ELMA's mission is to create new avenues for better cultural understanding between the people of Europe and the USA by celebrating alternative cinema and language study.

"Coming from a working-class background in New York, my parents were not educated, were not in the habit of reading books, so I saw a great deal of film," "This opened up a new world to me. I find that I was fed by those cultures." "Understanding another culture can also breed tolerance."
Martin Scorsese at the Cannes film festival in May 2007 on the launch of his “World Cinema Foundation” (extract from interview By Mike Collett-White – Reuters)