This blog post really, really frustrated me. I'm really sick of these arguments being trotted out every time a publicly-funded Canadian film fails to do well domestically. Here's my response to the original post:
I'm going to do something radical here. I'm going to suggest that the value of a cultural product cannot be measured by financial success. Shocking idea, that. A book or a film or a piece of music can matter, and still not make a dime. And maybe that's okay.
Maybe in a world increasingly driven by materialism, by American cultural domination and by ever-shrinking and increasingly fractured audiences, it's not necessary to demand that a film or a television series enrich the public coffers with huge box office receipts. Telefilm's mandate (as well as the mandate of other publicly-funded creative programs in Canada) is to provide an alternative to American media. That's it. We use public money to fund our films so that Canadian culture (in all its heterogeneous glory) continues to exist.
...continuedFinally, and most importantly, the Canadian film industry contributes $40 billion a year to the GDP. It’s not exactly an industry that sucks the public dry. Even if a film doesn’t recoup its production costs (which, again, is tough to do in a very small country faced with tremendous competition from America and Europe) a movie or a TV show can still benefit the economy. Film and TV productions create jobs, both in industry-specific sense (the cast and crew, catering, wardrobe and prop/set production, and special effects/post-production) but also in secondary or tertiary contexts. An entire community benefits when a film production comes knocking. Why do you think communities fight so hard to attract film productions? Cultural capital is also something that brings huge financial benefits to our country’s tourism industry, and to Canada’s reputation abroad
( ... )
Unfortunately in these tough economic times, arts funding is being pointed to as a luxury. As though by eliminating the peanuts that go to the arts would solve govt budget problems rather than cutting off all those high priced politicians and consultants feeding out of the govt trough.
Comments 3
I'm going to do something radical here. I'm going to suggest that the value of a cultural product cannot be measured by financial success. Shocking idea, that. A book or a film or a piece of music can matter, and still not make a dime. And maybe that's okay.
Maybe in a world increasingly driven by materialism, by American cultural domination and by ever-shrinking and increasingly fractured audiences, it's not necessary to demand that a film or a television series enrich the public coffers with huge box office receipts. Telefilm's mandate (as well as the mandate of other publicly-funded creative programs in Canada) is to provide an alternative to American media. That's it. We use public money to fund our films so that Canadian culture (in all its heterogeneous glory) continues to exist.
Does Passchendaele offer an ( ... )
Reply
Reply
Reply
Leave a comment