CANNES - A FESTIVAL VIRGIN'S GUIDE
Updates to the book
Festival Tightens Up Accreditation Criteria
1-Mar-2004
For the 2004 event (and presumably beyond), the Festival has significantly tightened up the criteria for professional accreditation. In the past, if you had attended a previous festival it wasn’t necessary to produce any evidence of your activities as a film industry professional (of course, new registrants have been required to provide this evidence for several years now).
This year (2004) all requests for professional accreditation must be accompanied by documents supporting your status as an industry professional. Even if you have previously attended Cannes, you will be asked to provide evidence that you have worked on a recent feature film (2002 or later) in the capacity in which you are applying. For example, if you are applying as a foreign producer, you will need to show a credit on a recent feature film where you are named as a Producer.
The Festival has outlined that the following types of documents are acceptable as proof:
- Publicity material for the film, showing your name and credit;
- A contract (distribution, employment etc) which names the film and your position;
- Listing in an Internet database (eg. Internet Movie Database) with the appropriate credit;
The Festival won’t accept a CV or other declaration of participation in a feature film. It is also important that your company web site includes details of the films you have made and your credits on them, as this will also be used in the process of reviewing your accreditation request.
If you haven’t had a credit on a recent feature film, it will be extremely difficult to obtain accreditation this year. An alternative may be to consider registering for the Market instead, particularly through one of the new initiatives: Producer’s Network or Short Film Market.