cheesenightmare
Head Administrator
Global user
Registered: 10-2005
Posts: 876
Karma: 1 (+1/-0)
|
|
Reply | Quote
|
|
IF Magazine Letter of the Month
Hey all. I recently sent got chatting via email to a journalist at IF Magazine. We sent a few thoughts back and forth and eventually I sent through a few of my thoughts about the Australian Film Industry.
They asked me to cut it down to 300 words and I tried but it stayed at about 600. Then they published their cut and I found out about it when I got an email telling me it was featured as letter of the month - which is nice 
I am in London and the moment and haven't read their cut of what i said, so I thought I'd post what they could print here.
So below is what i actually wrote to IF Magazine. I'd love to hear you thoughts...
Cheers Doug_
___________________________
Sometime in the late 80's (I think I was about 12 at the time) I remember thinking that it was odd that Australian films were clearly lacking compared to the rest of the world and yet Australian music - as in popular rock music - was absolutely world class with Midnight Oil, AC/DC and INXS going strong at the time.
Lately the thought has returned to me. Now, the likes of Silverchair, Powderfinger, John Butler, Eskimo Joe and others are carrying the flame. The Australian Film Industry flame? Its a lone cigarette lighter being waved in an empty rock arena.
But why? It had occurred to me that Australian Film and Australian Music were two arms of the entertainment industry running in in a sort of parallel.
They both require discovery of fresh talent. They both require marketing, exposure and investment of capital. Both branches of the entertainment industry exist at the juncture of art and commerce. Both are cultural expressions. Yet one is absolutely world class while the other is struggling.
The difference? 20 years later, here's my humble observation:
One is built on government support, while the other operates exclusively in the free market. One has all the fresh talent in the garage or the pubs or the recording studio. The other has all the new talent on the AFC website preparing for the next round of grants, ticking boxes that satisfy the guidelines, with barely a thought for any audience beyond the bureaucrats in charge of the money.
What if the film industry took its cue from the music industry? What if it had to stand on its own two feet?
Film funding theory talks about the benefits of subsidising local productions so Australia can have a 'voice' on the world stage, and that we?d be drowned out in a free market if we didn?t have it. But our music industry proves that our culture doesn?t drown in a free market. Its voice grows stronger. Our cultural voice is not put into the mouths of music artists by government mandate.
Yet that is what the government presumes to do with the film industry. And by government, of course I mean ourselves.
Government intervention creates an artificial drag on our talent by paying them to work on mediocre films that fit AFC?s guidelines, and this work then gets highlighted as the best that we have to offer. Only in a free market can a film survive on its own merits. An unsellable script would never get produced in a free market. But with the right connections and by ticking at the appropriate boxes, it gets made with aid from the government.
In a free market, no one's going to put his money into a film unless the script is marketable. And if your argument is that commercial equals crap and only the government can produce quality then go listen to Silverchair?s album Straight Lines. It's fantastic. And if you don't think so, no problem. You didn't pay for it in taxes.
The worlds first feature film "The Story of the Kelly Gang" was made in 1906 in Melbourne, told a distinctly Australian story, screened in Australia, New Zealand and The UK, made the producers a fortune...and it was a privately funded product of the free market.
Sales make an industry. Grants make a bureaucracy. Hence we have no Australian film industry...we have a flourishing Bureaucracy.
DOUGLAS SUITER
www.SydneyFCP.info
---
Doug Suiter.
Freelance Director, Promos, Post & Creative.
LondonFCP/SydneyFCP Administrator.
Find Local FCP Operators (Sydney & London) at the FCP Talent Registry: www.FCPTalent.com
|
|
2/Jun/2008, 1:05 am
|
Send Email to cheesenightmare
Send PM to cheesenightmare
|
