Legislature and film industry sit down for talks

This Wednesday, the first of two sessions of the "Mexican Culture and Cinema Forum in Every Corner of the Republic" took place in the Senate and at the Churubusco Studios. The Senate's Culture Committee convened the chairs of the Culture, Tourism, and Economy committees of the state chambers, heads of the state Culture secretariats, and various representatives of the country's audiovisual industry, including producers, filmmakers, exhibitors, technicians, and the acting profession. The event aims to define and standardize the areas of focus that need to be addressed to strengthen an attractive and decentralized film industry.

Thus, after welcoming the guests, Senator Beatriz Mojica Morga, president of the Culture Committee, was blunt: "It is possible to make cinema a transformative force in every state of the Republic, today more than ever, in the face of the attacks from the United States, in the face of threats to impose tariffs on film productions."

For her part, Representative Alma Lidia de la Vega, president of the Culture and Cinematography Commission in San Lázaro, acknowledged that "it is imperative to promote legal and institutional reforms that strengthen the film sector," adding that "it is essential to establish more robust and equitable financing mechanisms that include subsidies, financial support, venture capital, guarantees, and investments."

The dialogue is being established after numerous attempts over the past decade by the film industry to lay the groundwork for a comprehensive policy vision from the legislative branch, particularly to unblock the process of creating a new film law and lead to reforms to related laws to align them with the technical, labor, artistic, and fiscal requirements of today's cinema.

More than intentions, where to start?

"It's necessary to strengthen and coordinate current regulatory frameworks," said Daniela Alatorre, director of the Mexican Film Institute (Imcine), who attended the meeting representing the federal Ministry of Culture but, above all, she emphasized, as a member of the film industry.

And Alatorre continued: “we must promote filming laws in each state that allow for the creation of film commissions and offices that receive large, medium and small productions (…) today we need to think about what state incentives can attract greater production and greater film activity, not as an expense but as an investment, because it has been demonstrated in many countries, even in some states, that it can generate a large profit.”

Of incentives, support and states

After the opening ceremony in the Senate, two panels were held Wednesday afternoon at the Churubusco Studios. The first panel was attended by representatives of the Ministry of Culture: Claudia Patricia Santa-Ana Zaldívar, Director General of State and Municipal Relations; José Luis Paredes Pacho, Director of the National System of Art Creators; and Georgina Salvador Almazán, Director of Regional and Municipal Development; as well as José Miguel Álvarez, Director of Film Production Support at Imcine.

The second panel included Daniela Alatorre, the aforementioned director of Imcine; Marina Stavenhagen, director of the National Film Library; Cristián Calónico, director of Estudios Churubusco; and Dinorath Ramírez, director of the Film Training Center (CCC).

All of these panelists presented the current programs and action plans in the institutions or areas they represent within the Ministry of Culture, particularly those related to the seventh art. But even more notable was the feedback from those who did not participate from the podium, but traveled from the Senate of the Republic to the southern part of the city, to the Tlalpan building, to attend the second part of the first day of this forum.

Filmmaker Ana Bárcenas Torres took the floor to point out that the main problem facing the industry is distribution: “That's where the bottleneck is, that's where many high-quality Mexican films don't reach audiences (...) Who is diagnosing audience connections?”

For her part, Baja California's Secretary of Culture, Alma Delia Ábrego, questioned the current decentralization criteria: "I'm specifically referring to PAICE (the Program to Support Cultural Infrastructure in the States). This is the right time to say that PAICE, which in its heyday had 300 million pesos, is now significantly reduced, and film libraries continue to open in Mexico City. Sorry, but (with these indications) decentralization remains a political rhetoric."

The Baja California official's response to the proposal came from Claudia Santa-Ana Zalvídar, Director of Cultural Relations with States and Municipalities, who explained the situation and explained to Senator María Kantún Can, who moderated the panel, the precarious budgetary situation for cultural activities in the states.

“It would be advisable to continue the dialogue, Senator, on the possibility of increasing these resources. To give you an idea, we currently only have 50 million pesos in PAICE, but the demand has already reached 750 million pesos, based on the needs that the states are identifying as priorities (…) The ideal would be to consider an increase at some point based on the demands of the states and municipalities, but at the same time, for them to commit to working in coordination with the federation,” Zaldívar said.

In this regard, Baja California Sur's Secretary of Culture, Víctor Hugo Caballero, stated: "The mechanisms seem to have been narrowed rather than expanded. I deeply share the need for greater rigor in the stewardship of public funds, because, indeed, in many of those glorious times there was also a lot of waste. That is why we are deeply committed to safeguarding public resources."

Finally, a third panel entitled "The Impact of Film Production, Distribution, Promotion, and Exhibition on the Local Economy" was held, featuring representatives from various production and filmmaking associations, as well as the president of the National Chamber of the Film Industry (Canacine), Mauricio Durán Ortega.

This Thursday, the "Mexican Culture and Cinema Forum in Every Corner of the Republic" will hold its second and final session.

Some of the forum's proposals