Save B.C. Film? Who from? What for?
Posted: Jan 29th, 2013, 4:05 pm
There's a whole lot more behind the decline of the BC Film industry than trying to suggest that having a VAT would save it from itself. For rich Hollywood Moguls even "Free" is not usually good enough, and they are really good at playing jurisdictions such as B.C., Ontario, and Louisiana off against each other for local taxpayer subsidies. Saying "NO!" to subsidizing these low grade leaches any further than we already are is one position I support.
Nab
Excerpt from: http://staging.rabble.ca/blogs/bloggers ... m-who-what
""Save B.C. Film? Who from? What for?
By
Michael Stewart
| January 28, 2013
Critics say that the tax credit game hurts workers, since Miramax & Co. will always go to the lowest bidder, institutionalizing a climate of displacement and unemployment. Tax credits to billionaire production companies continue to escalate while labourers, who don't see a red cent of income tax deducted, are repeatedly forced to uproot and move their lives to whatever state or province has decided to outbid last year's A-list tax cut. Advocates, 3000 of whom jammed inside the dilapidated former set of Judge Dredd last week to show support for the increased tax credits, say that the credits will pay for themselves through some ancillary economic mysticism -- a theory that coincidentally underwrites the plot for 2012's runaway scatalogical sleeper hit, Movie 43.
I'll let the economists argue over which position has a better chance of Matt Damon's and George Clooney's endorsements; but the question no one has asked yet is: does the B.C. Film Industry deserve to be saved?
The film industry would appear to offer an ideal dénouement to B.C.'s cultural pickle -- with the sole exception that movies made here are awful. Peter Leitch, head of the Motion Picture Production Industry Association of BC, pointed out, presumably to strengthen his case, that Twilight: Breaking Dawn, was not wholly filmed in Vancouver like the previous iterations of the erudite political thriller/sexy vampire agit-prop, but chose Louisiana's business-friendly fiscal effulgence instead -- nary a word for the cost to the social fabric for foisting the first two Twilight films on not only the citizens of British Columbia, but the world.
It's hard for me to support any market incentive which helped bring Smokin' Aces 2, Air Bud: Strikes Back and White Chicks into the world. Indeed, the only justification for having a film industry in B.C. at all is the fact that it produced both Rocky IV (the most sensitive reflection on Soviet-NATO relations in the Cold War era) and, of course, Battlestar Galactica (seasons 1 & 2).
Workers' livelihoods is a serious issue and a good economic policy will ensure that stable, well-paid, unionized work is available to all. But aside from the fact that the argument underwriting increased tax credits for film production tacitly assumes a worker in B.C. deserves a job more than a colleague in Ontario, or that the film industry deserves more public money than, say, the lumber industry or social services, the numbers prove that tax credits (just raised in 2010!) are only a short-term fix and institute a industry-wide culture of disruption, precarity and pandering as labour remains vulnerable to the whims of a never ending bidding war.
As a cultural policy, the idea is terrible. Can someone tell me when the NDP became the party of tax credit and subsidy? When was the last time emerging poets, playwrights or authors were offered $100-million in tax credits? While some economic incentive does benefit independent filmmakers, the proposed policy clearly favours multi-million dollar regurgitation of the incessant dreck leaking northwards from Beverly Hills. Why not invest that money in, to name one example, a public broadcasting television channel or website with a focus on social engagement and artistic inventiveness rather than cheap thrills? Such a plan would create a stable, sustainable industry focussed on employing British Columbians and encouraging their artistic impulses.
As long as we're worried about losing the next Stephanie Meyer epic to whichever state opts to offer a 40% tax credit to Daddy Warbucks, we will continue to develop the cultural heritage we deserve.""
Nab
Excerpt from: http://staging.rabble.ca/blogs/bloggers ... m-who-what
""Save B.C. Film? Who from? What for?
By
Michael Stewart
| January 28, 2013
Critics say that the tax credit game hurts workers, since Miramax & Co. will always go to the lowest bidder, institutionalizing a climate of displacement and unemployment. Tax credits to billionaire production companies continue to escalate while labourers, who don't see a red cent of income tax deducted, are repeatedly forced to uproot and move their lives to whatever state or province has decided to outbid last year's A-list tax cut. Advocates, 3000 of whom jammed inside the dilapidated former set of Judge Dredd last week to show support for the increased tax credits, say that the credits will pay for themselves through some ancillary economic mysticism -- a theory that coincidentally underwrites the plot for 2012's runaway scatalogical sleeper hit, Movie 43.
I'll let the economists argue over which position has a better chance of Matt Damon's and George Clooney's endorsements; but the question no one has asked yet is: does the B.C. Film Industry deserve to be saved?
The film industry would appear to offer an ideal dénouement to B.C.'s cultural pickle -- with the sole exception that movies made here are awful. Peter Leitch, head of the Motion Picture Production Industry Association of BC, pointed out, presumably to strengthen his case, that Twilight: Breaking Dawn, was not wholly filmed in Vancouver like the previous iterations of the erudite political thriller/sexy vampire agit-prop, but chose Louisiana's business-friendly fiscal effulgence instead -- nary a word for the cost to the social fabric for foisting the first two Twilight films on not only the citizens of British Columbia, but the world.
It's hard for me to support any market incentive which helped bring Smokin' Aces 2, Air Bud: Strikes Back and White Chicks into the world. Indeed, the only justification for having a film industry in B.C. at all is the fact that it produced both Rocky IV (the most sensitive reflection on Soviet-NATO relations in the Cold War era) and, of course, Battlestar Galactica (seasons 1 & 2).
Workers' livelihoods is a serious issue and a good economic policy will ensure that stable, well-paid, unionized work is available to all. But aside from the fact that the argument underwriting increased tax credits for film production tacitly assumes a worker in B.C. deserves a job more than a colleague in Ontario, or that the film industry deserves more public money than, say, the lumber industry or social services, the numbers prove that tax credits (just raised in 2010!) are only a short-term fix and institute a industry-wide culture of disruption, precarity and pandering as labour remains vulnerable to the whims of a never ending bidding war.
As a cultural policy, the idea is terrible. Can someone tell me when the NDP became the party of tax credit and subsidy? When was the last time emerging poets, playwrights or authors were offered $100-million in tax credits? While some economic incentive does benefit independent filmmakers, the proposed policy clearly favours multi-million dollar regurgitation of the incessant dreck leaking northwards from Beverly Hills. Why not invest that money in, to name one example, a public broadcasting television channel or website with a focus on social engagement and artistic inventiveness rather than cheap thrills? Such a plan would create a stable, sustainable industry focussed on employing British Columbians and encouraging their artistic impulses.
As long as we're worried about losing the next Stephanie Meyer epic to whichever state opts to offer a 40% tax credit to Daddy Warbucks, we will continue to develop the cultural heritage we deserve.""