Vancouver producer Brightlight Pictures is opening a Toronto office to take advantage of Ontario’s new 25% all-spend tax credit.

The way Brightlight co-founder Shawn Williamson tells it, Ontario has taken a wrecking ball to the British Columbia film and TV production sector by extending its labor-based tax offset to apply to all production expenses, including travel costs and studio facilities.

‘When Quebec raised their credit to 25% of total expenditures, B.C. put on a flashing yellow light, indicating this is a concern, but we don’t compete with Montreal, but absolutely compete with Toronto,’ Williamson explains.

So alarm bells rang at Brightlight when
Ontario matched Quebec and sweetened its own tax credit. A meeting with Kevin Krueger, B.C.’s minister of tourism, culture and the arts, signaled to Williamson that the fiscally responsible province will not follow Ontario and Quebec’s lead — prompting Williamson to move senior executives and resources to Toronto.

‘The only reason we are going to open an office in Toronto is we don’t expect B.C. will match. So we have no option but to open an office out east,’ Williamson said.

Vancouver-based Straight Line Films, which services visiting U.S. projects with production services, is also considering relocation to Toronto.

‘We need to go where the dollars are. It’s absolutely a consideration for us,’ said Jamie Goehring, head of business development for Straight Line Films.

Jim Mirkopoulos, VP of facility management at Cinespace Film Studios in Toronto, said he noticed an immediate spike in interest from Hollywood producers in the wake of Ontario’s new 25% blanket tax credit, and booked Resident Evil 4 into his studio.

That picture had originally scouted and budgeted for Michigan or Montreal before the shift to Toronto.

The financial benefits of the Ontario and Quebec blanket tax rebate grow with project budgets. Budgets on a $1 million feature are barely changed, but the impact on a mid- to high-budget feature or TV series is potentially massive, which matters greatly in a mobile business.

For example, Brightlight was partnering on an $11 million Hollywood feature that was booked into Vancouver, and then pulled up stakes and moved production to Toronto after Krueger personally told a studio executive that the province would not match Ontario’s sweetened tax offset.

Ontario and Quebec now market their tax rebate to Hollywood as being more lucrative to U.S. producers, both in dollar value and the percentage of a budget it encompasses.

The unnamed $11 million feature Brightlight is part of stood to receive a $950,000 rebate on the existing 25% tax credit, and the calculation jumps to a $1.7 million offset under the new tax credit, Williamson estimates.

In a U.S. indie film industry, where international sales have collapsed and securing financing is increasingly difficult, Williamson says shooting in Ontario becomes a ‘no-brainer’ if Ontario can add $1 million to the budget.

‘You shoot Ontario. You will forgo conveniences,’ he adds, referring to Vancouver’s time zone and proximity to Los Angeles.

Brightlight is also shifting production on The Saint TV series remake, which was written for Vancouver, to either Toronto or Montreal.

The episodic scripts, which include a host of waterfront action scenes, are currently being broken down by film commissions in either city to find the best location for the TV series.