MONTREAL: Galafilm producer Arnie Gelbart says there should be an open dialogue in the industry, and with Canadian Heritage and Telefilm Canada, on the chronic lack of public production resources for English-language projects out of Montreal.

In a July 3 letter to Heritage Minister Sheila Copps, the veteran Montreal film and television producer says English-language TV production out of Montreal is ‘chronically underfunded’ and the same kind of regional allocation thinking is now being applied to the new Canada Feature Film Fund. Gelbart says ‘less than 10% of this [CFFF] selective envelope is available for English language feature films this year. What this is saying to Quebec producers, including those who may have developed their companies producing in French, is that Telefilm will only support one and a quarter feature films per year out of Montreal.’

Gelbart earlier raised the issue in a letter to former Telefilm chairman Laurier LaPierre, and the regional funding split controversy has been aired out, more than once, among CFTPA board members, with seemingly little consensus.

In his letter to Copps, Gelbart makes the claim the ‘unfair allocation ignores the fact Montreal is the second major centre of production, historically where the industry started, where its artisans are widely experienced and internationally recognized.’

Gelbart’s letter suggests that ‘a Quebec allocation of somewhere near 30% represents a fair and justifiable share of the English language envelope for feature film [and television]. While the argument is made elsewhere that ‘Quebec already receives one third of the envelope’ you will agree this refers to French-language production. English-language production is a separate and distinct issue.’

The producer has also asked the minister to publicly reiterate ‘that the one-third French and two-thirds English envelopes are Canada government policy and will not be changed.’

Gelbart says general regional envelopes are established at the beginning of the EIP spending cycle. This year, Telefilm’s English-language production and development resources for feature films produced out of Montreal are expected to be as high as $3.5 million – 7.5% of the $46 million allocated nationally.

Gelbart says the regional allocation (skewed by debatable demographic data) is a product of ‘political, industrial decision-making’ and has little to do with ‘Canadian project quality or the actual capacity of a specific region to produce viable projects.

‘What are we to do with filmmakers such as Francois Girard, Lea Pool, Denys Arcand, Denis Villeneuve, Arto Paragamian and many others who will have to share less than 10% of the English-language national resources?’ Gelbart’s letter asks the minister, adding: ‘What are we to do with Denise Robert, Roger Frappier, Lorraine Richard, Kevin Tierney, Michael Prupas and other major Quebec producers who are also preparing films in English? Are they to be left with one or two films to share while other regions get to make six or 10 films a year?’

Structural factors

Gelbart says the CTF Licence Fee Program ‘is a special case, much less selective,’ in that allocations are awarded on criteria like the level of the licence fee and Canadian content. ‘So there’s no built-in bias other than broadcasters are going to favor projects that they know are going to get fully funded. And even though they might like a [Montreal] project and give CTF money for it, they might also say, ‘We’re not going to get the Telefilm [EIP investment] money because it’s out of Montreal and Montreal never has enough money, therefore let’s not go forward with it.’ And everybody knows everybody else’s business and the name of the game is not to fill out applications, but to get the project made.’

‘I’d rather [feature film selections] were determined by virtue of the quality and the viability, both creative and economic, of a project rather than be about [regional] industrial development,’ says Gelbart.

Gelbart’s Montreal

Gelbart’s vision of Montreal includes ‘both English and French and the marriage of both to produce Canadian works of significance, the Leonard Cohens, the Mordecai Richlers, the Robert Lepages. They come from here and [someone like] Lepage can work as easily in English as in French. So are we going to say, ‘If you’re working in French, we’ll help you but if you’re working in English, we won’t?’

‘There is this anomaly in Canada,’ continues Gelbart. ‘It is not a clean break, it is not two separate nations, and Montreal happens to be a place where both cultures are vibrant and potentially the source of great programs. But why make it very difficult to produce out of Montreal?

‘Of course stories should be told from across the country, and I’m not saying a region shouldn’t be represented, but there has to be a debate about how [funds] are allocated. Because if there are six or seven films that come out of Western Canada and only one, or one and a quarter, out of Quebec in that mix, does that mean you’re going to get the best choice of films?’

Gelbart’s arguments are not about any lack of business activity out of Galafilm, nor an expression the company has ever been unfairly treated by Telefilm.

The house is in fact one of the most successful in Montreal, with good relations historically with CBC and specialty channels like History Television, new business with CTV and partners in Ontario and Alberta, and good relations with coproduction partners and broadcasters in the U.K. Galafilm’s share of this year’s $16-million film and TV production slate is close to $13 million.

‘I really shouldn’t bitch about the system,’ Gelbart says. ‘Compared to other people I’m not badly off. I’m rather well off. But the point is, what the system has to come to grips with is that we have this community in Montreal which is really capable of producing in the English language for the Canadian market and eventually the international market.’