Panel discussion Zurich Summit
I am glad and really happy that the film festival circuit is happening again. This weekend I have been attending a panel at the Zurich Film Festival and have had the opportunity to meet and greet with some great people. But first, I will give an eloge to the festival organization and its guest department. If the same service and updated information about what happening could be communicated when you are traveling with an airline, I believe the could make a lot more money. So basically, thank you to the guest department.
Has the film business turned local?
Global streamers like Netflix and Amazon have impacted every element of our business in every corner of the world. How is that affecting the local production? Rueg Sutherland from CAA in Los Angeles kick-started a panel discussion at the Zurich Summit Saturday, September 26th.
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A very interesting and import discussion which needs a well carved out strategy for those who want to stay in business. Not only the private sector with its production companies, private equity companies, distributors, and cinema owners among others needs to think about this, but also the public funding bodies such as regional film funds, film institutes, etc. The traditional value chain has been transferred to other global players which truly challenges our businesses.
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Local content has become global – no question about it. Local drama series like the Spanish La Casa de Papel was struggling on the national level until Netflix came on board and scaled it up to worldwide mega success! According to Netflix. it was the most viewed series on their platform in 2019. Features like Parasite has performed extremely well in theaters all over the world. As far as I am concerned, the absolute beauty in these two cases was to watch them in the original language! It gave the spice and real feel of the settings they were put. The beautiful and dynamic Spanish language just gave the characters in La Casa de Papel the right personality and we got so familiar with one and each of the “gang”. So brilliant with all the capital code names for the members of the gang to make it even more global. Likewise in Parasite, the contrast of rich and poor set in South Korea just must be consumed in the original language. What does that mean to the local content going global? Well, even if you have the choice to watch these productions with extremely high-quality dubbing, no way could compete with the flavor of the original language. I believe we’ve just seen the beginning of a power shift from Hollywood to Europe and the rest of the world’s content.
Hollywood is still going to be producing global blockbusters on a market (US) which still is one of the biggest and therefore also can afford to finance high budget productions with the potential for global sales.
The big challenge will probably be the American independent movies, will they have a chance to compete with local content from the rest of the world? There has been quality and creative development in independent movies outside the US that appeals to an international audience, or a local audience that is big enough to buy tickets at the cinema or pay the monthly subscription fee to be able to your favorite local story. Who did see this opportunity? Yes, Netflix did and others will follow!
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Power shifts from state to American tech companies
Developing, financing, producing, distributing, and screening of content has been challenged. Will the old world have any chance to compete or has the new world already set the new standard? In the Swedish business newspaper “Dagens Industri” there was recently an article about the global tech giants taking over the role of what many people believe is the government’s responsibility!
In addition, the pandemic has emphasized the importance of the digital domain for influence. One of the most interesting, but least noticed, events during the pandemic was how two private companies decided how 3.2 billion smart phones worldwide could be used for infection tracking. Not even Europe’s most powerful states – Germany and the United Kingdom – could implement their infection tracking solutions but had to comply with Apple and Google’s decentralized protocols.
This shows both how power today is in control of technology, but also how hand-picked Europe and Sweden are in this. The computer you are working on is rarely European and even less likely is the mobile you are reading this on. The marketplace where you buy your apps is definitely not, nor are the operating systems, cloud services and data generated in European control. All this is provided by the big tech companies which during the pandemic have grown considerably while other sectors have declined.
Business Newspaper Dagens Industri 2020-09-28
One of the most interesting discussions in the future is who drives and is responsible for high-quality audiences and artistic content in nom film and drama series. Last but not least, who develops, finances and shows this content.
