Argentina's president Eduardo Duhalde is to push through measures to rescue the country's film industry after a meeting last week head of the Argentine film institute, INCAA, Jorge Coscia, minister of culture Ruben Stella, and the producers of Oscar nominee Son Of The Bride - Pol-ka's Adrian Suar, Jemsa Productions' Estrada Mora and Patagonik's Pablo Bossi.

Duhalde will back moves by INCAA to reform the country's existing film laws in order to free-up extra funds for film production and distribution.

Coscia, attending the Mar del Plata International Film Festival last week, said that although Argentina's audiovisual laws were good, they have not been applied. The government levies a 10% tax on cinema tickets but does not pass the full value onto the film industry.

"I propose to expand and improve the reach of the law in the context of profound political and economic change," said Coscia. "The central idea is to recover the genuine value of those funds that previous governments have left out of the reach of the industry.

"My job will be to take charge of the full management of that funding process and to optimise the funding of the industry in a fair way."

Coscia, who was appointed last month, intends to focus attention on distribution and promotion. "In the past year, 49 films have been shot in Argentina and many of those can't be released because of a lack of funding," he said. "In the past INCAA has sown the seeds but has failed to protect the harvest."

He also intends to lobby for enforcement of screen quotas. "We have a [theatrical] screen quota that isn't fulfilled by those responsible and TV quotas, similar to those in France, which are not enforced and not respected," Coscia said.