Perth City council will meet today to plan the arrival of Film-Com Down Under in September, the first time the event will be held outside the United States.

The annual festival started in Nashville in 2010, and will showcase Perth to international film executives in the hope of enticing them to shoot their next project in Western Australia.

Film-com Down Under director Melanie Phillips said Australians who attended the event overseas had encouraged organisers to hold it in Perth.

“Over the last six years, the number of Australian attendees at the Nashville event has increased, and so [we] realised there was a definite interest from Australia and also a vacuum in this type of event,” she said.

“Holding it in Australia would make the event more accessible to not only Australian but New Zealand and Asian film makers too.”

Film-Com is a financing, packaging and distribution market, created as a platform for local and international filmmakers to connect with Hollywood executives and learn from masters in the field.

Those who attend the festival will have the opportunity to pitch their ideas and to link up with domestic and foreign banks, financiers, co-production partners and other groups involved in film.

Organisers said they expected more than 40,000 people to attend the week-long event.

The council revealed in the agenda for today’s meeting that it had been asked to provide $20,000 for corporate sponsorship of the event, which included the cost of hiring Forrest Place Mall and Northbridge Piazza for four days.

The agenda said “two other high profile local government authorities “ had offered cash sponsorships to host the event, but organisers wanted the even held in the CBD.

“Primarily, one of our main marketing points is to showcase the wonders of Perth to both our international guests and attendees,” Ms Phillips said.

“Most of the executives have been to Australia, but only the east coast. We would love them to see what Perth has to offer and hopefully entice them to shoot future film projects here.”

Ms Phillips said she hoped the event would be held annually in Perth.

Film-Com will run during the first week of September.