In recent years we have witnessed a return of big international productions to our country and finally the beauties of Italy are once again traveling around the world through cinema.
Lately we have climbed on board James Bond’s super-accessorized Aston Martin and enjoyed a high adrenalin tour of the capital at 160 km/hour in “Spectre” (2015), or dashed between Florence and Venice alongside symbology professor Robert Langdon in “Inferno” (2016), and admired the perfection of the Sistine Chapel reconstructed by the maestros of Cinecittà at the service of Paolo Sorrentino and his “The Young Pope” (2016).

This is all due to a policy of tax incentives and investments put in place by the State and Regions and a renewed institutional interest in the Seventh Art that led to the launch, in 2016, of the New Cinema and Audiovisual Law: a measure we had been waiting for since 1965 and that, with a
€ 400 million Fund, finally released the contributions from the instability of the public accounts.
The functions that the New Law assigns to the State include activities aimed at promoting the image of Italy through cinema and audiovisuals for tourism purposes as well, in connection with the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation and also through agreements with the National Tourism Agency (ENIT).

Moreover the Law recommends that the activities aimed at attracting foreign investment in the film and audiovisual sectors in Italy are carried out in agreement with the Ministries and other competent institutions, also taking advantage of the relevant national and international structures through special agreements.
Alongside this strong trajectory the New Law assigns Regions and the autonomous Provinces of Trento and Bolzano the task of valorizing and promoting the artistic heritage of cinema through cataloguing, digitalization and conservation projects also for educational and cultural purposes, involving the movie and audiovisual heritage as well as through media and film libraries in order to valorize regional and local initiatives in a network with the National Film Library Archives.
Sealing this renewed spirit of collaboration between State and Regions in the field of regional promotion also using the lever of movie tourism is the recognition of the role and activities of the Film Commissions, thus rewarding the work carried out by the same in support of audiovisual productions over the last een years.

Within the sphere of this policy and fully aware that the image of a country is, to a great extent, entrusted to cinema and audiovisuals, the Italy for Movies project was created and sealed last January with the signing of a memorandum of understanding by the Cinema and Tourism Directorate-Generals of the Italian Ministry of Cultural Heritage and Activities and Tourism (MiBACT).
A portal, realized by Istituto Luce Cinecittà in collaboration with the association of Italian Film Commissions, at the service of Italian and foreign producers and directors with the strategic objective of intercepting the growing flow of investment from abroad and increasing the attractiveness and visibility of Italian regions from a tourist perspective through theatrical and audiovisual productions.
This is the rst step for anyone interested in shooting their film or audiovisual work in Italy and provides information tools that are easy to consult through a search engine that also refers them for further details to the websites of the individual Film Commissions and the institutions that distribute the Funds.
The work has only just started, but the objective is to place online, for all members of the trade, as much as possible of the unique and varied patrimony of Italian streets, piazzas, palazzos, churches, monuments and beautiful landscapes.
The intention is to limit itself to theatrical locations but, coherently with the New Film Law, the mapping will be extended to include TV series, documentaries and videogames.
The project consistently fits in with the lines of intervention drawn by the Strategic Tourism Plan directed towards strategic interventions that contribute to harmonizing and systematizing the existing planning patrimony whilst at the same time initiating experimental initiatives characterized by a high level of innovation both in terms of the proposals as well as with reference to the target markets and relevant channels of promo-marketing.

The aspiration is that the project will contribute to bringing Italian cinema back to the splendor of the past when we used to export the model of Italian cinema abroad and our movie industry attracted international producers, directors and stars.
A time when colossals of the caliber of “Quo Vadis?” (1951) and “Ben Hur” (1959) contributed to the creation of the legend of Cinecittà, the “dream factory” which was to provide work for generations of craftsmen, extras and employees, or when people used to simply come to Italy to discover the places of “La Dolce vita”.