Film is playing a more and more important role in the One Belt and One Road initiative (the new Silk Economic and Maritime roads linking China with Europe).

This year's Shanghai International Film Festival (SIFF) launched the One Belt One Road - World Cinema Forum bringing in filmmakers from associated countries to share their experiences and thoughts on National Cinema from filmmaking, distribution and exhibition aspects.

Representatives from the Tallinn Black Nights Film Festival of Estonia, the Cairo International Film Festival and the SIFF signed a strategic cooperation contracts.

World Cinema and National Cinema have been long-appreciated concepts that have changed constantly with different historical and social influences.

Forum guests discussed how National Cinema filmmakers from different countries and cultural backgrounds could work together to fulfill the promise of World Cinema.

How can each country promote its own filmic products overseas while introducing its own cultures and traditions to local and international audiences?

Speakers at the One Belt One Road - World Cinema Forum Photo: Qi Xijia/GT

A strong team

Tiina Lokk-Tramberg, director of Estonian Black Nights Film Festival, said that although Estonia was a small country with a population of only 1.3 million people it had a strong production team for animated and feature films that attracted international audiences.

One good example was the 2013 anti-war film Tangerines which was nominated for an Oscar and a Golden Globe. Films like this also had a good domestic box office record.

"I am proud to say Estonian movies are more watched in Estonia than Hollywood movies," Lokk-Tramberg said.

In India, although Hollywood films are popular there is also a strong domestic market which not only promotes Bollywood movies but also regionally centered films.

"Although Hindi is our national language each region has its own culture and language," said Anu Rangachar, head of the International Program at the JioMAMI Mumbai Film Festival.

And sometimes films from small countries succeed because they are different in that they do not follow standard formats.

"Hollywood and Bollywood movies are largely similar and remind one of huge industries. You can predict in big industry screen writing how a scenario starts and how it ends but if you are watching a movie from a small country you never know what the director is up to - it's always a surprise, interesting, fresh and urges you to learn more about the culture behind it," Lokk-Tramberg said.

Countering the Hollywood titans these smaller countries are embracing co-productions.

Posters for Tangerines, Grace of Monaco and Iron Man Photos: mtime.com

A positive way

Magda Wassef, president of the Cairo International Film Festival said co-productions were a positive way of opening up the international film market.

Wassef said that Egypt worked with European and Arabic countries and she was looking forward to more collaborations with China and India. "I think it will be a win-win situation."

Lokk-Tramberg viewed international film collaboration as a model for the future especially for small countries. Film collaborations in Estonia started in the 1990s working mainly with filmmakers from Finland and Sweden.

"It makes films more universal. It helps to take the message out of your country and distribute it into other countries. I think it is the way of the future at least for us small countries," Lokk-Tramberg said.

In recent years China has also begun co-production deals, especially with Hollywood studios.

Su Yantao, president of Chinese American Film Festival said that the core of collaboration between China and Hollywood had now shifted from merely telling a Chinese story in English to production and funding.

"Films like Grace of Monaco (starring Nicole Kidman) and the Iron Man series (starring Robert Downey Jr) all have Chinese funding," Su said.

While co-productions encourage culture exchanges filmmakers also questioned how they could maintain the cultural identities of their own countries.

"Hollywood is like a big factory where everything can be eaten up. If I were a Chinese filmmaker, I would be afraid I would be eaten up by Hollywood," Lokk-Tramberg said.

Discussing this while Su admitted that in the past Hollywood was predominant, the development and opening-up of world markets meant China and America were able to stand shoulder to shoulder.

"The US brought the Kung Fu Panda to their film but with the rise of the Chinese film industry, in the latest installment that very same panda returned to Shanghai for postproduction. This shows that Chinese culture and American culture can now match each other," Su said.