Will Sarlat become the Hollywood of Périgord? It is a project but it could become reality. The city, the community of municipalities, the department and the Region submitted a file at the end of October to apply and hope for funding as part of the state recovery plan for cinema. The answer will be given by the end of the year.
A project to accommodate even more filming
Currently, the Dordogne welcomes film crews half the year, “about 150 days of filming” explains Raphaël Maestro, director of the Ciné Passion association. It’s a lot but it could be a lot more because some teams give up according to Thierry Bordes specifically in charge of filming “there would be studios here, there would be films that we could have captured, such as international films and big-budget Anglo-Saxon films”.
This project must fill a gap in the Dordogne but also in the New Aquitaine Region according to Jean-Jacques de Peretti, the mayor of Sarlat “there are two highways that pass here, the A20 and the A89. When there are sets made for the cinema or for the series, the site makes it possible to create studios but in addition to storing and recycling sets “. Especially since the number of filming is increasing explains Thierry Bordes with the requests of platforms like Netflix or Amazon.
Eight studios and workshops imagined in the former factory
This grant could make it possible to rehabilitate the premises of the former tobacco factory closed in 2019 and which belongs to the Community of Communes Sarlat Périgord Noir. If the project is accepted, this wasteland of 10 hectares could then be transformed into several studios (two studios of 1,500 m2, two studios of 1,200 m2, four studios of 400 m2) and also into workshops and a shed for storing and recycling sets. “It takes space to store them and it’s expensive to recycle them, so we want to create a “resource center” for the sets” details Thierry Bordes especially that the place is not lacking on the site of the old factory_. _
All the developments in the former wasteland are estimated at approximately 43 million euros according to Benoît Secrestat, vice-president of the Community of Communes and elected to the department. If the State retains the Sarladais project, the subsidy would amount to a maximum of 30% of the overall bill. Who could pay the rest? Mainly private partners, “they must be in the majority” replies Benoît Secrestat, the local authorities who will also put their hands in their pockets but above all “to support”.
Film studios and dedicated training?
According to Benoît Secrestat, “a 1,000 m2 studio employs 300 people”. The project of the Dordogne communities therefore plans to train young Périgord in vocational high schools but also in the CFA “for example in the formations in the building so that they can build sets”.
There are opportunities in many film professions, some professions are in tension “like the decoration, the dressing, the make-up, the electricity, the machinery, in fact all the manual trades that make a film made” summarizes Thierry Bordes, in charge of filming at Ciné Passion.