Oberhausen Festival resigns from the European Coordination of Film Festivals

With a letter to the Board of Directors dated 1 December 2005, the International Short Film Festival Oberhausen cancelled its membership in the European Coordination of Film Festivals (ECFF). Reasons given for the withdrawal include the failure of the ECFF to adequately represent the interests of its members before the European Commission, and its costly activities from which only few stood to gain.

Oberhausen complained specifically of the ECFF’s silence in the face of the festival promotion policies of the European Commission. In addition to the bureaucratic hurdles the Commission places in the way of festivals applying for funding, criticism was directed at the provision by which festivals must devote at least 70% of their programme to European film in order to receive grants. In Oberhausen’s view, this restriction on the participation of non-European films is irreconcilable with the cultural and aesthetic quality criteria of an international festival. Acquiescing in this policy harbours the danger of all festivals adapting in a streamlined fashion to a one-dimensional European standard, thereby expanding Fortress Europe at the expense of the rest of the world.

The Short Film Festival Oberhausen ties its resignation from the ECFF to an appeal to the European Commission to revise its Eurocentric festival promotion policy and to orient itself in future according to qualitative criteria instead. Addressing the other members of the ECFF, some of whom allegedly share its critical view but do not dare to voice it publicly, the Short Film Festival Oberhausen expressed the hope for a new, non-institutionalized, but more effective form of co-operation.

The Short Film Festival Oberhausen is a founding member of the ECFF, which represents some 250 European festivals. The European Coordination of Film Festivals/ Coordination Européenne des Festivals de Cinéma was founded in 1996 as a ‘European Economic Interest Grouping’ (EEIG) according to European law. The organization’s goal is to form a European network and lobby vis-?-vis the European Parliament and the European Commission. ECFF activities include a common obligation to observe a Code of Ethics, informational exchange between the festivals, conducting workshops, carrying out studies on festival-relevant themes, Europe-wide exchange of festival employees, and the formation of a collection of European films. Activities in the field of short film consist mainly in the annual tour programme “Europe in Shorts” and collaboration with Jameson Irish Whiskey to hold the Jameson Short Film Awards. The Coordination’s headquarters is in Brussels. The work of the organization is financed by membership fees, sponsorship grants and public funding (including more than 50% of the total budget of the MEDIA Programme of the European Commission).

Website of the ECFF: http://www.eurofilmfest.org/