Francesca Accinelli: Last News

Katherine Brodsky Last year, at the Toronto Intl. Film Festival, Telefilm Canada had launched a campaign to invite audiences to return to cinemas. They called it “Feel Again” and had partnered with distributors, cinemas, festivals, broadcasters, Air Canada — and even filmmaker Director X — to help drive audiences to re-discover Canadian films. “We really spent last summer doing different audience-focused partnerships,” says Francesca Accinelli, VP, promotion, communications and international relations at Telefilm Canada and interim CEO for the past 10 months. “As always, we try and connect with audiences where they are versus creating a whole new audience.” That meant that if they were going to Tim Hortons, part of their strategy was to reach them there.

Katherine Brodsky Canada returns to Mipcom this year after several years of physical absence, and will present its new eco-friendly Canada Pavilion, connecting homegrown producers and production companies with the international market for networking, financing, co-production, acquisitions and sales opportunities.“Telefilm is excited for Canada to have its first physical presence at Mipcom after nearly two years of participating in international events virtually,” says Francesca Accinelli, Telefilm Canada VP of promotion, communication and international relations.Among those attending in person are producers such as Toronto-based Julian De Zotti, who admits that he simply can’t handle doing yet another virtual festival or market.