This fall, the Montreal-based film press agency Mediafilm will launch a new bilingual Canada-wide platform for aggregating data on all films released in the country, for industry professionals. The management of Telefilm Canada, which is funding the project, believes that it is an essential tool for reviving cinemas in the country.
“A site like this, which allows you to know where all the films are shown, according to data updated daily, no one else does,” says Marie Martinez, project director at Mediafilm.
Named Panoscope, the platform will centralize data already collected by Mediafilm since its founding in 1955 in the form, among other things, of a schedule of film releases in the country. “We collect the schedules of more than 750 cinemas”, adds Marie Martinez.
Each film that will be shown in theaters, even just once, will be registered there. And each film sheet will contain essential information for the distribution of films, including metadata (images and trailers), press material and contacts of rights holders.
Panoscope will therefore be particularly useful for three distinct scenarios. Distributors will be able to know where — and to what extent — the films in their catalog are circulating. The programmers of theaters and festivals will be able to find films there, know who to contact to present them and have access to the material necessary for their circulation. And journalists will also be able to consult this information in order to have a better idea of the releases of films in the country.
It is a kind of convergence of the MediaFilm Plus industry database, the Media Film newswire and the guides accessible to the general public, Ouvoirvoir.ca and Where2Watch. Access to Panoscope will also be free for one year, then will become chargeable in the form of a subscription. The platform will launch in November, on a date yet to be determined.
“We are currently caught in a chaos where we have to contact all the distributors ourselves to find out the release dates of the films. Such a platform could be very practical, but only if it is properly updated,” says Jason Béliveau, programmer at Antitube, in Quebec, as well as at the Cinemania and Regard festivals.
Relaunch independent rooms
Francesca Accinelli, Acting Executive Director of Telefilm Canada, affirms that Panoscope will have a role to play in the economic recovery of cinemas in the country: “Quebec films have contributed a lot to box office revenues in Quebec, but elsewhere in Canada, the the country’s cinema sells less. Yet Canadians want content from home. We want to make it easier for them. »
A report on a survey of directors of independent theaters commissioned by Telefilm, and published earlier this year, shows that theaters across the country are still struggling to program Canadian films: “Unlike American films, which are Accompanied by ready-made promotional material, promotional campaigns for Canadian films must be set up from A to Z (and therefore cost more than a turnkey campaign). »
Jason Béliveau, who will direct the programming of a new movie theater in the capital, is delighted to have access to more information on Canadian cinema outside Quebec: “For the moment, it’s difficult to know what happening in the country, to easily have the images, press releases, trailers. I hope it will help circulate the films, which will also help cinemas in return. »