Paris-based The Party Film Sales, attached to Oscar-nominated “The Voice of Hind Rajab” and Cannes Un Certain Regard winner “Congo Boy,” has inked multiple deals on the French documentary “Tax Me (If You Can),” helmed by Thomas Lafarge (“The World According to Amazon,” “In the Murky Waters of BNP Paribas”).
New pubcasters on board the Little Big Story production include RTVE in Spain, RTS in Switzerland, RTV in Slovenia and YLE in Finland. The deals were announced on the eve of the French TV confab Unifrance Rendez-Vous in Le Havre, and ahead of the documentary’s national launch on Arte France’s streamer arte.tv Sept. 8 and ARTE channel Sept. 14.
“Managing to secure leading European broadcasters so quickly, ahead of the first broadcast, is a very encouraging sign, particularly in the current challenging market where public broadcasters and their funding are facing significant pressure,” said The Party Film Sales’ Estelle de Araujo, co-head of international sales.
Describing Thomas Lafarge’s film as “an economic investigation, a documentary tackling some crucial and current political issues,” De Araujo also said “the fact that broadcasters have chosen to air it so fast is therefore an encouraging editorial and political signal. It shows a real appetite for these topics from the decision-makers who have a key role to play in bringing them to wider audiences.”
Shopped as a 52 minute-feature or a two-parter of 45 minutes, “Tax Me (If You Can!)” is the latest dive into the financial clout of the power-players of this world from investigative journalist and filmmaker Thomas Lafarge, co-director with Adrien Pinon of “The World According to Amazon” and “In the Murky Water of BNP Paribas” with Xavier Harel.
In his new film, the 38-year-old helmer turns on the power of money and potential ways of changing the rules of the games. He investigates both how the ultra-rich have seen their fortunes soar in the last 20 years, while the “trickle-down” economics theory promoted by U.S. economist Arthur Laffer has been gaining momentum as has the emerging “tax the rich” movement led by French economist Gabriel Zucman and backed by a handful of millionaires including Abigail Disney.
Lafarge said reading in the media about multi-millionaires calling for higher taxes was what first caught his attention, together with Olivier Lamour who came up with the idea, and producer Valérie Montmartin. “The traditional approach would have been to reach out to Oxfam or Attac, which have been working on these issues for decades, but as Chuck Collins puts it so well in the film, “A dog biting a man is no surprise, but a man biting a dog – that’s news!” And ultra-rich people asking to be taxed is a man bites dog story,” Lafarge said.
Then accessing Zucman was a mix of intuition and luck. “I’d been familiar with this economist’s work for a long time, and when I approached his team, they told me to come to Washington for the G20. They told me that something interesting was going to happen. But I had no idea that it would be the starting point for an international campaign on taxing billionaires, which is now part of the public debate in France, the U.K., Sweden, and the United States.”
However, getting the uber-rich to actually open up about their wealth was the biggest challenge.
“People often think that wealthy French people have a problem talking about money. But in reality, wealthy people all over the world have a problem talking about money. Even those who want to pay more taxes. They know they’re exposing themselves to risks, and they’re very cautious,” Lafarge said.
With this film, De Araujo hopes issues such as inequality, the concentration of wealth, and the debate around fair taxation of the ultra-rich “will have a strong global resonance.”
At this week’s Unifrance Rendez-Vous in Le Havre, the sales executive aims to lock new deals from partners who have already expressed interest, especially from the Nordics, Japan, Portugal, Eastern Europe, and in the rest of the world.
“Tax Me (If You Can!)” was produced by Little Big Story (“Nicole Kidman, Eyes Wide Open,” “Welded Together”) in co-production with Arte France, in association with Public Sénat, and support from the CNC, PROCIREP, Société des Producteurs, ANGOA, and Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes Region.
The Unifrance Rendez-Vous market runs Sept-7-10 in Le Havre, Normandy.