Rai Cinema

While being forced to cope with a constantly falling investment capacity, Rai Cinema succeeded in maintaining a leading role in terms of weight and consideration thanks to a careful buying policy, cutting out a space of its own in a highly competitive and constantly evolving market, thanks to consolidated relationships and fast action.

It is vital to point out that, in 2010, Rai Cinema completely took over responsibility for purchasing from RaiSat (which converged into Rai during the year), taking on the product procurement activity also for the nongeneral- interest networks.

Rai Cinema continues to pay attention to the different types of rights available for purchase, against the consolidation of more and more new ways forms of exploitation and a strategy of the Rai Group based on the development of DTT and renewed business models.

Among the Major CBS, an important and consolidated television producer, continues to be the exclusive mainstay of Rai Cinema for free tv, while Disney, an historical and privileged interlocutor of the Rai brand for over two decades, secures its role as strategic partner.
As at 2010 Disney was the only Major free from framework agreements within the Italian television sector.
After long months of negotiations, Rai Cinema succeeded in fighting off the economic bids of the competition, acquiring two thirds of the Disney product. With respect to the other Majors, the Disney policy is distinguished by a strong connotation of the brand and need for safe and controlled exposure of its product. In this sense, with an economic investment of such an important entity as to be competitive, the winning weapon of Rai Cinema and Rai was the possibility to offer Disney the prospects of excellent exposure of its products and its brand, which Rai has been and continues to be capable of exploiting with particular care.

If the agreement between Rai Cinema and Disney is undoubtedly the event of the year, the CBS agreement, which was entered into in 2009 but began to yield its excellent rewards in 2010, was no less important. Among the TV series with hour-long episodes, the most successful is the detective action series Hawaii 5-0, an updated re-make of the original Hawaii Squadra 5-0, a 70s classic. A dynamic series with fantastic locations, cast and special effects, well written and easily and broadly usable, it is the ideal product for guaranteeing viewers for RaiDue's prime time slot. To create an all-round broadcasting operation and develop a synergic promotion mechanism, the first two seasons of the original 70's series Hawaii Squadra 5-0 have been purchased for inclusion in day-time, to run simultaneously with the first passage of the re-make.

Another two very different series by CBS are distinguished by a return to the screen of two big names in film and TV: Tom Selleck in the New York detective family saga, Blue Bloods, and Jim Belushi in the ironic courtroom drama set in Las Vegas, The Defenders. These three series can benefit from the first free passage before the release on pay TV, with an exclusive window of ten months.

Among the returning series of CBS, Rai Cinema has obtained the second season of the huge successful Navy Ncis Los Angeles and of the female legal drama, The Good Wife, both prime time guarantees for RaiDue, along with the inter-generational dramedy, Life Unexpected, the first season of which was scheduled on RaiDue during daytime and is currently being shown on Rai 4 in the prime time slot, repeated during daytime.

Continuing CBS series, subject to negotiations prior to the first framework agreement between the parties, are brands with which the audiences of RaiDue and RaiTre are familiar: Navy Ncis, now in its 8th season, and Beverly Hills 90210 (season III) are two mainstays of RaiDue's programming; Medium (season 7) is an important piece in the puzzle of RaiTre's prime time guarantee schedule.

Film product procurement is influenced by several factors, some of which have already been identified, while others are still in the development stages. First of all, the reduction in film requirements for programming schedules, which had characterised recent years, deeply affecting Rai Cinema's purchasing policy, seems to have come to a halt. It's true that the requirements are still restricted basically to RaiDue and RaiTre and that the use of film is still mainly a question of tactics as opposed to strategy, but RaiUno offers glimpses of programming openings for titles of some weight, in keeping with the broadcasting style with which its audiences are familiar and RaiTre has begun the regular programming of films during prime time.

Access to the big international blockbusters is still largely denied to Rai Cinema, because the US Majors - apart from Disney obviously - are held more or less exclusively by the competition. One of the reasons for this is Rai Cinema's long-standing conscious and responsible policy to lower the costs of the licenses. Certain important independent distributors are however able to partially make up for these shortcomings, proposing products that combine good television potential and quality at fair prices.

Furthermore, the pressing need for film products expressed by Rai's non-general-interest channels, each with its own specific broadcasting style but all with a currently limited investment capacity, launch a new vision of procurement onto the market, which Rai Cinema has complied with, contributing in terms of know-how and presence on the market. Rai Movie primarily, but followed closely by Rai 4 and then by Rai 5 and Rai Gulp to a lesser extent (the latter limited to fulllength cartoons or films for children, grew in credibility and visibility of their broad, free television offering. Strategic value is taken on by procurement in Rai's general-interest and theme-specific channels three years after the acquisition of the famous library Titanus, with the acquisition of the second most important Italian film brand on the national scene today, Cristaldi. A grand total of 200 titles, which make up a prestigious synthesis of the most influential and rewarded Italian films. To cope with the numerous requests from non-general-interest channels, Rai Cinema has entered not only into the broad spectrum agreements mentioned above, but also into specific agreements, the negotiation of which takes place almost always following the broadcasting through agreements which, despite being cheaper than those sustained for the general-interest channels, implicate a constant commitment.

Finally, Rai Cinema continued to pursue its consolidated procurement policy of so-called 'full rights' launched in 2001 and aimed at the acquisition of the full rights to exploit appropriately selected foreign titles in Italy for a relevant period of time.

This purchasing method has enabled 01 Distribution to create composite lists, used to vehicle Italian-produced films in cinemas, flanking them with titles of diversified genres, most of which American and characterised by outstanding appeal to audiences. In a moment in which resources are scarce, this purchasing policy has turned out to be particularly clever, also in relation to the Rai networks' needs, being capable of supplying significant help to satisfy television broadcasting requirements, especially in consideration of the multiplication of Rai's multiplatform offering 2010 was another leading year for film production branded Rai Cinema. As regards the films on release in cinemas, the season was opened by three authors who have made a success return to comedy: Mine vaganti by Ferzan Ozpetek, with Riccardo Scamarcio, Ennio Fantastichini, Lunetta Savino, Elena Sofia Ricci, Nicole Grimaudo and Alessandro Preziosi; Happy family by Gabriele Salvatores, with Fabrizio Bentivoglio, Margherita Buy, Diego Abatantuono and Fabio De Luigi; Matrimoni e altri disastri, Nina di Majo's third full-length film with Fabio Volo, Margherita Buy and Luciana Litizzetto.

January witnessed the remarkable success, due to the product type, of L'uomo che verrā, the second film by Giorgio Diritti, winner at the Rome Festival of the grand prix of the jury and title of best film for the public. This led to the attainment of the most prestigious national award as best film of 2010 at the David di Donatello ceremony. The author is currently assessing a new project, Io sono l'amore, by Luca Guadagnino, released in Italy in March.

The box-office success of La nostra vita by Daniele Luchetti, the only Italian film in competition at the Cannes Film Festival, followed the highly prestigious prize awarded there to Elio Germano, for best leading actor. Also successful at the box-office was Maschi contro Femmine, the fourth success in a row for Fausto Brizzi, who made his debut with Notte prima degli esami.

The season of festivals was characterised by numerous films co-produced by Rai Cinema at the Venice Festival, in the various categories. The following were selected in the competition: the comedy by Carlo Mazzacurati, La passione, with Silvio Orlando; Noi credevamo, the grand presentation of the Italian 'Risorgimento' by Mario Martone (the only film to celebrate the 150th anniversary of the unification of Italy); the muchappreciated directing debut of Ascanio Celestini, Pecora nera.

At the Rome Festival, Rai Cinema was represented in the competition by, amongst others, La scuola č finita, a film by Valerio Jalongo, a story of schools today, depicting their degradation and the dedication of some teachers, and by Una vita tranquilla by Claudio Cupellini, which confirmed the director's talent, as well as that of the leading actor Toni Servillo, winner of the award for Best leading actor.
Films made in 2010 and released in 2011 include Habemus Papam, the long-awaited return of Nanni Moretti, with a story featuring unexpected twists, set in the Vatican during a conclave, starring Moretti, Michel Piccoli and Margherita Buy.

Qualunquemente, directed by Giulio Manfredonia, based entirely on the hugely successful TV character, Cetto La Qualunque, played by Antonio Albanese, was released in cinemas in January 2011 and was invited to the Berlin Festival in the Panorama section.

2010 also marked the return to film of Ermanno Olmi after the success of his last work, Centochiodi, in Il villaggio di cartone, Olmi tells the story of contemporary Italy, through a real evangelical parable. It offers a clear and simple message in relation to the deeper meaning of mankind. Based on the novel Ruggine by Stefano Massaron is the film of the same name by Daniele Gaglianone, a harsh and gripping story of children living on the outskirts of a big city in Northern Italy in the 1970s.

The profitable cooperation with Fandango continued in 2010, with the identification (to be completed and subject to written agreement in 2011) of some prestigious and commercially profitable projects: the forthcoming film by Matteo Garrone on reality shows, the film by Ozpetek, set in Turkey this time, and two promising debuts: by the comic strip artist Gipi, whose drawings are famous not only in Italy, and Pippo Mezzapesa, who has already created shorts which have received several awards.

Rai Cinema is also contributing to the development of numerous scripts for possible new productions. Particular success was achieved by the annual documentary produced by Rai Cinema with Teche: 1960, by Gabriele Salvatores, presented at the Venice Festival as a special event and broadcast soon afterwards in prime time, with 2.2 million viewers, is continuing its success on the home video circuit.

The full-rights and production activity already described allowed 01 Distribution to consolidate its ranking among the first five Italian distributors in 2010.

Titles worth mention are Happy Family by Gabriele Salvatores, Mine Vaganti by Ferzan Ozpetek and La Nostra Vita by Daniele Luchetti, which received numerous awards at the David di Donatello, Nastri d'Argento and Globi d'Oro from the foreign press, Maschi contro femmine by Fausto Brizzi and The Tourist.

2011 seems to be proceeding brilliantly, with Qualunquemente by Giulio Manfredonia which, with 16 million euros in box-office takings, is achieving the best-ever performance by 01 Distribution.

As regards the home video segment, the haemorrhaging of rental has slowed down, while cartoons, especially those produced by Disney, continue to sell well. Despite the fact that piracy continues to be very aggressive, 01 Distribution has managed to maintain its market position, further enhancing the number of products available.
With a view to improved integration, in November 2010, the Shareholders' Meetings of the respective companies approved the merger by incorporation of 01 Distribution into Rai Cinema, which will be completed in 2011.

Rai Cinema product on Rai networks

• 20% of network programming throughout the day (5,370 hours)

• 28% of prime time programming (618 hours)

• 658 'pieces' (films, TV movies and series) with 372 prime time placements (34% of the total)


Films

• 122 prime time placements, of which:
    - 17 on RaiUno (18.1% audience share)
    - 30 on RaiDue (9.3% audience share)
    - 75 on RaiTre (7.6% audience share)


Tv movies

• 4 prime time slots on RaiUno with an average share of 20.7%

• 10 prime time slots on RaiDue with an average share of 10%


Series

• 235 evenings, mainly on RaiDue

• 9.4% average share for RaiDue

• 6.6% average share for RaiTre