Almost three million euros are additionally allocated for the shooting of foreign films in Latvia

According to the Ministry of Economy (ME), with the aim of attracting foreign funding to the film industry and other sectors, the Investment and Development Agency of Latvia (LIAA) administers and distributes state budget co-financing for the shooting of foreign films in Latvia by tender. LIAA makes a decision on the allocation of co-financing and the conclusion of an agreement, or on the inclusion of a project application in the reserve list of project applications, or on the refusal to conclude a co-financing agreement.

The right to conclude a co-financing agreement is granted for the implementation of project submissions that have obtained a higher rating. Project submissions that are supported, but which do not receive funding due to insufficient co-financing for the project submission competition, are included in the reserve list of project submissions, ranking the project submissions in priority order according to the number of points obtained.

The reserve list is created with the aim of supporting high-quality projects for the implementation of which the budget funds provided in the state budget are insufficient. The Ministry of Finance, in cooperation with LIAA, has prepared a draft order, with which the Cabinet of Ministers is asked to support the increase of the appropriation in 2024 for the necessary co-financing for the shooting of foreign films in Latvia.

The Ministry of Economy states that the sixth round of the 2024 state budget co-financing competition for shooting foreign films in Latvia was announced between November 13, 2023 and December 13, 2023. This year, the available state budget co-financing for the shooting of foreign films in Latvia was 721,700 euros, taking into account the co-financing agreement concluded in 2023 for the shooting of one film in 2023 and 2024.

In the sixth round of selection, seven project submissions were submitted, from which an agreement was concluded with co-financing recipient SIA “Cinevilla Films” for the co-financing of the film project in the amount of 639,500 euros, while six projects are included in the reserve list.

For the six project submissions included in the reserve list, the total necessary co-financing from the state budget is 3,066,798 euros, while the co-financing available to LIAA for the project submissions included in the reserve list is 82,200 euros, thus the additional necessary financing for the reception of foreign films in the sixth round of 2024 is 2.985 million euros.

The seven projects approved in the sixth round will be fully or partially implemented in Latvia. It is planned that the projects of these seven films will attract investments of 16 million euros to Latvia in 2024.

With co-financing from Latvia, SIA “White Picture” and “SBS Productions” will implement their project in the sixth round of selection, which will shoot the film “Two Prosecutors”, SIA “White Picture” and “Slot Machine SARL”, which will film the film “Danish Woman”, SIA ” Film Angels Studio, “Network Movie Film”, “Fernsehproduktion GmbH” and “Studio Zentral” intend to shoot the film “Abracadabra”.

Also, funding is needed for SIA “Bergmane Producton” and “360 Media OÜ”, which will film the film “Detektivs Foks”, SIA “Amber Land Film” and “Filmivabrik OÜ”, which will shoot the film “Mūsu Ērika”, SIA “Mima Films” and ” Argonauts Productions SA”, which will film the film “Plaisa”.