Film Funding Act (Germany)

Basic data
Title:	Law on Measures to Promote German Films
Short title:	Film Funding Act
Abbreviation:	FFG
Type:	Federal law
Scope:	Federal Republic of Germany
Legal matter:	Subsidy Law
References :	707-27
Original version from:	December 22, 1967 ; ( BGBl. I p. 1352 )
Entry into force on:	1st January 1968
Last revision from:	23 December 2016 ; ( Federal Law Gazette I p. 3413 )
Entry into force of the ; new version on:	January 1, 2017
GESTA :	O003
Weblink:	Text of the law
	Please note the note on the applicable legal version.

The German Film Funding Act (FFG) is the legal basis for the establishment of the film funding agency . Among other things, it defines the tasks and the institutional structure of the film funding agency, contains regulations on requirements and procedures for granting funding and is the legal basis for collecting the film fee.

Overview of the regulatory content

The film funding agency established by the Film Funding Act promotes the production, sales and display of German films. An important distinction is made between project and reference film funding: With the latter, the manufacturer of a successful film (determined on the basis of reference points) automatically acquires a right to subsidies for the production of a new film. A committee, however, decides on project film funding (in the form of conditionally repayable loans); This means that there is no entitlement to funding, but this type of funding is independent of a reference film and can therefore also benefit first-time films. The FFA can also support film theaters and video libraries and provide assistance for individual further training measures as well as for research, rationalization or innovation in the film industry. The grants can take the form of grants and conditional or unconditional repayable loans.

Another mechanism to protect German cinema in addition to financial support are the blocking periods regulated in Section 20 FFG . These regulations stipulate that a film funded by the FFA may only be evaluated in other ways (e.g. television, DVD, video-on-demand) a certain time after its first broadcast in the cinema.

The Filmförderungsanstalt obtains its funds according to §§ 66 ff. FFG by collecting the film fee from film theater operators, from landlords or sellers of videos and - since the Sixth Amendment Act - from public and private television broadcasters; The latter previously made payments to the FFA on the basis of voluntary agreements (so-called film-television agreements).

History of the Film Funding Act

Versions of the Film Funding Act
Title (execution / entry into force)	Reference in the Federal Law Gazette (consolidated version)
Law on Measures to Promote German Films (December 22, 1967 / January 1, 1968)	BGBl. I p. 1352
Law Amending the Law on Measures to Promote German Films (August 9, 1971 / August 13, 1971)	BGBl. I p. 1251
Second Act Amending the Act on Measures to Promote German Films (February 27, 1974 / March 3, 1974)	BGBl. I p. 437
Third law amending the law on measures to promote German film (December 11, 1978 / December 20, 1978)	BGBl. I p. 1957
Law on Measures to Promote German Films (Film Funding Act) (June 25, 1979 / July 1, 1979)	BGBl. I p. 803
First law to amend the Film Funding Act (November 18, 1986 / January 1, 1987)	BGBl. 1986 I p. 2040
Second law amending the Film Funding Act (December 21, 1992 / January 1, 1993)	BGBl. 1992 I p. 2135
Third law amending the Film Funding Act (August 6, 1998 / January 1, 1999)	BGBl. 1998 I p. 2046 ( BGBl. 1998 I p. 2053 )
Fourth law amending the Film Funding Act (December 22, 2003 / January 1, 2004)	BGBl. 2003 I p. 2771 ( BGBl. 2004 I p. 2277 )
Fifth law amending the Film Funding Act (December 22, 2008 / January 1, 2009)	BGBl. 2008 I p. 3000
Sixth law amending the Film Funding Act (July 31, 2010 / August 6, 2010)	BGBl. I p. 1048

With the law on measures to promote German film of December 22, 1967, a legal basis for federal film funding was enacted for the first time; This law already contained essential elements of the law in force today, for example the establishment (§ 1) and the institutional structure of the film funding agency (§§ 3 ff.), the reference film funding (§§ 7 ff.), the short film funding (§ 13), the Promotion of film theater operators (Section 14) and the collection of a film fee (Section 15). The producers of subsidized films were obliged to transfer the television usage rights to the film funding agency (Section 12).

In the first amendment to the Film Funding Act of 1967, the acquisition of television usage rights was replaced by a blocking period for television usage rights for a period of five years (Art. 1 No. 1 and 8). In addition, the existing exception to the possibility of funding for morally and morally objectionable films was extended and films of low quality were also excluded from funding (Art. 1 No. 3 b to Section 7, Paragraph 9).

In the second amendment law, the reference film funding was supplemented by project funding, which - as a predecessor regulation broader than the current project film funding - intended to promote individual projects in the field of film, film theater, film sales or professional film training through conditionally repayable loans; A project commission made up of knowledgeable personalities who were appointed by the civil society and state representatives on the administrative board decided on the funding (Art. 1 No. 12 on §§ 14 a ff).

With the "Law on Measures for the Promotion of German Films (Filmförderungsgesetz - FFG)" from 1979, the previous law was repealed and replaced by a more detailed set of rules. An evaluation and award committee made up of knowledgeable personalities should assess the quality of a film and decide on project funding, which has now been reorganized and split into project film funding, funding for film playback and film sales, and other funding.

The first amendment to the Film Funding Act of 1979 regulated the emerging video industry in particular. Section 30 (1) stipulates a blocking period of six months after the cinema release for the exploitation of subsidized films by image carriers. At the same time, the video industry was used to pay a film fee (Section 66a). In addition, the previous option for funding the modernization or improvement of film theaters was supplemented by a new funding option for the construction of new film theaters (Art. 1 No. 35 a).

The second amendment law regulates the promotion of videos and video libraries (Sections 53 and 56a). It also shortens the blocking period for the use of television rights to three years.

The third amending law shortens the embargo period to two years. In addition, for the first time it contains an express regulation of the film-television agreements that have been in place since 1974, by distinguishing their contributions from other third-party income (Section 67) and determining the use of the contributions (Section 67 b).

In § 1 of the fourth amendment law, the promotion of the "creative and artistic quality of German film" (§ 1) was expressly set down as a goal of the FFG. In addition, the Filmförderungsanstalt was assigned the new task of "supporting the overall economic interests of the film industry, in particular through measures for market research and combating the violation of copyrighted rights of use" (Section 2, Paragraph 1). On the basis of Section 60, the Filmförderungsanstalt supported the “fight against film piracy” and carried out the “Brenner Studies” on copying and downloading feature films.

In the fifth amendment law, the blocking periods for exploitation rights were further shortened (new section 20 ). In addition, a point system has now also been introduced for short films (amendment to Section 41 ).

As a reaction to the order for reference by the Federal Administrative Court (see below), the Sixth Amendment Law provides for a tax obligation for public and private television broadcasters and thus replaces the previous use of voluntary film-television agreements. According to the new version of § 67 FFG in Art. 1 No. 4 of the sixth amendment law, the public television broadcasters should pay 2.5% of the costs they have incurred for cinema films; the private television broadcasters should pay a share of their advertising income, which is graduated according to the share of the cinema films broadcast at the total broadcast time; Broadcasters with a share of the airtime of cinema films of less than 2% of the total airtime are exempt from the tax. This regulation applies retrospectively to January 1, 2004 ( Section 73 (7)); however, no additional claims will be made. With this retroactive legal obligation of the television companies to pay the film tax, the legislature intends to remove the constitutional concerns on which the legal review action pending before the Federal Constitutional Court is based. According to Federal Minister of State for Culture Bernd Neumann, this regulation meets concerns because the federal government, by obliging the broadcasters to pay a film fee, could interfere with the “ cultural sovereignty of the federal states ”, the legislative competence of the federal states in matters of culture; in this case the only alternative would be to finance the film funding agency solely through voluntary agreements with the television broadcasters as well as with the cinema operators and the video industry. The Federal Government, on the other hand, believes that the collection of the special charge is permissible as an annex competence to Art. 73 Para. 1 No. 1 and Art. 74 Para. 1 No. 11 of the Basic Law; it does not go into detail on the particularity of using the state media authorities to pay the film levy.

Case law on the constitutionality of the Film Funding Act

In 1974 the Federal Administrative Court did not doubt the levying of the film tax and in particular the constitutionality of the Film Funding Act in its original version. The Federal Administrative Court classified the film levy as a so-called special levy and considered the legislative competence to levy it to be covered by Art. 74 No. 11 GG; It also rejected a violation of Articles 3 and 14 of the Basic Law, since the fee would benefit the film theater operators as the addressees of the fee and therefore the special fee would not be of any benefit to others.

With a decision of December 9, 1999, the Federal Constitutional Court suspended constitutional complaint proceedings after the complainants withdrew their complaints. It has expressly left open the questions whether the collection of the film fee is covered by the legislative competence of the federal government and whether the collection of the fee without consulting the television broadcasters is compatible with Article 3 (1) of the Basic Law.

Doubts about the compatibility of the levying of the film tax with Art. 3 Abs. 1 GG and Art. 20 Abs. 3 GG on the basis of the Fifth Act amending the Film Funding Act (2008) expressed the Federal Administrative Court in its order for reference of 25 February 2009: By the television broadcasters would not be involved in the financing of the film funding by law, but only through contracts to be negotiated between them and the film funding agency, the regulation on film levy would violate the principle of equality in Article 3 (1) of the Basic Law. It is true that the regulation to use the television broadcasters through contracts with the film funding agency to co-finance the film funding is not as such unconstitutional; However, the Federal Administrative Court is convinced that Article 3 (1) and Article 20 (3) of the Basic Law are violated by the fact that the Film Funding Act does not specify any criteria for the negotiation of these contracts, in particular no minimum level of participation by television broadcasters. Now that the television broadcasters were obliged to pay retrospectively with the Sixth Amendment Act from 2010 (and no longer only make payments within the framework of voluntary agreements), the Federal Administrative Court has withdrawn its decision for submission to the Federal Constitutional Court; his concerns about the constitutionality were dispelled by the Sixth Amendment Act. The judges had no concerns about the competence of the federal government, which the plaintiffs also questioned, or the admissibility of the retroactive effect of the law.