Jens Rykaer - President of MEDIA Salles

As of 1 May 2004, the European Union will consist of 25 countries with 450 million inhabitants. Whilst welcoming these new members - and in particular all those who work in the world of the cinema - I should like us to remember that the strength of this new and increasingly far-flung Europe,lies in its diversity, as the President of the European Commission, Romano Prodi, has emphasised on several occasions. Diverse peoples and diverse cultures that must find room to express themselves in the European Union, both inside and outside the Continent. The cinema is certainly an area where there is room for the dialogue between cultures. Everyone agrees that a film can open a window on the world, offering a way of finding out how other people live, where they have their origins and what their view of the future is.

In a similar way, cinemas themselves can become a meeting place for exchange and getting to know one another. Yet it is not at all certain that all this potential may take concrete shape. It is in the spirit of boosting the cinema and Europe’s movie theatres in every way - cultural, economic and social - that MEDIA Salles works. Thanks to the support of the MEDIA Programme and the Italian Government, since 1991 MEDIA Salles has been working on behalf of cinemas and exhibitors in Europe, developing initiatives for the promotion of European films, for training and for information.

As can be seen from the work carried out so far, MEDIA Salles has taken every possible opportunity to address its attention and actual initiatives towards a wider Europe than the one that has constituted the Union to date. As many as 32 countries are, in fact, the object of analysis in MEDIA Salles’ survey of cinema-going in the “European Cinema Yearbook”; the newsletter “European Cinema Journal” has frequently hosted articles on the countries of Eastern-Central Europe and the Mediterranean Rim; MEDIA Salles’ courses for exhibitors - thanks to agreements signed with the MEDIA Programme - have already seen the attendance of professional operators from the Baltic Republics, Slovenia, Hungary, Czech Republic, Poland and Bulgaria, whilst the Hungarian exhibitors’ organisation already figures amongst the associations that belong to MEDIA Salles.

This is another reason why we were delighted to accept the invitation from Eurovisioni to take part in the Festival “Torn Curtain”, that is held in Rome from 23 to 30 April 2004, devoted to the cinema of the ten new member states. We have thus drawn up this statistical panorama, offering basic information on the sector of cinema exhibition. This is also an opportunity to confirm our commitment to working with the institutions and with professional operators, so that the slogan that MEDIA Salles chose at the very beginning of the association’s work, “Europe gets together in the cinema”, may come true for ever-increasing numbers of citizens.

Jens Rykaer - President of MEDIA Salles