Festival Film Market to Leverage World’s Second Largest Film Market - BJIFF Film Market Boosts the Film Industry

　　The 7th Beijing International Film Festival will open on April 16th, 2017. The event is of diversity and inclusion to promote outstanding projects, and makes contributions to the film industry based on higher quality and efficiency. The 7th BJIFF invites filmmakers from home and abroad to share the screen and shape the future, and build a platform of international film elements. The Festival becomes a cultural landmark of Beijing film industry and will witness the great charm of Chinese films.

　　Beijing International Film Festival was founded in 2011, and it comes to its seventh session this year. Based on the concept of “Share the Screen, Shape the Future", the Festival is designed as a large international, professional, innovative, high-end and market-oriented film event, aiming to be an industrial platform for exchanges and cooperation between Chinese and foreign films. Adhering to the idea of public participation and benefiting the mass, BJIFF promotes the development of the Chinese film industry, showing Beijing’s rich cultural deposits as the cultural center of its country. BJIFF strives to create an international cultural exchange brand of first-class level with Chinese characteristics and Beijing style.

　　BJIFF Film Market, as one of the main section of the Festival, attracts key enterprises, major international cooperation projects, producers and distributors from home and abroad, and holds various activities, including investment exhibition, project pitches, industry conversations, events & activities, signing ceremony and so on. It makes efforts to build a platform for element exchange, project pitches over the years. The amount of signed money increases year by year, effectively promoting the development of the film industry.

　　Contracted Sum Increases with More Outstanding Projects

　　The number of projects and the contracted sum are both important indicators to measure the development degree of the film industry. As one of the five major sections of the BJIFF Film Market, the signing ceremony aims to serve as a platform for project release and display to get cooperation opportunities. The contracted sum increased to RMB 16.331 billion with 49 key projects in 2016, much more than 2011’s RMB 2.794 billion. There are more and more outstanding projects, making BJIFF a signing platform for quality projects, leading the trend of the country’s film market.

　　The rapid development of the film industry requires a complete industrial system. Along with the increased contracted sum, the signed projects of BJIFF are of rich genres and more extensional and diversified. In BJIFF 2016, there are 11 film fund projects and their contracted sum accounts for 51.9%, manifesting that the boom of the Beijing film industry. Besides, there are 5 film infrastructure projects, involving cinema construction, film and television base construction, screen construction, which reflects the BJIFF focuses on theater upgrade and film high-tech development and explorations in other fields. The development of all these areas will help to improve Beijing’s film industry system, highlighting the exchange and trade function of the platform.

　　A Platform for Exchanges and Cooperation

　　BJIFF Film Market “Exhibition” provides an exchange and trade platform for domestic and foreign filmmakers. With the constant enhancement of influence of BJIFF, the “Exhibition” event has accumulated a good network of contacts over the past six years. The 7th“Exhibition”invites more foreign exhibitors on the basis of the previous year’s. So far, 225 domestic and foreign institutions have registered to enter the event. Domestic exhibitors include National Cultural Exchange Center, Tencent Comic, Beijing Weying Technology, Hengdian Film and Television, Sohu Changyou (CYOU), Top Vision, Phenom Films, Huashi.tv, Xiaoxiang Film, Evergrande Tourism, etc. And there are exhibitors from Hong Kong, Macao and Taiwan as well as exhibitors from other countries such as Israel, the United States, Mongolia, and Australia. Taiwan exhibition group, Italian Trade Agency, and Hong Kong Baptist University will also take part in the exhibition.

　　In response to the hot registration situation, this year’s Film Market “Exhibition” increases the exhibition areas to meet more organizations’ needs so as to invite more foreign exhibitors, creating BJIFF as the “film wind vane” for domestic and international film festivals. Exhibitors include publishers, industry associations, training companies, law firms, film and television funds, theatrical distributors, copyright sales and agents, publicity and marketing organizations, interactive media and new media, covering the entire film industry chain. What’s more, this year’s “Exhibition” invites domestic and foreign exhibitors of research and development of new film technology and exhibitors which explore new marketing models to promote copyright, co-production and other comprehensive exchanges and cooperation.

　　To Hatch and Explore Potential Projects

　　With the Chinese gross box office growing rapidly young people become the main audience, and outstanding young directors, screenwriters, like stars, are becoming the targets of companies in the film industry. Capital, stories, young talents, all these elements get together at the BJIFF, which makes Beijing’s film industry various.

　　“Project Pitches” is the incubator of high-quality film projects at the Beijing International Film Festival. The 7th “Project Pitches” will continue the mode of "training-selection-fostering-negotiation-incubation-tracking-show" to help achieve project trade, making “Project Pitches” platform a highlight of BJIFF Film Market. With several years of experience and optimization, the “Project Pitches” event gradually forms a mature system with characteristics of “based on local situation, looking overseas”, and this system gains industrial recognition. The event provides a platform for young talents to reach international film markets. Perfect Stranger was awarded "Foundation Award for Chinese New Filmmakers”. And its director and writer Tian Li participated in 2016 Cannes "New Chinese Film Talents Fund Forum". Zhang Fengmiao, whose project Grandpa's Counterattack was awarded "Foundation Award for Chinese New Filmmakers”, participated in 2016 Cannes "New Chinese Film Talents Fund Forum". "Six-week Summer" won the“Project with Greatest Commercial Potential”in the 6th BJIFF Film Market “Project Pitches” and was awarded  "MPA Grand Prize" by the Motion Picture Association of America. The project My Beloved Bodyguard was released in April 2016 and won impressive box office. The project Mountain Cry was selected as the closing film of the 2015 Pusan International Film Festival, and was widely praised. Mountain Cry was released in August 2016 in mainland China. The 4th BJIFF Film Market “Project Pitches” event project "Special Award" winner Seventy-seven Days has entered the post-production stage. The 5th BJIFF Film Market “Project Pitches”event project Till the End of World has finished shooting. The later two films are scheduled to be released in 2017.

　　According to reports, in the 7th Beijing International Film Festival•Film Market, 712 projects have been collected in total, with an increase of 5.6% compared with the previous year, which sets a new record. It is worth mentioning that, of all the collected projects, there are 246 projects from the young filmmakers in their twenties or thirties, who work in emerging studios. This kind of projects accounts for 34.6%, and more than 60% of the projects from young filmmakers have raised a certain amount of funds for the development and shooting. In addition, this year’s overseas projects are mainly from the United States, France, Germany, Japan, India, Canada and Malaysia and other countries, and most of the projects are co-productions. The event provides an opportunity for young filmmakers to learn from foreign advanced experience, promoting the country’s film industry.

　　Industry Conversations, Leading the Forward-looking View

　　Industry Conversations is a platform for filmmakers to exchange ideas and share knowledge. As the most forward-looking communication platform at the Beijing International Film Festival, Industry Conversations follows the latest trends, focuses on the hottest topics, explores the cutting edge trends in the film industry, building the brand of “industrial wind vane”.

　　The 6th Beijing International Film Festival Film Market Industry Conversations focuses on industry hot topics, highlights innovation trends, selects different entry points, invites international veterans in the film industry to explore and forecast the film market and industry trends. The 6th Industry Conversations was co-organized by Entgroup, the Motion Picture Association of America, Bianjubang Media, Sina Entertainment. The Conversations unfold from four perspectives, including the impact of new film technology, the integration trend of international film industry, the innovation type of genre films and the deep interpretation of Chinese film box office. More than 20 international experts, scholars and business leaders involved themselves in the discussion, making a highlight of thought exchanges.

　　The 7th Beijing International Film Festival Industry Conversations, serving as a cross-industry communication platform, will continue to invite senior industry professionals at home and abroad. They will discuss the new phenomena, new trends and new technologies in the industry from all aspects of the film industry chain.

　　Events & Activities, Deepening Market Cooperation

　　As one of the highlights of Film Market, Events & Activities covers diversified events, including project roadshow, corporate release, salon activities and so on to fully meet the promotional need for brand, business and projects of domestic and foreign organizations. In accordance with high international standards, Events & Activities serves as a platform to help all participants explore market and cooperate deeply.

　　Events & Activities is an important part of the Beijing International Film Festival Film Market, which will provide customized services for organizations to achieve in-depth exploitation of film market. The 6th BJIFF witnessed 16 sessions of Events & Activities, which were diversified and with different themes, including film co-production, financial investment, marketing trends, screenwriter innovation, online video, IP development, animation development. VR and other new science and technology topics became hot topics. The organizers include domestic and foreign Internet companies, We Media, film and television service companies, technology companies, government agencies and so on, reflecting the international status and comprehensive influence of BJIFF. This year, we will continue to improve promotional effects of the platform to better serve BJIFF and current fast-growing Chinese film market, and contribute to the development of the market.

　　A big market needs a matching film festival and film market. That is why Beijing International Film Festival Film Market was established. It will shoulder the responsibility and obligation and take good use of its opportunities. As one of the most important sections of the BJIFF, since the first session, the Film Market Section aims to build a leading international platform for film elements exchange and project pitches, focusing on the development of the whole film industry chain to create new benefits for Chinese film markets.