After the Yugoslavia dissolution, the state film financing has ended and after the Balkan wars and 2000 democratic changes Serbian institutions were not able to significantly finance film. Whenever Serbian cinematography finds itself without a signpost showing it the right way to go, Serbian film workers find the way out. During the recent years, some directors have managed to make films with the financial help of the European film fund, Eurimages, since the domestic public funds cannot manage to efficiently support domestic cinematography.

In every country in transition, gathering resources poses a real challenge within cinematography as one of the most expensive culture branches. While in the European Union (EU) countries films are made, among other things, with the help of the public funds filled with the taxpayers` money, Serbia is still waiting for the cinematography law that should regulate the way of financing the film art.

Film workers in Serbia can count on three state sources for the film financing - the Serbian Film Centre Fund under the auspices of the Ministry of Culture, the Belgrade Secretariat for Culture Fund for Film Production Stimulation, and the Autonomous Region of Vojvodina Secretariat for Culture Fund. Nevertheless, financing out of these resources sometimes depends on numerous factors - starting with whether and when the bidding will be and all the way to the rule saying the film getting money from one fund automatically is disabled to apply for resources coming from the other fund.

While in the neighbouring Croatia television stations are ordered by law to allocate funds for cinematography, in Serbia public broadcasting service has no obligation to invest a part of the subscription payments into the production of a certain film whose authors have been chosen at the transparent tender according to precisely established procedure. That way the film financing out of one more resource comes down to sporadic examples and not systematic process.

Thanks to the lousy system, domestic producers direct their attention to a very hard possibility of making appropriate financing and film project realisation plans. While producers are still "finding the way out" in getting money out of the public funds, some film workers are managing to obtain money from the European fund Eurimages.

With Serbia`s entering the Council of Europe in 2003 our cinematography has become the member of the most prominent European film fund - Eurimages, whose mission is giving support to the European film through co-financing of co-productions, distribution, and cinemas.

Some 90 percent of this fund resources is secured through the states` fee (annual fee for Serbia is 100,000 euros) and the goal is not the commercial success of films but the artistic quality that has to picture variety of the European society. Since its founding in 1988, the Eurimages has co-financed more than 900 feature and documentary works and during the last year only, 21,508,000 euros have been allocated.

The first film from Serbia that has been supported by the Eurimages was Milos Radovic`s "Pad u raj" ("Falling in the Paradise") for which 280,000 euros was approved. Three years ago supported were Dusan Milic`s "Guca" and Srdan Golubovic`s "Klopka" ("Trap") with 240,000 euros each, Jovan Todorovic`s "Fantom" ("Phantom") with 80,000 euros and in 2006 Eurimages also financed Stefan Arsenijevic`s "Ljubav & drugi zlocini" ("Love & Other Crimes"). Last year upheld were two Serbian films, Srdjan Dragojevic`s "Sveti Georgije ubiva azdahu" ("St. George Shoots the Dragon"- 380,000 euros) and Goran Markovic`s "Turneja" ("Tour"- 225,000 euros). All these films have first been supported by the Serbian Ministry of Culture and have been realised in co-production with the European states, being the one of the Eurimages conditions. Another requirement was the realisation of the capital and authorship merger mission as well as the fight against Hollywood through the preservation of the European cinematography identity.

This also confirms Rajko Grlic`s 2006 film "Karaula" ("The Border Post") whose production was realised with the help of the Serbian company Yodi Movie Craftsman, and Refresh from Bosnia and Herzegovina, Sektor from Macedonia, Slovenian Emotion film, Croatian Propeler, French Cine-Sud Promotion, and Great Britain`s Film Entertainment. With 200,000 euros, the Eurimages has supported this first mutual cultural project of all the former Yugoslav republics.

After the first international festival success of his film "Jagoda u supermarketu" ("Strawberries in the Supermarket"), Serbian director Dusan Milic joined forces with the German producer Karl Baumgartner for "Guca," the film project made in Serbian-German-Austrian-Bulgarian co-production. Made after the certified recipe of the "Romeo and Juliet" but on the Balkans, melodrama on the Rom young man and a white girl situated in the popular milieu of the Serbian music festival in the small town of Guca was supported by the Eurimages with 240,000 euros.

"Persuading Eurimages to support a film is a long story. We have been trying for the three long years. We had to close the film finance structure at 80 percent of the whole budget so that they could finance the rest of 20 percent. Eurimages is a prestigious institution in terms of the European cinematography since with its authority it guarantees for films with potent future in terms of distribution within Europe and supported films are showed in the member countries," explains Dusan Milic.

In the case of Srdan Golubovic`s film "Klopka", the author considers that the unlimited application of the story - the fate of the father who becomes a hit man in order to assure the money needed for his son`s surgery - was crucial factor for Europe to support this film coming from Serbia.

"`Klopka` is the drama on disappointment since eight years after democratic changes in Serbia we are not living in better society; value and moral principles systems are not different; and as individuals we are not much better. `Klopka` is also a story on moral society decay that is not only the characteristic of Serbia but the one that can refer to Europe, too and this was something the Eurimages has understood and supported," says Srdan Golubovic whose film was awarded at more than 30 international festivals and was among nine films nominated for the Academy Award for the best foreign language film.

Stefan Arsenijevic, "Ljubav & drugi zlocini" director, believes the Eurimages has upheld his film since he was a debutant, while his older Macedonian colleague Milco Mancevski, the author of the film "Pre kise" ("Before the Rain" - the Golden Lion at the 1994 Venice Film Festival), considers foreign funds as inevitable ones for the European film survival.

"I do not like gathering resources for film since during that process you are opening the doors to you life to the people who have moral attitudes of amoebae. American film is made in the studio that finances it and even does distribution. Very often they even go all the way from the very idea through the script and shooting to advertising campaign," he says and ads that Europe has more financiers thanks to the market and industry that are more splitted.

According to him, the film is an expensive toy and therefore co-productions are allowed to distribute risk as well as co-operation and exchange of experience.

"We are already living in the global village and the film is the most global art. My last film `Senke` (`Shadows`) was the co-production of Italy, Spain, Germany, Bulgaria, and Macedonia and, with the support of the Eurimages, the team consisting of the people coming from 13 countries successfully brought it to the end," concludes Mancevski.

Although the Eurimages help is important, domestic filmmakers would benefit more from establishing efficient and more open domestic financing system for the film industry through public funds and public televisions financing.