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Venice Film Festival under threat
Movie companies may boycott this year's Venice Film Festival in protest at Italy's decision to scrap tax incentives.
Film festivals may have little to screen in the way of homegrown talent if the country's major film companies carry through on their threat.
The tax breaks were approved late last year by the centre-left government headed by Romano Prodi and allowed tax rebates on up to 25% of a film's budget up to 5 million euro with foreign production companies filming in Italy also eligible.
Italian producers had been seeking such incentives for decades. But the newly elected Berlusconi government has blocked the rebate along with other tax-cutting incentives.
Now Italy's film industry warn they will boycott the Venice, Rome and Turin film festivals in protest. Angry industry leaders are urging international distributors to follow suit.
The Venice Film Festival is et to open on August 27. Film production spend in Tialy in 2007 was $496 million, rather less than the respective $1.53 billion and $1 billion in France and Germany, where tax credits are given.
This article was written for TravelSavvy Europe by Val Adams. For more information see: Venice - Nightlife. If you know of an interesting European travel related news story, please get in contact.
