Save The British Film Industry.Com

http://www.savethebritishfilmindustry.com/2010/08/the-uk-film-council-betrayal-of-the-british-flm-industry-is-about-to-be-fully-exposed-in-the-battle-for-pinewood-shepperton-sound-stages/

http://filmutopia.typepad.com/film_utopia/2010/09/movie-blog-an-open-letter-to-the-uk-government-about-the-film-industry-lgm.html
(reprinted with permission)
Hard copies sent by the author Clive Davies-Frayne to The Prime Minister, Deputy Prime Minister, Chancellor, Culture Secretary.
Movie Blog: An Open Letter to The UK Government, About The Film Industry #lgm
Dear Conservatives and Lib Dems,
A few weeks ago you announced the demise of the UK Film Council. A move which I publicly supported. I supported it, largely because of my years of experience of dealing with the Film Council’s regional funding bodies, who seem to be held in almost universal contempt, by regional film makers. Let’s face it, regardless of the arguments to support the UK Film Council, the one thing nobody can argue is, that we now have a vibrant and successful film industry. However, that isn’t what this letter is about. This letter is about what what you guys could do now, to transform the UK Film Industry into something that would work and would also be in the public interest.
Firstly, let’s keep the ball rolling and close the regional film funding bodies as well. I see no evidence that they serve either the regions or film making as an industry, or even film making as an art-form. Let’s get rid of them and look at more radical and business oriented approaches to film funding.
Right from the start, I am going to be perfectly honest, what I am going to suggest here, is a strategy which would provide the most help to me as an unknown writer and producer. This is what I would like to see happen, purely because it would make it easier for me, to make movies and to make a profit.
In the past, the focus of film funding has been largely about supporting jobs in the film making profession, rather than supporting creative entrepreneurs. I want to see that change. I want to see the focus of film funding shifted from projects, to producers.
My first suggestion is that state funding for films, ought to be a one time deal. A producer/film company ought to be able to apply for funding, only for one project, the project they believe will kickstart their career. To me this makes perfect sense. It is always going to be tough for an unknown producer to get finance for their first movie. As an unknown they represent an unquantifiable risk to investors. This is the perfect point at which to support the industry. What we really need to get away from, is a system that supports some film makers for their entire careers, whilst leaving other film makers completely unsupported. However, just supporting a film producer for their first major project, isn’t enough. What also needs to happen, is we have to encourage and support new talent to make both a reputation, and a profit, with their first movie. My next suggestions are about how that could be achieved.
I suggest that “first movies” should be required to come in at a total production budget of £300,000. This is about the same budget the major TV broadcasters provide for an hour of drama. An independent producer should be able to deliver ninety minutes for the same amount, whilst still providing wages for their cast and crew. £300,000 is enough money for someone to prove their worth as a producer, without taking insane risks with either state or private investors’ money.
Don’t panic. I am not suggesting that the government fund the full £300,000! Hell, no. What I am suggesting is that the government provide a £100,000 repayable grant, providing this is matched by £100,000 from a broadcaster (in return for UK TV broadcast rights) and £100K from private investors.
The involvement of the UK broadcasters is vital. New producers need to be guided by the existing industry and the public service broadcasters really are the best people to green-light productions. They are also the best partners to help these first time producers achieve international sales. I would like to see the broadcasters actively involved in the micro-budget movie business, using their experience and expertise to help develop new, independent talent. On top of that, by involving the UK broadcasters in the process, you would ensure that every funded movie, at the very least, would be shown on UK television. This alone would be a massive improvement over the current position, where even funded movies struggle to be seen by the public. I know some people argue that we should be investing in digital cinemas, but my take is that UK television is a much better way to expose new talent to the home audience. Let’s get British people excited about our new, home grown talent. Let’s have our new talent exported, by our already established broadcasting institutions. At the same time, let’s minimise the risk for our broadcasters to test out new talent. Their £100,000 investment for 90 minutes of programming, makes it a good deal for them as well.
So, just to recap, so far I have suggested: one time only grants for independent producers’ first films; that these films should be commissioned by the UK broadcasters; and, that UK broadcasters should contribute £100,000 per project in return for the UK TV rights.
However, we still need new producers to find £100,000 of private investment and as an unknown producer is a unquantifiable risk, that is going to be a tall order. However, what if you made it easy for investors to come on board. What if you offered a tax break to anyone who invested £10k or more in a first movie. In fact, what if you offered the same tax break to any movie professional who invested their time “pro-bono” into a project. This would encourage actors and professional crew to invest their time and expertise into micro-budget first movies.
I want you to imagine what our film industry would look like, if first time movie producers had the expert support of our professional broadcasters and further “pro-bono” support from the industry’s best technicians and actors? Instead of trying to find private investment without any history of success or without industry support, new producers could use the “film investment tax break” to enlist the support of the kind of actors and crew that will make the project even more attractive and even more successful. One of the biggest criticisms of UK independent film makers, by BECTU and Equity, has been that unknown producers often ask for professionals to donate time into projects, where the professional has little or no hope of gaining from their participation. Simply by providing a tax break for “first film investors,” whether they invest money or professional skills, it will allow unknown producers to leverage the additional £100,000 they need, to get their project into production.
OK. Let’s do a quick comparison between how things are now and with the film funding I am proposing…
Well, at the moment, an unknown producer has a project. Alone, that producer has to persuade investors to fund the movie, despite the fact that once it is completed, its chances of reaching an audience are very slim indeed. The truth of the matter is, the American studios own and control English language movie distribution… and they aren’t very interested in new English talent. So, basically, a producer struggles alone to get a film made, and then will struggle even harder to get it seen by an audience. Having made their first film, without getting either an audience or making a profit, the same producer will struggle to get their second film made. All of these facts remain true, regardless of what government funding the project does or does not receive. Let’s face it, the existence of the UK FIlm Council did not create a vibrant, successful film industry! It’s time to move on.
What I am proposing, solves most of those problems. New producers get the following: a government grant; support in development from a UK Broadcaster; exposure of the end product to the UK audience, with the potential to benefit from international sales via the broadcasters’ sales agent; and finally, they get to offer tax breaks to investors, which overcomes the “unknown” problem.
Personally, I think the idea of funding one time only, attaching the project to our successful broadcasting industries and exposing the end product to the British public, seems like a sensible and practical business development plan. One that stands a far greater possibility of success, than the previous strategies, which were hopeless. Of course, you are going to have to give the broadcasters percentages of spend, that must be spread across the regions, so they don’t just use it as a “cheap programming” fund… but, working out those issues will be worth the effort.
By abolishing the UK Film Council, you took an important step towards creating a great British Film industry, that supports and encourages new talent… now it’s time for you to go one step further and do something that will actually work.
Let’s face it, you are the guys who claim to be all about making business work… well, now is the time to actually apply that to film funding by funding producer/entrepreneurs.
All the best
Clive Davies-Frayne
media hobo
viva la revolution

http://filmutopia.typepad.com/film_utopia/2010/09/movie-blog-an-open-letter-to-the-uk-government-about-the-film-industry-lgm.html

http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/cutting-edge-radical-arts-funding-2060055.html
What one is not hearing, apart from that brief mention in Edinburgh, is the notion that the cuts, however savage, could also present an opportunity. Instead there is a refusal to accept that the current model of public funding may not actually be the only reasonable and civilised one, or that the present reliance on largely unaccountable quangos to fund and administer most arts bodies, small and large, is not necessarily a democratic one, even though it would be pilloried in novels, plays and films if it existed in any other walk of life.

That is the huge irony of the way the arts are paid for and run in Britain. On stage and screen there is a constant message of imagination, radicalism and challenge to the status quo. But in the way it runs itself, the arts world is one of the most unimaginative and conservative industries in Britain.

Much has been made in recent weeks of the damage that will be done to the nation’s culture if public funds are cut. But, inconvenient as it may be, should we not then be asking how such institutions as the Glyndebourne Opera Festival and the Royal Academy manage to exist on no public funding at all? These are smaller institutions, of course, but the Royal Academy mounts lavish blockbusters, sometimes every bit as stunning as those of the publicly funded Tate and National Gallery and Glyndebourne’s productions can be every bit as stunning as the Royal Opera’s. How does it do it – and keep an expensive building going in Piccadilly – without a penny of public funding? Shouldn’t the arts world that can rouse itself to lobby against a threat of cuts, also rouse itself to study the way the country’s most successful private arts institutions make contacts, find sponsorship, run membership schemes (the RA’s Friends scheme brings in £6m a year) and generally raise money and make a profit? Does Clint Eastwood not have a view on this?

And it’s not just private organisations that can share their wisdom. Julia Fawcett, chief executive of the Lowry Centre in Salford, turned down an offer of increased public funding to cut a deficit. Instead she developed commercial activities, running a conferencing business at the centre and selling tickets for cultural events across the country at her box office, and turned a loss-making arts institution around. Public funding is not a universal panacea.

There are other opportunities to be grasped – both by the arts world and by government. One could, for example, rather than just cutting funding by a set percentage, re-examine the whole way that the arts are funded. Most arts companies in England are funded by the Arts Council, a quango which decides on how to distribute millions of pounds without a single one of its meetings being open to the public or public scrutiny. Question after question in the House of Commons to the arts minister receive the response: “That is a matter for the Arts Council.” It is not the most democratic way to proceed. Again, one can imagine what merriment would be had on stage and screen and in contemporary novels if any other walk of life practised such a lack of accountability. The much-cherished “arm’s length principle” by which the Government department responsible for the arts does not actually run the arts may well have run its course. Democracy is also held at arms length. Again, is this major review of arts funding not a time to at least discuss this?
http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/cutting-edge-radical-arts-funding-2060055.html

http://www.savethebritishfilmindustry.com/2012/03/please-pray-for-the-peace-and-prosperity-of-jerusalem-as-the-psalm-83-war-approaches/