Paris—Sep 7, 2007
"This is England" released digitally in Norway thanks to the European project: D-PLATFORM
This is England, directed by Shane Meadows, is the first movie digitally released through the D-PLATFORM initiative. It is currently being digitally screened in three cinemas in Oslo, Tromsoe and Fredrikstad. Arthaus, the movie's Norwegian distributor, has thus achieved its first step in the digital world.
The D-PLATFORM project was launched by the French company CN films, and is supported by the MEDIA programme of the European Commission as a pilot project. Its aim is to help European distributors in digitally releasing art-house movies. Whereas almost any U.S.A. title is available for digital projection, Europe faces a lack of local content in that format. Through this initiative, CN films offers a technical and operational assistance, gathering the technical information, and trying to find synergies between several European distributors in order to share the costs. With fundings coming from the European Union, CN films also offers a financial help, covering up to 50% of the release's technical costs.
The D-PLATFORM project relies on a consortium of 8 independent European distributors: Arthaus in Norway, Cinéart in Belgium, Frenetic Films in Switzerland, Haut et Court and Rezo Films in France, Notro Films in Spain, Polyfilm in Austria, and Soda Pictures in the United Kingdom. Three more have already decided to join the project for 2008: Budapest Films in Hungary, Dogwoof Pictures in United Kingdom, and Non Stop Entertainment in Sweden.
Following Arthaus' lead, the other members of the consortium are currently working on a digital release of one of their forthcoming movie.