UK Film Council Launches New £15M Film Fund

The UK Film Council have today published a three year plan to launch a new £15m Film Fund.
In developing the final plan, the Council spent three months consulting on the proposals, engaging with hundreds of people from across the film sector, facilitating more than a dozen consultation sessions and attracting almost 1,000 responses.
The plan specifically:

• Opens up for business a £15m-a-year Film Fund (topped up further by film recoupment) for emerging, experimental and world class filmmakers
• Ring-fences money for development
• Confirms production companies will for the first time automatically receive a significant share of the UK Film Council’s recoupment from all feature film investments they are involved in, following State Aid approval of the measure by the European Commission
• Sets up a think tank chaired by Tim Bevan to identify new policy initiatives to grow independent UK film companies of scale
• Proposes a national web-based talent showcase, to be launched in autumn 2010, to unearth fresh talent and to broaden the diversity, reach and the opportunities available to all filmmakers who are keen to engage with one another in a national filmmaking community
• Confirms £5m is allocated to the new Innovation Fund, which will launch in autumn 2010
• Provides £500,000 for film exports for each year of the plan
• Confirms that 100% of recoupment from the Prints & Advertising Fund - which widens and supports the distribution of selected specialised films and British films - will, like the Film Fund, top up that fund’s budget

Alongside this plan, the DCMS have been leading merger discussions between the UK Film Council and the BFI. These discussions have been underway since August 2009 and are continuing.
Launching UK Film: Digital innovation and creative excellence, Tim Bevan CBE, Chairman of the UK Film Council, said: "We’ve set out a renewed mission, a new set of priorities, and a new way of working. With the right level of support, a successful British film industry can continue to help get the UK out of recession, drive innovation and create more highly-skilled jobs. Further tough choices probably lie ahead, but having reduced our overheads by 20% and positively responded to the needs of British filmmakers we’re now in the best place we can be to support and promote UK film in the years ahead."
(BMcN/GK)