Since its creation in 1995, the Quebec funding agency Société de développement des entreprises culturelles has been instrumental in growing Quebec cinema.

Currently sandwiched among Independence Day and the Lord of the Rings and Harry Potter films in terms of all-time Quebec box office are Séraphin: Un homme et son péché, La Grande séduction and Les Boys I-III . This year sees three films crack the top 20 and $5 million in Quebec box office: C.R.A.Z.Y., Aurore and Horloge biologique. Including Oscar winner Les Invasions barbares, which rounds out the top 20, eight of these homegrown finalists were funded from a combination of tax credits, Telefilm Canada money, and SODEC participation, which averages $1 million per picture.

Just four years ago, la belle province commanded only 4% of its own ticket sales. As of the end of 2004, it had taken a major bite out of Hollywood, increasing its own market share to more than 14% and climbing, according to box office tracker Cineac.

SODEC arrived as part of a sweeping policy for the arts in Quebec initiated by Minister of Heritage Liza Frulla when she was the province’s minister of culture and communications in the early ’90s.

‘It said two things,’ Frulla notes in reference to the original concept. ‘We should have an organization responsible for cultural industries. And we should have an arts council.’

Part two came first. Frulla created the Conseil des arts et des letters du Québec, the first arts council in the province. The next year, she tabled Bill 14 in the National Assembly, proposing the new one-stop agency that would effectively render powerless embattled agency SOGIC, headed by Charles Denis, which then handled film and TV subsidies. The new organization would be comprised of a cinema and television arm, a tax-credit division and a banking section to offer loans and loan guarantees. It would provide support to every stage of production, from script to exhibition.

‘The philosophy was openness. We wanted the industry to be a partner, and the people working in the industry to have an input,’ says Frulla. ‘We didn’t want to have a one-man shop… I had a lot of problems philosophically with the administration of la SOGIC.’

She wasn’t alone. Cité-Amérique producer Lorraine Richard (Séraphin) recalls life pre-SODEC.

‘It was very difficult to access the people who ran [SOGIC],’ she says. ‘They had their agenda, and they didn’t care whether it fit the needs of the people… There’s a much better understanding of the business from SODEC than there was before.’

To that end, SODEC took the time to listen to each sector and created the Conseil national du cinéma et de la télévision, an industry-based committee of 19 members that is still active today.

‘It has certain powers ­- not in the decision-making process, but in terms of objectives, programs and strategy,’ observes Joëlle Levie, SODEC’s director general of cinema and television. ‘The members are all from the industry – from scriptwriters, directors, actors, producers, to post-production representatives and exhibitors.’

Richard headed the committee for the first five years, a time that coincided with Quebec’s first modest box-office successes, including the comedy J’en suis, which took in more than $800,000 at the box office in 1995, and then the smash hit Les Boys, which surpassed $6 million at the till in 1997 despite no SODEC involvement.

‘I don’t think only SODEC was responsible for [this growth],’ Richard notes. ‘But it’s certain that it gave a good push to the film industry, because it became a tool for every player in cinema to have a chance to go and talk and promote cinema, and find the best ways to create programs to finance films.’

Levie believes the timing of SODEC’s launch was good.

‘I think the comedies were a starting point, but it’s not only that,’ she says. ‘Just the fact of a feature film succeeding on the screen became a reality. That is the key point that changed the mentality and the creativity of the industry in Quebec.’

Both Richard and Frulla cite the dismal state of Quebec box office 10 years ago, despite the fact that Quebec TV helped promote a star system and audiences were familiar with the actors.

‘In the ’90s, we were supporting Quebec films, but they had two problems,’ says Frulla. ‘Certain scripts weren’t ‘there’ yet. The other problem was distribution. I remember one [wonderful local film]… We could see it only for three weeks, because the American blockbuster would come in and take all the screen space.’

Of course, the efforts of talent, producers and distributors can’t be underestimated in the meteoric growth of the local industry. But another major factor is certainly the Quebec funding model and SODEC’s place within it. After a minor increase to its funding envelope in 1999, it received an additional $12.5 million in 2003 for cinema alone, raising SODEC’s total budget to $26 million.

The agency briefly funded dramatic TV series in the prepro stage, but Levie says that given the creation of the Canadian Television Fund and that the amount was so limited (about $75,000 per project), it made more sense to funnel the cash to TV documentaries instead. It supports 30 feature-length one-off docs annually.

The combination of funding from Telefilm, a potential 25% SODEC investment (based on a $4.5-million budget), and stackable provincial and federal tax credits that contribute another 30%, has proven a winning formula in getting hit feature films made in Quebec.

‘One of the interesting aspects of the tax credit is that it’s allowed the participation of banks in the production process,’ notes Stéphane Cardin, SODEC’s director general of tax credits. ‘Tax credits are largely recognized as being bankable and are usually financed up to 90%.’ As SODEC looks to the next 10 years, this might prove to be a great incentive in getting more foreign coproducers to the table.

The continuing reality is that very few projects with box-office potential will get made without both Telefilm and SODEC, which operate remarkably in sync.

‘We respect the decision-making process of Telefilm Canada,’ says Levie. ‘We never consult each other for decisions, although we share our decisions before they’re announced. It’s very late in the process. We also explain to each other why we choose projects.’

Levie, who formerly headed Telefilm’s Quebec office, goes on to say that despite the fact that ‘Telefilm Canada has a clear objective of box office that we don’t have,’ at the end of the day, the results are mostly the same in terms of what gets funded.

The challenge for the next five years will be to find the money to sustain the recent growth and success rate, which has manifested itself in a jump in feature film submissions from 56 in 2003 to more than 100 this past year – only 25 of which were given funding. With those kinds of odds, many producers will not be happy with SODEC decisions.

Case in point, the soon-to-be-released biopic Maurice Richard, produced by Cinémaginaire and scripted by Ken Scott (La Grande séduction) was turned down by both Telefilm and SODEC, but upon appeal got funded and is now one of the potential box-office stars to close the year in Quebec.

‘It’s becoming very tough for us to make good decisions, because the pressure is very high,’ says Levie. ‘A film above $4 million cannot be done without us or without Telefilm Canada. We are never sure what will work. The risk is always there.’

www.sodec.gouv.qc.ca