Bio

Intro

I moved to Canada roughly 10 years ago and tried to establish myself here as a producer (I produced films before I moved here too). Since moving here,  I was able to produce a few features but mostly outside of the Canadian funding system.

I noticed my first year in Toronto that there is a group of producers that Telefilm favours and they allocate most of their funding for them. Other funders (in general) follow Telefilm’s lead with the exception of Art Councils since they are mutually exclusive for over $250k projects. I feel it is extremely hard for people to break in unless they can associate themselves with one of THE FAVOURITE companies/producers. In rare cases, Telefilm funds an outsider/new comer, in this case you can be sure that the amount is minimal or only for post production phase, I only witness this case for regional funding not for national. I am not sure how national funding is distributed, recently regional funding executives were criticized, I agree with every word said but I also would like to see the same discussion around National funding body of Telefilm, they (or I should perhaps say -she) distribute millions  of dollars. Who gets what and why is never clear. I am sure they have a system that make sense to themselves and to their management. Otherwise how could such a one MAN/WOMAN decision making mechanism be still in use.  But if this is a public company and funded by tax payers money we should be able to question and understand how it operates.

To me most useful funding in Canada is tax credits since they are automatic. My friends and I discuss if we should only have tax credits as a way of public funding and dissolve all other funding bodies, let’s say have a 50% of tax credits for every production, whoever makes a movie gets 50% of the budget from tax credits. In this case only gate keepers will be distributors/sales agents/streaming services. I prefer their gate keeping to bureaucrats. I think in a such environment, the industry will create its own eco-system and will be more useful to all filmmakers.

Sorry for the long introduction but I feel our current funding system does not work for most of the people and for the future of Canadian film and tv and I’d like to be part of the discussions to change this.

I am very happy that there is this group to discuss and find a way to address this problemS.  Thanks a lot.

Reel/Clips