How ironic. While photos of ecstatic Oscar winners are being splashed buoyantly across the pages of websites and newspapers, elsewhere the film industry is floundering and possibly also drowning - the Mallorcan film industry, that is, and specifically the Mallorca International Film Festival.
Go back a few months, to the World Travel Market in London for example. A stand, a logo, a microphone. A laughing actor, Colin Meaney; a glamorous Italian actress, Maria Grazia Cucinotta; a beaming director, David Carreras. The film festival was in the spotlight. One of the partners in the film festival, and the reason for the promotion at the travel market, was the tourism ministry. Go back a few months, and in the photo album from London there was someone else. Stage left of Carreras. Smiling. Miquel Nadal, the then tourism minister. Many takes have been made since that photo, and Nadal, together with his reputation, has been left in tatters on the cutting-room floor.
It wasn't just the local press that joined in the celebrations and the announcements. "The Daily Mail" got in on the act, quoting Carreras in his best brochure talk: "the island is stunning, we have beautiful scenery and it would be perfect to hold an international event like this." The prospect of ever more celebrities, the prospect of some A-list promotion for Mallorca and the prospect of a film festival that might even compete with Cannes. It had it all. A showcase for the island, the lovely people of an up-market image Mallorca so craves, the diversification of the tourism industry in a different cultural direction - the cinema. It had it all. So where did it go wrong?
Carreras got the first inkling of trouble when he presented initial invoices to the tourism ministry, which was in for some 650 grand's worth of the lights, camera and action, around a third of the financing. Nadal's replacement, Miquel Ferrer, said that there was a problem with the agreement and that there was something to do with a grant. Something to do with a grant. Hmm.
The tourism ministry, and therefore the Balearic Government, has stated that the agreement is in the process of being annulled. The legal chaps have been giving it the once over, but there has been no clear statement as to precisely what the issue is with the agreement. Carreras, along with other private investors, has pumped money into the project and is, you might guess, incandescent. He has every right to be.
This may not be the end for the film festival. A resolution with the government may be sought and even found. More private investment might be forthcoming. But were it to be and the government got away without handing over a centimo and yet could wallow in the publicity of the festival, a rotten stench would be left. And unfortunately, in the absence of a clear statement, one is left to imagine another odour. I leave that to you to figure out.
The shambles that has been the tourism ministry has also left Rafael Nadal tied up at the moorings of television advertising. Rather than bouncing over the waves and sailing into the living-rooms of mainland Spain, Germany and the UK, the promotional adverts with the Manacor Muscle have been becalmed by a paralysis of inactivity at tourism, the consequence of all the comings and goings. New minister Barceló recognises the problem and has said that the promotional campaign will be reactivated as swiftly as possible. She seems to be saying that a lot of things will be done swiftly, such as seeking a resolution as to another paralysis - that of the golf course in Muro. The Nadal adverts are due to be shown for periods of two months in the three main tourism markets. Eventually.
Any comments to andrew@thealcudiaguide.com please.
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