Characteristics of the film industry in Latvia

Like all the other post-Soviet countries, also Latvia turned over a new leaf in ALL the spheres of life 11 years ago – in 1991. The film industry experienced a very difficult period at the beginning of the times of independence, as there were more essential spheres of life the government had to support than the production of films. In 1991 Latvia started to finance national cinematography again. However, everything happened very slowly and the year 1992 was critical when the overall film budget was reduced to the amount that the Soviet Latvia got for producing shorts. The production of feature films almost stopped. Ever since then the infrastructure of the film industry has been gradually adapting itself to the newly established reality of the market economy. The former Soviet Latvia filmmakers as well as young filmmakers educated in the 90-ies have acquired basic knowledge about the notion of film producer. A number of private film production companies have been established. There are around 25 – 30 active production companies working in Latvia, some of them mainly dealing with production of commercials due to the scarce financial situation in the field and the overall economic instability.

The development has been slow but steady since then. Now we have reached the stage when we have regular film production again. On the national level we have had a commercial success in the year 2000 when the feature “Dangerous Summer” by Aigars Grauba ranked 2nd in the top ten in Latvia cinemas (right after “Stuart Little”gathering almost 80 000 audience. The most important issues as regards the international level we have joined EURIMAGES foundation in 2001 and MEDIA Plus in 2002. Our film directors Laila Pakalnina and Anna Viduleja have screened their films at the Cannes International Film Festival. The Estonian- Latvian co-production feature “Good Hands” won Manfred Zalcgeber distribution prize at the Berlinale 2002 and “The Python” by Laila Pakalnina was screened in the competition programme of the Venice International Film Festival in 2003. The documentary by Ivars Seleckis “New Times at Crossroad Street” (1999), as well as the documentary by Una Celma “Egg Lady” (2000) have been screened in more than 40 film festivals in all continents. We have produced many animation films that have been very successful in the film festivals of different countries. In the animation field our production companies often take up contract jobs in order to keep up the skills of the specialists. The latest examples of co-operation in this field are “Kirikou et la Sorciere” and “Les Triplettes de Belleville” done by animation company “Rija”. Our film professionals have brushed their skills in different courses all over Europe, as well as in practical work when working as service companies for film productions from abroad. In other words, we are surely a small film industry if compared to bigger countries, but since quantity is not something we can thrive to achieve, we are rapidly developing as regards quality. We have also set up a co-operation platform “Baltic Films” that allows the three Baltic countries to represent our region jointly in the big film festivals, markets and other film events all around the world.