Czech Film Fund Refuses Minister's Bid to Halve Its $38 Million 2027 Budget

All 15 board members of the Czech Audiovisual Fund (Státní fond audiovize), which backs film, TV, animation, video games and screen infrastructure, vote at an extraordinary meeting on 23 October to keep their 787.5 million koruna (roughly $38 million) support plan for 2027, after culture minister Oto Klempíř asked on 21 October for a cut of about 400 million koruna (~$19 million), a fall of roughly 51% to 387.5 million. The board says the cut would save the state budget nothing: the law sets the minimum state subsidy for 2027 at about 228 million koruna (~$11 million), and the rest comes from the fund's levies on cinema tickets, retransmitted TV, on-demand services and TV advertising. The plan was split into calls across all four support categories in September and calls have been opening since October, which the fund's statute forbids changing; the government broke off discussion of the fund's 2027 budget on 19 October and has not yet sent it to parliament.