rewarding to come into contact with people with different models for film development - both in terms of supporting filmmakers and developing their audiences. We still have to work on our invitation list. There are many key people we'd like to see here that we haven't reached yet.

"I'd like to see DFC keep its focus. Over the last four years DIFF has developed an Arab film profile and the co-production market should have the same remit. If we try to make DIFF an international market, we'll dilute ourselves."

Attending DIFF this year was Marianne Khoury of Misr International Films - the production company of Egypt's eminence grise of film Youssef Chahine, who received DIFF's 2007 Lifetime Achievement Award. Khoury also held a documentary production workshop and sat in at DFC, representing a new project by Lebanese filmmaker Mai Masri.

"I've been involved in a big film industry for years now," she says. "Egypt's has a strong market-oriented industry. It's nice to have a receptive audience but we can't think about one territory alone. The market is the world. I'm interested in finding a new formula for film production, something in our own language. Broadcasters are interested but they're slow in making decisions.

"[DIFF] is our second stop with Mai's script," Khouri adds. "At Locarno there was interest in finance and script development. Here the interest is different because the Arab broadcasters are here. But the money still isn't tangible and that side needs developing.

"This Film Fund proposal would be a step forward. The production, post-production, and promotional sides of the industry all need development and a fund that puts emphasis on the Arab filmmakers would help.

"The biggest challenge lies in making films that will attract audiences. We can't rely on film funds. It's important to create markets for the films. At the end of the day, you're not making a novel. You're making a film and films are expensive. I'm not in favor of having a fund for making arty film. The object is to create a system to discover talent."

"It's always been my 'editorial line' to support art-house film," says Thierry Lenouvel.

The founder of Cine-Sud Promotions, Lenouvel was a founder of the Montpellier Film Festival and in the 1980s formed an art-house film distribution company. He's also worked as a press agent. He has been involved in the production of several films from this region, including Simone Bitton's 2004 documentary "The Wall," which took the jury and grand jury prizes at Sundance in 2005.

"No matter which line of work I've chosen," he says, "I've had the privilege of choosing my own films. I've always been looking into Arabic cinema but there aren't a lot of good meeting points. There is a lot of talent in Lebanon but no money. In Morocco there is talent but with some kind of structure. In Lebanon there's nothing.

"There are two problems with Arabic film: distribution and development, but the problems aren't the same in all countries. Lebanese scripts are usually well-developed.

Lenouvel attended DFC with Lebanese filmmaker Dima al-Horr, shopping her first feature script. "We're here to find partners ... [and] money to make Dima's film ... The film's challenging for formal reasons but if we have the means to put her ideas on screen it'll be cinematographically very beautiful. It has a good message as well."

He says he still needs to raise nearly half of Horr's budget and he doubts he'll find it in Dubai.

"I'm not sure people here are enthusiastic about art-house scripts. All the people we've met here, but for two, weren't local. My first meeting here [was with a wealthy Emirati]. We soon realized we had nothing in common.

"Dubai must invest, and maybe in two or three years people will decide to invest in cinema of quality. People here say [they want return on their investment]. I tell them that cinema can be good for business.

"Commercial films are ephemeral, and the turnover ends after one year. Art-house films are eternal. People want to screen them for decades after they're made. When people here understand that, there'll be interest in funding cinema of quality. If you give the public opportunity to see good films, you create the need, and therefore the market in the public."

Irit Neidhardt was also busy at DIFF. Neidhardt represents mec [Middle Eastern Cinemas] film, a distribution and co-production company specializing in films from the Middle East.

Mec had a film in competition at DIFF (Mahmoud al-Massad's documentary "Recycle, which will also compete at Sundance in 2008) and two projects in DFC - "Port of Memory," the first feature by critically praised Palestinian documentarian Kamal Aljafari, and "The One Man Village" by fledgling Lebanese filmmaker Simon el-Habre. Habre's was one of the three projects to win the $15,000 DFC grant.

"It's important to have a co-production market in the region," she says. "It doesn't affect whether a European producer will like a project or not but they're not going to tell you how to make the film the way they would in a European market - though they're the same people you meet at the European markets.

"You always need to have the doors opened, but it matters where the door is opened ... You can debate whether Dubai is really 'Arab,' but here, bombarded by luxury, people can have no doubt where the power lies."

Projects submitted to DFC went through a two-tier adjudication process. Pre-selection was overseen by four jurors - Antoine Khalife, of uniFrance film promotion organization, freelance film scholar and filmmaker Viola Shafiq, Jannie Langbroek, a member of the Rotterdam International Film Festival CineMart selection committee, and DIFF's Williams.

The winners of the $15,000 grant were decided by a three-person jury - Ilse Hughan of Holland's Fortuna Films, Focus Features' David Gerson, and Paris-based Lebanese filmmaker Randa Chahal Sabbagh, who was in an accident just before DIFF and had to phone in her comments from overseas.

Some disgruntled filmmakers left outside the winners' circle complained that the DFC's judges awarded their prizes without reading the scripts. This is partly true, Williams acknowledges, but insists all the scripts were read.

"We never claimed that we'd force the judges to read all the scripts and we didn't make it a requirement because there were 15 of them and we thought it'd be a bit much to ask," she says. "The filmmakers did have to submit scripts for the pre-selection and selection processes. We gave the judges the option of reading the scripts and they did look at all the other project material the filmmakers provided.

"I know most of these filmmakers really need the money to make their films," she says, "but bringing people together is far more important to the process than the prize money."