Is B.C.'s domestic film and TV industry suffering from neglect?
Shawn Williamson, cochairman of the Vancouver production company Brightlight Pictures, loves British Columbia. A North Vancouver native, he remains fiercely loyal to his roots and vows his company will never leave the province.
Even so, when the Ontario government announced in June 2009 that it was expanding its tax credits for domestic productions, Williamson and his business partner, Stephen Hegyes, didn’t waste time: two months later they announced they were moving the bulk of their domestic production staff to Toronto.
“We were made aware quickly that the B.C. government would not match or get close to the credits in Ontario,” Williamson tells the Straight by phone. “It’s very unlikely we’ll shoot any domestic production here. We used to do tons here, but we’ve now opened an office up there and have staff there. We’ve laid staff off in Vancouver to allow for that, from a budget perspective.” According to Williamson, Brightlight has gone from spending $20 million a year in B.C. to $2 million last year.
It’s stories like Williamson’s that have the B.C. branch of the Canadian Media Production Association concerned. “We’re on a downward trend with respect to Canadian content or domestic production here,” its managing vice-president for operations and member services, Liz Shorten, says by phone. “The lifeblood of our members is the various financial incentives that they have at their fingertips to use.”
In the run-up to Christy Clark’s election as premier designate, the CMPA-BC pressed all Liberal candidates to restore research and development funding to B.C. Film at $2 million a year for five years (the most recent budget allocated it just $941,000) and implement tax-credit adjustments of $3 million to favour local production.
With celebrity blogs plastered with images of Tom Cruise parading around Science World and Kristen Stewart and Ashley Greene arriving at YVR, you’d be forgiven for thinking all is well in the local film and television industries. Figures on foreign production expenditures collected by the B.C. Film Commission even increased from $1.2 billion to $1.3 billion between 2008 and 2009 (although the number of television and film products declined over that same period from 260 to 239). And last month, the federal government handed over $969,000 to Capilano University for its new Nat and Flora Bosa Centre for Film and Animation and $510,000 to the Motion Picture Production Industry Association of British Columbia, to help with a three-year strategy aimed at attracting investment in B.C.’s film, television, and digital production industries.
But when it comes to domestic production, the situation looks about as rosy as a scene from 127 Hours. Between 2008 and 2009, expenditures fell from $366 million to $218 million. Go back to 2007, and the decline is even more striking: that year saw $407 million in domestic production. Figures from 2010 are yet to be released, but Shorten expects them to come in under $200 million.
B.C.’s tax credits aren’t insignificant. Domestic productions get a cut of 35 percent on the cost of labour, and in February 2010, then-Minister for Tourism, Culture, and the Arts Kevin Krueger announced his ministry was raising the foreign tax credit to 33 percent of labour costs, up from 25 percent, as well as introducing a new interactive digital media tax credit of 17.5 percent of labour costs. But when Ontario one-upped B.C.’s incentives in June 2009 by expanding its 25 percent tax credit to all expenses in the province, Beautiful British Columbia suddenly looked a lot less attractive.
“The all-spend credit in Ontario is much more lucrative,” says Shorten. “I’ve heard producers say for a television series it’s $100,000 an episode cheaper to shoot in Ontario right now than in B.C. That’s a no-brainer, right?”
Foreign productions simply can’t take the place of a healthy local industry, explains Jackson Davies. Davies, best known for his 16-year role in The Beachcombers, is a member of the Alliance of Canadian Cinema, Television and Radio Artists National Executive, and sits on the board of the B.C. Arts Council. He calls himself a poster boy for indigenous production.
“I was lucky enough that, over my career, from when I started that series [The Beachcombers] at 23 until when I was 40, I basically could afford to live here,” he says by phone. “I didn’t have to go to the States to get another job, so I became a part of the community.”¦ People forget that when you have Canadian indigenous shows, shows that are shot in B.C., it’s a training ground for the actors, but also the crews, writers, and technicians. And you can’t get that if you’re in a service industry. You need B.C. or Canadian productions done here for that particular reason.”
Shorten insists there’s no shortage of local talent. Documentaries like 65_RedRoses and TV shows like Anna & Kristina's Grocery Bag, Sanctuary, The Cupcake Girls, and Hiccups prove that B.C. has the right ingredients for a thriving domestic industry. All it requires is a little bit of vision on the part of decision-makers in Victoria. Without that, says Davies, B.C. will be left at the mercy of notoriously fickle foreign productions. “There’s a reason there’s tires on those trucks,” he quips. “They do move.”
Comments
19 Comments
estevez
Mar 8, 2011 at 11:08pm
I don't get why the film industry deserves free taxpayer money, when photography studios or clothing shops or bookstores or accounting firms or engineering companies have to pay their fair share. Maybe the fact that Ontario gives away their money to an unprofitable industry is one of the reasons why it's in such an awful financial shape.
Joni
Mar 9, 2011 at 2:43am
Re Estevez... You dumb ass , think about it !!
The film industry brings in millions and millions of dollars to the local economy. Benefits rental houses , property owners , caering and food , and small shop owners benefit from all the money injected into local business .
Not to mention the 30,000 people it employs who also spend their wages locally .
What's to get Estevez , it's a no brained !!!!
virgil miner
Mar 9, 2011 at 7:53am
and dont forget the 20mil to Tom Cruise!
idiot self serving film types think only their industry employ's people when it gets government handouts. What a maroon.
Popcorn Time!!
Mar 9, 2011 at 3:06pm
A note I feel is currently relevant... Of the current top 5 domestic films listed on the sidebar to the right, all five are Quebec productions, and there's no doubt that most of the box office returns are coming from Quebec as well. See, the Quebecois love and support their local film products, while Anglo Canadians for the most part won't give Canuck productions a shot.
You can attribute this to many causes -- Lower budgets and lack of star power which immediately cause snap-judgments, less information available even to interested parties (most domestic film press is in French, inaccessible to us Anglos even if the films themselves are in English), less cultural clout in general. Many films considered classics of Canadian cinema were totally ignored or even vilified at home at the time of release, only finding success abroad. David Cronenberg, one of Canada's finest artistic exports, was crucified in the Canadian press for his first film, Shivers, and has been the subject of much scorn ever since. Where does he make his movies now? Hollywood, of course.
These days, even potentially mass-marketable fare (like the currently lauded Barney's Version, or all the great genre pictures we've recently spawned like Pontypool and Fido) find themselves lost in the shuffle of bad distribution and worse marketing. We write them off before they're out of the gate, release them in five theatres, tell nobody about them, and act like it's the film's fault when it fails. If Telefilm Canada's got all this money to fund movies, then where's their marketing budget?
Ultimately, there's just no local consumer confidence in Canadian films. We don't have a 'buy Canadian' mindset beyond what the CRTC forces upon us (and which inspires a predictable backlash). When was the last time we wanted to 'buy Canadian' of our own accord? For that reason, the BC film industry is trapped as a service industry for the moment. No amount of tax credits can change that -- only market forces led by consumer choice. And indifference is a self-defeating cycle, hard to break out of. If you consider Hollywood's stranglehold on our theatres to be a culture war, then we've certainly lost. At least for the moment.
So what is the solution? It can only come from film lovers, film press, and filmmakers. It's up to us to spread the word and get excited about Canadian film (and not scoff at the idea of being excited about Canadian film). It's up to us to make those films, and make them better, and make more of them. And of course, buy local.
Roger C
Mar 9, 2011 at 11:37pm
Maybe we need to have more film festivals that showcase and support local films and filmmakers. The growing popularity of film festivals shows that people want more than the cookie cutter factory that is Hollywood. I have seen one film festival, the Vancouver Queer Film Festival, become very good at advocacy at the grassroots level. Last year, they went well above their fundraising goals (maybe almost double?). Some of that money will be used to support local filmmaking.
Steve Y
Mar 10, 2011 at 10:13am
To esteves's point, they should support all those industries similarly. Why don't videogames get the same treatment? How about high tech companies? How about engineering companies? How about financial services? What is particularly special about the movie industry? How about lower taxes for everyone? Starting with payroll taxes.
D Man
Mar 10, 2011 at 12:31pm
I find it funny we can give tax breaks to major corporations, businessman and any other businesses but not to the movie industry. This is a huge business that has been neglected buy the BC Liberals for the past 12 years. Millions if not Billions of dollars is funneled by this industry. Anyone who disputes this fact is uneducated and needs to do there research. (Aka estevez & virgil miner). Wake up you clowns and stop watching TMZ. Morons.
buzz
Mar 10, 2011 at 2:37pm
Gee, When I read the title to the article I just knew it would come down to someone asking for more money from the government (that's money from you and me). Seems the movie industry should stand on it's own two feet just like most other businesses in this province. Everybody wants government money - artists, lawyers, movie producers, housing advocates, transit, bicycle zealots, etc., etc., etc. I'm reminded of John F. Kennedy - "Ask not what your country can do for you, but ask what can you do for your country".
virgil hammer
Mar 10, 2011 at 3:19pm
D MAN is a funny kinda slow type, with his head planted firmly in the core of the 7th planet from the sun to wit "I find it funny we can give tax breaks to major corporations, businessman and any other businesses but not to the movie industry. This is a huge business that has been neglected buy the BC Liberals for the past 12 years. Millions if not Billions of dollars is funneled by this industry. Anyone who disputes this fact is uneducated and needs to do there research."
1. The basic PSTC tax credit is 33%
2. The REGIONAL tax credit is 6%
3. The new DISTANT Location tax credit is 6%
4. DIGITAL ANIMATION or VISUAL EFFECTS tax credit is 17.5%
steve w
Mar 11, 2011 at 8:32am
Joni wrote: "Re Estevez... You dumb ass , think about it !!
The film industry brings in millions and millions of dollars to the local economy. Benefits rental houses , property owners , caering and food , and small shop owners benefit from all the money injected into local business .
Not to mention the 30,000 people it employs who also spend their wages locally .
What's to get Estevez , it's a no brained !!!"
Why does it have to be FILM, though? You can throw money at anything and stimulate an industry with it. Why not education? Or medical research? Or alternate energy programs? Or nuclear arms reduction programs?
I don't even watch movies, so I resent the fact that I'm forced to PAY for them with my tax dollars, which could be put to MUCH better use elsewhere. If this industry is so profitable and so good for the nation, they can pay their fair share. As much as I'm sure guys like Shawn Williamson needs a new yacht or extension in his North Van house, I'd prefer that he find a way to buy it without using my taxes to make a movie that I'll never go see.