Russian films should account for roughly 70% of box office screenings in Russia, with foreign films quotaed to around 30%, State Duma deputy Alexander Sholokhov told the National News Service (NSN).
Sholokhov, first deputy chairman of the State Duma Committee on Culture, said quotas for foreign films were necessary but should be introduced without harsh measures that could provoke resistance.
Call for a Combined Approach
Sholokhov said a comprehensive approach was needed, combining increased production of Russian films with quotas on foreign ones, since neither measure alone could meaningfully change the situation. He said the quota question caused the greatest concern among the public and parts of the film industry.
He said the film market was regulated to some degree in every country, and no nation had fully opened its market to foreign film production, given that the film business could account for a significant share of national income. Sholokhov said no one intended to remove foreign films from Russia entirely, but their volume relative to domestic cinema would be regulated so that Russian films remained the majority, with around 30% of distribution left for foreign titles.
Warning Against Harsh Restrictions
Sholokhov said strict prohibitive measures from regulators were unacceptable. He said that if a regulator acted too rigidly to boost the share of domestic cinema, it would provoke resistance, whereas correctly selected foreign films provided healthy competition. He added that no one was rejecting world cinema, especially its best examples, but secondary and low-quality foreign productions could easily be filtered out without causing harm, and would likely be beneficial. He said such action would be counterproductive without public demand for it.
Family and Patriotic Films
Separately, Olga Kazakova, chair of the State Duma Committee on Culture, told reporters at the 23rd congress of the United Russia political party that the share of patriotic and family films in Russian distribution should increase, and that work was underway in this direction. She said a relevant law had been passed.
Background
The State Duma is the lower house of Russia's parliament. United Russia is the country's ruling political party. Earlier, producer Hamid Reza Rouhani, chairman of the board of directors of the Sicap accelerator in Iran, said relations between Russian and Iranian cinema could be described as "varied" and impressive.
