Georgia is planning to introduce its own programme of tax incentives for film production in the second halfof 2009.

Speaking at this year's B2B Belgrade Industry Meeting, Konstantin
Chlaidze, director of the Georgian National Film Center, revealed that
research was currently being carried out with the UK-based consulting
company BOP on the feasibility of such a scheme.

Chlaidze said that the Film Center was working 'very actively' to
achieve this goal and he was 'hopeful that we will succeed in this
since the initiative is coming from higher governmental structures.'

He added that Georgia's national public broadcaster would begin
financing feature films for the first time this year and said that the
Film Center was planning workshops for Georgian filmmakers in the
coming months 'to enable screenwriters and producers to become
acquainted in European standards and practice.'

Chlaidze pointed out that Georgia's annual state support for the
national film industry had more than doubled from 2004's Euros 419,000
to the planned Euros 930,000 for this year.

In 2008, seven feature films were released in Georgia, including four supported by the Film Center, while 2009 would see six to seven local films coming into the cinemas, with three receiving backing from the national funding body.

Last year had seen the Film Center backing two international co-productions: Dito Tsintsadze's Georgian-German production The
Mediator, starring Ewen Bremner and Merab Ninidze, and Giorgi
Ovashvili's The Other Bank, which screened in the Berlinale's
Generation sidebar last month and was in competition at Belgrade's FEST this week.

A third international co-production, Ilgar Safat's mystery drama The
Precinct had been made as an Euros 900,000 collaboration between
Baku-based Nariman Film and Georgia's Bagira Films with technical
support from Georgian Film. Safat's feature debut, which is now seeking
finishing funds, was the first project to go into production after being developed within the framework of the Independent Filmmakers of
South Caucasus (IFA-SC) training programme.

In addition, Tbilisi-based producer Rusudan Pirveli of Caucasian Filmodrom told ScreenDaily that principal photography has now been completed on Giorgi Chalauri's feature debut Susa which is looking for post-production funding.

Chalauri had received the VFF Talent Project Market Award when he presented the film at the Berlinale Talent Campus and the project, which was supported by the Georgian National Film Center and shot using the RED camera, had also been pitched at co-production events in Yerevan, Warsaw and Cottbus in 2007.

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