French and Italian co-productions and the limits of transnational cinema

This article revisits the concept of transnational cinema in light of the laws concerning French and Italian co-productions since the end of World War II, in an attempt to demonstrate how transnational modes of production negotiate with national modes at the level of financial resources and cultural exchange. It is generally assumed that, unlike national cinema, transnational cinema does not erect any boundaries between films produced in different nation states. However, the basic concern that co-production agreements promote is to assimilate co-produced films into a national culture under the direct tutelage of the nation state. Co-production treaties are made in the interest of domestic film markets and are revealing of a notion of cinema that reaches across borders while positing nationality as an imagined community. A definition of transnational cinema that is above and beyond the limits of the national is ultimately at odds with the limitations embedded in co-productions.