Interview with Matthijs Wouter Knol - the CEO and director of the European Film Academy.
Teresa Vena
How do you want to position the European Film Academy in the long term?
In 2021, I took over as managing director with the intention of turning the European Film Academy into an institution that doesn’t just focus on celebrating European films in a small, elite circle and primarily looks after its own members. Of course, this remains very important, and the Academy has achieved this extremely well for a very long time. But due to the fact that the world as a whole, and therefore also the world of European cinema, has changed significantly in recent decades, the Academy must not fall out of step with the times. Not least because of digitalisation, audiences’ habits and expectations have changed considerably in recent years. In order not to lose touch with reality, to remain on track, the Academy’s structures must become more effective. We need to adapt to developments in terms of how the Academy works, how it operates and communicates and, in particular, on what it focuses.
What is the biggest challenge for the Academy?
The Academy is currently transforming itself into an institution with a much broader focus. We want to make European cinema more relevant and more visible again. With a president like Juliette Binoche, we should be able to achieve this even better. European cinema has nothing to gain from being run by a few people as a hobby on the sidelines. European cinema represents much more than this. Those who know it generally like it very much. But the problem is that European cinema doesn’t reach a vast audience, and is therefore also unpopular in a diffuse way.
How would you categorise Swiss cinema in the European context?
Swiss cinema is a part of European cinema. There are many creatives, as in other countries, who are well known throughout Europe. In recent years, I have been increasingly involved with Swiss filmmaking and have seen many exciting works that have also caused a stir and been critically acclaimed internationally. In smaller countries, people tend to be dissatisfied more quickly when it comes to the reach of their films. But in Switzerland, marketing also depends on the language and the available funding. Nevertheless, Switzerland possesses a good film infrastructure. By this I mean, for example, the festival in Locarno, which enjoys an excellent reputation all over the world, but also the festivals in Geneva or Zurich. The latter in particular has developed significantly in a short time. For a small country like Switzerland, that is truly remarkable. So there is a lot happening in Switzerland. We also saw how diverse the country is during the preparations for staging the European Film Awards in Lucerne. As the European Film Academy, we are committed to making the diversity of Europe visible, with its different voices, cultures, languages, histories and contexts. And Swiss voices, with their linguistic diversity and other particularities, are part of this. Swiss film has a solid foothold within European cinema. One of the reasons why we are organising the awards ceremony in Lucerne is to once again raise awareness of Switzerland and also of its filmmaking throughout Europe.
How do you decide on the location for the awards ceremony?
Every other year we organise the European Film Awards in Berlin and in between we put it on in another European city. Switzerland expressed an interest about ten years ago. Now the time has come for European cinema to come to Switzerland. The preparations have taken a little longer compared to other countries, partly because one of the important questions was where exactly in Switzerland the awards ceremony should take place. Over the years, however, a very committed organisational support has emerged. These include the Federal Office of Culture, Swiss Films and, above all, Swiss broadcaster SRG SSR. The cantons and the city of Lucerne have also played an important role. Thanks to this professional development work, the collaboration with the Swiss partners has been extremely pleasant and productive. From the outset, we have had the impression of broad acceptance on the film scene.
What aspects are particularly important to you when organising the European Film Awards?
Particularly important to us was the extensive supporting programme around the awards ceremony organised by our partners in Switzerland. We agreed that European and Swiss cinema deserves more than just a weekend where we present the awards. The events in the support programme, which started in spring and have been showing the diverse relations between Switzerland and the rest of Europe, are aimed at a wide audience as well as the Swiss film industry.
Furthermore, the awards ceremony is embedded in the Europe-wide European Film Month. Cinema screenings of selected European films will take place in almost 100 towns and villages in more than 40 countries. For the people of Europe, for instance, European films nominated for the European Film Awards will be presented to shorten the waiting time until the awards ceremony. There will also be a month-long programme celebrating European cinema on the internet platform of our partner, MUBI.
As in Reykjavík 2022, the topic of sustainability has also been a matter of concern to us. Not only do we want to come together and meet online, we should also be a sustainable festival. Last but not least, we need to enable an online broadcast of the event, but this requires innovative approaches on site.
BIOGRAPHY Polyglot Matthijs Wouter Knol was born in the Netherlands. He studied Contemporary History at Leiden University and the Royal Netherlands Institute in Rome. Prior to this and during his studies, he worked as a journalist. After graduating, beginning in 2001, he became a producer and was involved in over 30 award- winning documentary films, including works by Heddy Honigmann, Maria Ramos and Mani Kaul. Following a brief stint at the IDFA in Amsterdam, he took over as Head of Programming of Berlinale Talents for six years in 2008. He then became director of the European Film Market in Berlin for another six years. Since 2021, he has been managing director of the European Film Academy. He is responsible for the administrative and conceptual organisation of all activities of the Academy and has initiated and developed projects in the areas of film education and film heritage, as well as the “European Film Month”. In this position, Knol is also continuing his commitment to greater diversity and inclusion in the film industry.
Image : European Film Academy, Sebastian Gabsch