Since the viral horned devil is in the cabin, side cultural foods, the citizen dressed in slack returns to crash in front of his computer or his TV, after a timid attempt to put his nose outside (and again, not often) between two waves. My New Year’s wish will be virtual, as it should be: to assist the country in bringing the big international platforms of VOD, Netflix and others into line in 2022, which dance the jig on the floor of the virus shackles. These giants get fatter during the closure of cinemas and theaters. To them the manna when living art and the big screen plunge red nose to the ground. “It must bleed!” »Sang Boris Vian in The merry butchers.
Of course, my first wish would be to see the rooms resuscitate soon, after a short omicronian episode. But being scalded like many by the lean months, a doubt assails me. Time will tell ! One day at a time ! The litany of soothing clichés scrolls through our minds. One thing is certain, the habits of consumption and creation mutate at the speed of the coronaviral variants, even in calm weather. So, today … let the rich broadcasters contribute. It’s urgent!
Back to last spring… Bill C-10 on broadcasting and telecommunications, led in Ottawa by former heritage minister Steven Guilbeault, fell in battle with teeth spitting out. The Conservatives’ systematic obstruction had given us a particularly vicious episode in political life in the House. Then, the absurd electoral campaign sealed the fate of the C-10, under the last mandate of Justin Trudeau who would give his colors to the next. Pablo Rodriguez therefore inherited the Heritage.
Part of the bill – to be fine-tuned, and go for it – was in part to force the mammoths of the web to protect and create Canadian content in their digital playgrounds. For the time being, they are only encouraged to do so and are doing it here and there, in Quebec as well, but could obviously do more. Under Omicron’s reign, the priorities of the Canadian state will undoubtedly go elsewhere. But we want the new holder of the portfolio to go headlong. He deserves a New Year’s wish for himself alone.
Take France, strong at fencing. She struck a deal in December with megaplayers: Netflix, Disney +, Amazon Prime Video, and Apple TV. It is 20% of the turnover of these foreign platforms on its soil which will henceforth be devoted to the financing of national film and audiovisual production. The Superior council of audio-visual (CSA) negotiated the blow upstream with each of the big diffusers for a three-year horizon. By this way, French works should earn between 250 and 300 million euros per year, including 20% in the cinema.
Faced with the tycoons of the American Web, everything is not yet in the pocket in soft France. To be able to screamCocorico ! in the cinema section, it will have to wait until February before the new agreement on the chronology of the media is initialed (a French particularity). This sets the operating period between the release of a film on the big screen and on a VOD platform at three years. An eternity in our times of instantaneity. In Canada, this period is about three months (less for Netflix) on agreements in principle and without decree.
The relations of the French film industry, still well in the saddle, with the giants of the Web have long creaked on the rails of this chronology. All the more so since powerful cinema operators in the country, Gaumont Pathé, UGC, MK2, etc., are loudly defending the cause of the big screen in the face of the internal flow. They stand up to their fierce foreign partners, which both honors and undermines them. The new deadline envisaged would be shortened to 15 months from February: a lot for the French, little for the Americans. The art of negotiation, sword in flank, is played out between the two.
Admittedly, the public of the Hexagon loves to run to the movies, but Omicron has caused theaters to be closed for the moment. Cinephiles protest. However, the habits of the public change like everywhere. From Paris to Marseille, people demand films at home without endless prescriptions, those conducive to a thousand piracies. The game is not won, but France at least is struggling with energy so that the giant platforms, for a long time without faith or law, push to the wheel by financing in substantial part its national works.
Seeking the same issue settled from coast to coast is not wishful thinking. Just an exhortation to the new Minister of Heritage to polish his weapons with the ardor of the warrior who sees victory in his sights.