Ukraine is the next East European country signalling interest to become a member of the Council of Europe’s co-production fund Eurimages.

Speaking at one of the roundtables during this week’s Moscow Business Square, Kateryna Kopylova, head of the Ukrainian State Film Agency, said that an initial meeting about this had been held during this year’s Cannes Film Festival.

“My subjective opinion is that it is a bit too early to enter Eurimages at the moment,” she said, adding the Film Agency would be working on the procedure for accession to membership from next year.

At the same time, she pointed out that a bilateral treaty for co-productions with France had been signed in Cannes this year and would soon be ratified by the Ukrainian State Government.

“This will enable us to give a boost to international co-production by Ukraine,” Kopylova observed.

While production of films in Ukraine is supported annually by €10m from the State budget and is set to back 5-6 projects this year, helping the theatrical distribution of funded films remained “a complicated problem”.

Kopylova explained that a concept had been submitted to the Ministry of Finance for additional funding to this sector, and the Film Agency had already stepped in to try and help support the distribution of Alexander Mindadze’s Innocent Saturday.

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