Council of Europe Convention on Cinematographic Co-Production (revised)

The purpose of the revised Convention is to provide a legal and financial framework for the co-production of feature-length films involving production companies established in three or more states Parties. The revised Convention can also be used as a bilateral framework in the absence of a specific co-production treaty between two Parties. The participation of one or more co-producers who are not established in such Parties is possible, provided that their total contribution does not exceed 30% of the total cost of the production. The co-produced work must also meet the definition of an officially co-produced cinematographic work set forth in Appendix II to the Convention.

This Convention brings up-to-date the provisions of the 1992 European Convention on Cinematographic Co-production (ETS No. 147), in order to reflect the profound changes undergone by the film industry in the intervening period.

The key revisions of the text aim to:

+ broaden the scope of the Convention by opening it to accession by non-member States of the Council of Europe and introducing the notion of “official international co-production” to replace that of “official European co-production”;
+ adjust the minimum and maximum proportions of contributions from each co-producer, to make it easier to participate in official co-productions, while at the same time providing safeguards for national authorities, should they wish to bar access to national production funding schemes;
+ ensure monitoring and sharing of best practice in the application of the revised Convention; These functions are to be filled by the Board of Management of the Eurimages Fund, meeting in an enlarged configuration to include all Parties to the revised text;
+ facilitate the work of the competent authorities responsible for its application, by updating the procedure for recognition under the Convention to reflect widespread practice.

The revised Convention applies to co-productions where all of the production companies involved are established in Parties to the updated text. The 1992 Convention will continue to apply to any co-production where at least one of the companies involved is established in a Party only to the 1992 Convention.