From: Bernard Roddy (email suppressed)
Date: Mon Apr 21 2008 - 11:44:21 PDT
Here's a letter of support for the festival:
April 21, 2008
Dr. Vasko Simoniti
Minister of Culture
Slovenia (email suppressed)
Dear Dr. Simoniti:
As a concerned artist and filmmaker, I am writing to
urge your intervention on behalf of the Isola Cinema
festival, now in its 5th season and enjoying an
international reputation for excellence. On April 8
acting director of the Slovenian Film Fund, Mr. Igor
Prodnik, reversed a decision to support Isola Cinema.
This reversal appears to have been an ad hoc response
to protests that Isola submitted over an earlier
decision, dated January 16, 2008, that the commission
sent to the film festival. On that earlier occasion
the film fund announced its decision to cut support
for the festival by half.
The later decision of April 8 declares that the new
members making up the commission are now of the
opinion that “despite its relative media recognition,
the content of the project is inappropriate for
co-financing.” This new decision apparently resulted
from the wholesale replacement of the first
commission, resulting in a new decision-making body
now presided over by Mr. Jambrek, head of the
Programme Department of Slovenska Kinoteka. Such an
irregular response to the festival’s protest strongly
suggests that Mr. Prodnik is simply looking for
support to cut all funding to the festival, regardless
of any committee recommendations. As a result the
film fund appears to be merely a collection of puppets
rubber-stamping the decisions of a particular
constituency of cultural interests.
I urge you to put an end to the arbitrary and
authoritarian approach that the film fund has adopted
under Mr. Prodnik. Please intervene immediately to
restore the full funding to Isola Cinema that it has
enjoyed for its first four seasons.
Sincerely,
CC
Janez Jan’a, Prime Minister of the Republic of
Slovenia (email suppressed)
Igor Prodnik, Acting Director, Slovenia Film Fund
(email suppressed)
Isola Cinema (email suppressed)
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