The Venice Production Bridge is the multi-faceted market arm of the Venice Film Festival, attended by festival business players. VBP focuses on producers and production than sales.
By Liza Foreman
When the Venice Production Bridge’s head honcho Pascal Diot started the Venice film market some 12 years ago, he had a specific idea in mind: Help producers with every step of the process of putting together a film, including completing financing.
“At the time, there were 150 co-production markets and all focused-on development money. But it’s just as difficult to raise the last financing on a film production,” he said.
To that end, this year, the five-day market (August 31-September 5, 2023) celebrated the tenth year of the Venice Gap-Financing Market.
A large number of projects that take part in the market reach their goals soon after, Diot said.
“As a producer, I knew the last 30 percent (of financing) is as difficult to find as the first. We have helped 370 films from 70 different countries, and 80 percent have been completed within six months of the market,” he said. “We are now proud of having famous directors come with their projects like Wim Wenders or Jim Sheridan.”
Steve McQueen’s documentary Occupied City, Wim Wenders’ The Secrets of Places, and Alain Parroni’s An Endless Sunday, are among the films that have completed financing on the Lido. “We have to adapt to each film we are selecting being at a different stage. It’s tailor made,” Diot added.
Meanwhile, VPB’s Book Adaptation Rights Market is so popular that six extra publishing houses were added this year, bringing the total to 40.
“For the book publishers, they all told us that it is becoming the second most important RDV after the Frankfurt Book Fair, Diot said, adding “The principle is for everyone to come with their total catalog. Then stay in touch throughout the year.” This year, more than 560 one-to-one meetings (compared to 450 in 2022) were organized with producers for the adaptation from the page to screen of literary rights.Other sections at the market include Meet the Streamers. This year, nine European and international streaming platforms participated in the market, taking 96 one-to-one meetings. Overall, as per Diot, the feedback from this year’s record number of attendees is that many say they prefer to stay for the duration of Venice, and not pack in Toronto as well, so the market could grow further.
“The highlight for me is that we have more than come back to a new situation because last year we already broke a record with about 2,500 attendees, and now it’s about 2,900 attendees. We’ve had almost 60 screenings. 50 panels. And a lot of people on Immersive Island, which is sold out,” he added.
As for selling films. “It’s not automatically a buy and sell market,” Diot said. “But, I’m sure this year that we will have more sales, especially as we have less American blockbusters here, and have more independent films, so they are not pre-sold.”
Diot, who also serves as head of Tokyo’s Gap Financing Market, says he doesn’t plan to change too much in Venice. “Our main parts are traditional cinema and immersive. The Venice Immersive market has become the number one immersive market in the world. It’s fully booked. From early in the morning until late at night,” he said.
Did the Hollywood strikes impact this year’s go-round? Diot affirms “The strikes didn’t affect the market so much. It’s a little bit more affecting the festival. Without having Hollywood stars, though, we have more people than last year at the festival which means it’s a core of cinephiles who want to see films here. We have fully packed theaters.”
