The far right’s crusade against French cinema – POLITICO
Should it win the Elysée in next year’s election, as polls currently predict, the National Rally would likely either make good on that proposal or redirect some of its funding toward other priorities. “People from the cinema world live in another reality, they are not aware of the financial problems of the French,” said Philippe Ballard, one of the National Rally lawmakers who led the effort to reduce state funding for the entertainment sector. Ballard said his constituents “roll their eyes” at talk of state-backed cinema at a time when they’re forced to choose between filling up their gas tanks or their refrigerators. Cinemagoers queue outside the Nickel Écoles cinema, a Paris cinema specialising in old American films, in July 1980. | Photo by Barbara Alper/Getty Images Directors, producers and actors who spoke to POLITICO respond that such a move would torpedo a job-creating industry that, according to one estimate, generated €12.6 billion of value added in 2022, and employs more than 260,000 people. They contend the current system attracts foreign investment, projects French soft …
