EPC Presentation Paris Project 2010 - Europa Distribution

EPC - Short Presentation• I am the Managing Director of the EPC. Ourassociation gathers wonderful independentproducers coming from all over Europe. OurPresident Martin Moszkowicz is duly representedtoday by Raimond Goebel from Pandora Film(Germany) and Member of the Board, and JohnJacobsen from Filmkameratene (Norway).• The EPC daily works at informing its Members ofthe evolution of the film industry (in terms ofpolitical, tax and regulatory dispositions),represent their interests before national andEuropean institutions, and organises events inEurope and third countries to foster internationalcooperation on film projects.12/07/2010 3

Why producers are settingup co-productions• For script reason: part of the shootinghas to take place in a particularcountry;• For money reasons;• To discover our great neighbors;• To extend the circulation of their film.12/07/2010 4

The crucial link betweenproducers and distributors• Allowing films to circulate throughout theworld;• At the EPC, we have always felt that coproductionsare better promoted the coproducingcountry thanks to the involvementof the co-producer;• A study conducted by the EuropeanAudiovisual Observatory in August 2008demonstrated that a film co-producedcirculates better than a 100% national film.12/07/2010 5

Key conclusions of the study• The study analysed the circulation and performance ofEuropean co-productions compared to 100% national Europeanfilms, both inside and outside their national market.• Three key conclusions can be drawn:European co-productions travel better than their 100% nationalcounterparts in the sense that a co-production gets releasedinmore than twice as many markets as national films. In addition77% of all co-productions get released on at least one nonnationalmarket, compared to 33% of entirely national films;In terms of admission, European co-productions attract anaverage of 2.7 times as many admissions as their nationalcounterparts; co-produtions also generate an average of 51 785admissions compared to 19137 for 100% national films;Non-national markets are more important for co-productionsthan for entirely national films in terms of admissions: nonnationaladmissions account for 41% of total admissions to coproductionscompared to 15% in the case of entirely nationalfilms.12/07/2010 6

Key conclusions of thestudy: some figures12/07/2010 7

A matter of choice:Co-production versussales agent (1)• Option 1:The producer could work with a sales agent,obtain an MG and include it in his financial plan(market money). Problem: no certainty as to atheatre release, the distributor could go for aDVD, Vod or TV release;• Option 2:He could ask a co-producer to find a distributorthat would deal with its own territory. In this case,the distribution would be better conducted.• Option 3:The producer could contact a distributor forforeign territories on his own12/07/2010 8

A matter of choice:Co-production versus salesagent (2)Each model had its own advantages:• More money coming from the market for thesales agent in the first-case scenario, and lesson a longer term due to high commissions +advantages of one-stop shops;• Results potentially higher for the secondoption, as it combines the presence of thesales agents and co-producers.12/07/2010 9

The crisis solved everything!• By decreasing the ad revenues, TV channels havedecreased their prices;• Having a hard time to access credit (credit crunch),distributors have reduced their financial risk and theirMG;• Sales agents have seen their potential buyers lowertheir investment. They lowered their MG, down to 0 insome cases;• To reduce their risk, distributors have started to getmore mandates on a film, and have becomeinvolved in the production field as well as on thesales field (e.g. Pandora Film and The MatchFactory);• Except for a few of them, producers have notchanged, and are still facing the same high budgetfilms, with less money.12/07/2010 10

What’s next ?• On the project sideWe have seen a return to coproduction fromthe producers side;A high difficulty to find some money comingfrom the market, at a European level• On the market side: I think we should see aconcentration of the structures from production tosales and national (European?) distribution.12/07/2010 11

Contact details• Alexandra Lebret – EPC• 18 rue de Vienne – 75008 Paris – France• Tel: +33 1 44 90 06 13• Email: alexandra@europeanproducersclub.org12/07/2010 12