FERA visits Swedish members to discuss and celebrate European and local audiovisual culture

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Swedish, but European. Practical, yet inspiring.

On 21-22 January 2023, the first in-person meeting of the FERA Executive Committee in Stockholm, SE, kindly hosted by FERA member Sveriges Filmregissörer – SFR, allowed us to reflect upon how European policies affect audiovisual national legislation and gather to celebrate Swedish audiovisual culture. The meeting comes at a time when from the 1st of January 2023, Sweden has taken over the Presidency of the Council of the European Union, setting out the priorities and main direction to take until 30 June 2023.
 

Following its board meeting, FERA representatives and Swedish members convened to address several issues that are of interest to the European directors’ community at large. Following welcoming words by SFR Presidents Carl Javér and Karin Wegsjö, Simon Norrthon President Scen & Film, Camilla Brown-Union Director, and Christine Strindberg-Head of Legal, all from the Swedish Union for Performing Art sand Film,FERA CEO Pauline Durand-Vialle’s presentation “How European policies affect Filmmakers – and what FERA does about it?” provided an overview of the main European audiovisual policies and legislation that have an impact on film directors across Europe, such as the 2019 Copyright Directive reinforcing authors’ rights in contracts negotiations, the revised 2018 Audiovisual Media Services Directive improving the framework to promote European works as well as other wider legislative initiatives that indirectly impact them. 

After a well-deserved coffee, Swedish members touched upon establishing a constructive dialogue with the new government in a polarized political context, particularly with regards to the importance of artistic freedom in the creative process, the support to the Swedish film production ecosystem and the impact of streaming services in the country. Sveriges Filmregissörer – SFR representatives gave us a sneak peek of the “Director’s Booklet”, taking a leaf out of the work of the FERA member Danske Filminstruktører and their “Director Book”. The Swedish Booklet was launched at the Göteborg Film Festival 2023. 

Later in the evening, a typical Swedish cocktail dubbed “Film Directors’ Mingle – Swedish and European audiovisual creation in the streaming era” gathered FERA members and selected guests such as Annette Novak, Chief Executive Officer of the Swedish Film Institute, Lena Glaser, Head of Department of the Swedish Film Institute and Member of the Swedish Parliament Lawen Redar from the Social Democrats party of the Committee of Culture. During the event, FERA Chair of the Board Bill Anderson touched upon the role of directors as creative leaders of the filmmaking process and the effect of streamers on local cultural environments. (Full speech below)   

The meeting represented an important moment to reflect on how to preserve the local culture at a time of sea changes for European audiovisual production and distribution with the pandemic-fueled rise of global streaming services in Europe, as well as sharing knowledge on FERA advocacy work to set and promote high standards for European filmmakers’ authors’ rights while strengthening community relationships within our network.   

 

FERA Chair of the Board, Bill Anderson – Full Speech 

“In the same year Sweden holds the Presidency of the European Council with priorities of “Greener, safer, freer”, FERA will be launching our Eco Movie Manifesto to make the screen director an eco leader as much as a creative leader – by the time most screen dramas go into production their carbon footprint is largely predetermined by the requirements of the story they’re telling. We plan to go upstream and bake sustainability into screen stories from the earliest dawn of script development, from the first firing of story synapses, to reduce carbon from the get go – borrowing from Dogme 95 and its stimulus to director-lead creativity, we will refashion its back-to-basics production “vows of chastity” and forge them into clearly defined  “vows of sustainability”- which we’ll blend with the ethos of the Slow Food movement- not just to deliver deliciousness, but to require production in the local cultural terroir.  

As we consider the urgent need to green our planet, none of us has any difficulty understanding why fossil fuel companies like Shell are paying half a billion euros into carbon offsetting – their successful business model delivers a product we currently need, but at a cost to our environment.  We suspect half a billion euros might not be nearly enough.  

The effect the streamers have on our local cultural environment is not dissimilar – in the UK the British Film Institute has documented how local independent film culture has been significantly damaged by the wage inflation caused by the streamers – lower budget local productions can barely find available crew let alone pay them: the streamers’ top-dollar commands the best talent, and local culture has to survive on what’s left.  

https://www.bfi.org.uk/news/economic-review-uk-independent-film 

This is why FERA wants the streamers to contribute financially to local culture to offset the damage they unintentionally cause.  Like we have carbon offset, we need algorithm offset to protect our diverse cultural environment. 

And the freedom of expression consequences aren’t just the concern of local screen storytellers, they affect audiences too:  the streamers are ruled by their algorithms, and financial survival for creators can prioritise feeding these digital algorithms above nourishing the living audience. 

But these algorithms are essentially historical, backwards looking – you liked this in the past so we think you’ll also like this – or sideways: other people who liked what you liked in the past also liked this in the past so we think you’d like the past thing they liked –  algorithms are archaeology.  But right here and right now, all of us, all of us yearn to be understood by stories that offer us paths into our futures.  We don’t just want to understand stories, we want to believe in their truth: that this story understands me.  And it’s not algorithms that deliver these kinds of audio visual stories, it’s authors.   

The more truthful authors’ search for meaning and hope on the doorstep of the world we actually live in, our local culture, the more universal our personal stories become.  The better they sell. 

In EU law the primary audio visual author is the director.  We don’t merely add to the value chain, we author the value. 

And yet… in the UK we informally asked the 8 leading television critics what they thought directors did, and every single one of said… they didn’t really know.  So we thank the Swedish Film Directors for developing the work of the Danish Film Directors and creating definitive documents that everyone can read and discover what directors do, but even better, tonight we have a room full of lots of wonderful directors – talk to us, enjoy us!”