An important question for the independent study.
This article about The Artist from the BBC raises some of the issues in particular just how French is this film, and why has it met with such indifference among French audiences. These questions are equally prescient to British cinema which a cynic might say offers either a cutesy or quaint representations to the world, and is predominantly in the thrall of US based multimedia conglomerates.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-radio-and-tv-17588793