Ex-BBC chief to head film institute
Greg Dyke, the former Director-General of the BBC, is taking over from Anthony Minghella as chairman of the British Film Institute (BFI), it has been announced.
Dyke, 60, who lost his job at the BBC in 2004 following the publication of the Hutton report into the death of Dr David Kelly, will take up the four-year post next month.
The BFI was created in 1933 and is home to the world's most significant film and TV archive, comprising more than 230,000 movies from 1895 to the present day, 675,000 TV programmes and over four million film stills.
It also has plans for a film centre - as yet unfunded - to house the archive, galleries and show films.
The BFI, which will receive £16 million annual funding from the UK Film Council for the next three years, runs the London Film Festival and holds film and TV screenings at London's Southbank.
Minghella, 54, the Oscar-winning director of The English Patient, has been chairman of the Institute for five years and is stepping down to focus on his own film-making and opera.
Dyke, who started in the TV industry as a researcher for LWT, wants to use the internet to increase access to the films in the renowned archive.
He said: "The BFI has probably got the best film archive in the world. What I believe is essential is that not only are its films preserved but also made available to as wide an audience as possible.
"At a time when the whole world is being changed by the digital revolution, we have a unique opportunity to make content available online to the whole of the education sector and, if we have the rights, to the public at large.
"I started something similar in my time at the BBC and I hope we can expand in this area at the BFI."
1 comment:
An interesting appointment -- let's hope Greg Dyke offers strong creative leadership that extends beyond the digital revolution to a reassessment of the BFI's Realignment Plan.
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