„There were three times more applying projects than in 2016, which means that the reforms we made together with the Ministry of Culture of the Slovak Republic were necessary and useful“, Martin Šmatlák, director of the Slovak Audivisual Fund, told FNE.
Slovakia’s 20% incentive scheme established in 2015 eased the requirements in August 2017. The minimum expenditure level was cut from 2 m EUR to 150,000 EUR for a single feature, documentary or animated film (with a minimum length of 70 minutes), and to 300,000 EUR for a project involving at least two such films or a television series (maximum 13 episodes of minimum 40 minutes).
The fourth season of the Netflix 13-episode series Outlander with an estimated budget of 83 m EUR is the biggest international project that was submitted in 2017. The series directed by British Julian Holmes will be shot in Slovakia for 30 days in 2018.
Slovakia‘s Filmpark production applied for the US/Czech/Slovak coproduction Alleraya – The Falcon Princess directed by Slovak Palo Janík Jr., which will be produced and postproduced in Slovakia with a budget of 2.22 m EUR.
The 12-episode series Mistresses / Zamilované, directed by the Slovak director Jakub Kroner, will have 72 shooting days in Slovakia also in 2018. The series is written by British scriptwriters S.J.Clarkson, Rachel Anthony and Lowri Glain, and the budget is 1,264,000 EUR. Slovakia‘s InOut Studio applied for incentives.
Seven of the projects approved for incentives are Slovak/Czech coproductions: Čertí brko directed by Marek Najbrt and coproduced by Trigon Production, RTVS, the Czech Television and Czech Punk Film; the three-episode miniseries Emma a smrtihlav, Naveky tvoj, Hodinárov učeň directed by Peter Krištúfek and produced by PubRes in coproduction with Czech Evolution Films and T.H.A; Villa Lucia directed by Michal Kollár and produced by KFS Production, RTVS and Czech Fog‘n’Desire Films; Krátka jar, dlhá zima directed by Laco Halama and produced by Filmpark Production in coproduction with RTVS and the Czech Television; The General / Generál, a film and a three-episode miniseries directed by Mariana Čengel Solčanská and produced by JMB Film & TV Productions in coproduction with Prague Film Production, and Šťastné zviera directed by Jozef Slovák, produced by Tatra Star and starring Ivan Trojan.
