In Marseille, the project of a city of cinema is taking shape

After the Minister Delegate for Transport Clément Beaune, traveling to Marseille on Friday January 6, it is the turn of the Minister of Culture Rima Abdul Malak to make a two-day stopover in Marseille to take stock of the cultural aspect. of the “Marseille en grand” plan announced in 2021 by Emmanuel Macron. She must announce Monday, January 9 several projects to make the city a center of filming for cinema and audiovisual and thus support the project to create new studios in the Mediterranean.

The President of the Republic had affirmed during his speech his desire to make Marseille “one of the major French centers of this cultural and creative industry”, and thus to benefit from the boom in film production generated by the development of American platforms and their recent obligation to invest in French and European creation. “In Marseille, there is the ability to do it, there is talent, there are studios, there is the desire and there are opportunities for young people”, underlined the Head of State. .

A contribution from the State of 22.5 million euros

With 500 film shoots per year, the city is already very attractive for production companies but is sorely lacking in infrastructure and technicians to welcome them and provide adequate services on site. Hence this section devoted to cinema of the “Marseille en grand” plan, which should help local authorities to invest in this area and to create a “Mediterranean city of cinema”. A total of 22.5 million euros would thus be provided by the State, according to La Provence, to finance these projects.

The Minister of Culture must sign a memorandum of understanding today with the main players concerned (The Paca region, the department, the city and the metropolis of Aix-Marseille) finalizing her commitments.

On the one hand, it provides for the creation of a film school, La CinéFabrique, on the model of that of Lyon, providing young people aged 18 to 25 with free, high-level training in careers in this sector as well as branch of the Cinémathèque française intended for the development of the cinematographic culture of the public through exhibitions, screenings and educational actions. The two structures could eventually be grouped together within a “Mediterranean City of Cinema”, installed at the Dock des Suds, a former port warehouse transformed into a concert hall.

A Mediterranean Studios project

The other part of the plan concerns hosting film shoots. It provides for the installation of a temporary logistics base on Boulevard Capitaine-Gèze, allowing up to six productions to be hosted simultaneously. It will replace the barracks of Aurelle, which until then provided this function, and will provide premises for the manufacture and storage of sets and costumes, offices for the production teams and the organization of castings.

Finally, the minister was to announce a modernization plan for the Belle-de-Mai site, mainly occupied until then by the production of the soap opera Plus belle la vie, which ended on November 18. In the future, it will host post-production, animation and special effects companies, as well as video game creators.

This set of measures comes to accompany the projects of creation of vast cinema studios envisaged within the framework, this time, of the France 2030 plan. Following a call for projects launched by the CNC (National Center for Cinema and the Moving Image) , the owner of Provence Studios located in Martigues, Olivier Marchetti, plans to extend his activity to Port-de-Bouc and Marseille in the premises of the former Saint-Louis sugar refinery.

A project actively supported by the Head of State. “What we have to create together in Marseille, what you have to create, are these big studios in the Mediterranean which will make it possible to have the infrastructure for the shooting of big films, big series”, he explained during the presentation of “Marseille en grande”.

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