It has been two months since SaskFilm implemented revisions to its provincial tax credit, putting it on par with Manitoba’s as the most attractive in the country. And although production has not significantly increased yet, interest from producers both in and out of the province has been steady and noted, according to Susanne Bell, acting Saskatchewan film commissioner and SaskFilm CEO.

In the last year, Manitoba also boosted its incentive, growing interest in prairie production that was once reserved for Alberta. That province, meanwhile, has hosted some major productions, thanks to its grant-based Alberta Film Development Program incentive, created in the late 1990s. Manitoba and Saskatchewan are hoping to see similar success, and have reason to believe they will as 2006 unfolds.

Revisions to the Saskatchewan Film Employment Tax Credit were first announced at the American Film Market in Los Angeles last November. The incentive, similar to Manitoba’s, offers producers up to 55% in credits on each project. The base credit for labor is now 45% (up from the previous 35%), with options for another 5% if a production shoots 25 miles or more outside of Saskatoon or Regina, and a new key-position bonus of 5% for projects of $3 million or more in which six key crew positions are filled by Saskatchewan residents.

Saskatchewan garnered attention for hosting Terry Gilliam’s fantasy feature Tideland in 2004 on the strength of its previous credit and its Canada Saskatchewan Production Studios in Regina.

‘We have received more than double what we did last year in terms of [production] inquiries, and the majority has been in the last four months,’ says Bell, who took over as commish/CEO after Valerie Creighton was hired away as president of the Canadian Television Fund.

Kevin DeWalt, president of Regina’s Minds Eye Entertainment and head of the Saskatchewan Film Producers Association lobby group, says the tax credit is good for the industry, but there is some anxiety about the strain it could put on the local infrastructure.

‘The concern is if it can attract larger feature films, what impact that will have on the indigenous projects in terms of crew,’ notes DeWalt. ‘But the government has really thought this through.’

Dearth of crews

At Minds Eye, DeWalt is developing the feature film In Seclusion, a coproduction with Saskatoon’s Thomega Entertainment, and the MOW Olympic Love: The Salé Pelletier Story with Edmonton’s Panacea Entertainment for CBC, and could be eligible for the full 55% credit for both, depending on where they shoot.

DeWalt says SaskFilm has a plan in place to combat a possible dearth of crews, which includes a soon-to-be-announced training initiative being developed with the SFPA.

Likewise in Manitoba, there will always be friction between local producers and the unions and guilds over where crew energies are best devoted in the busy production times.

Jamie Brown, CEO/executive producer of Winnipeg’s Frantic Films, is of two minds on the issue, being both a local producer and outgoing chair of the Manitoba Motion Picture Industry Association.

‘From an industry perspective, the more the merrier,’ says Brown. ‘It means more jobs and more money for the province. That’s what [the incentives] are there for.’

The Manitoba tax credit, like Saskatchewan’s, offers a 45% base credit, and 5% bonuses for rural work (35 kilometers out of Winnipeg) and a key-position bonus.

‘In a perfect world, all the work would be for proprietary, Manitoba-owned projects, and the same could be said for B.C. and Ontario, but at this stage that is not realistic,’ says Brown.

According to Brown, since the province revised its credit last year, there has ‘definitely been an uptick in interest in producing in Manitoba.’ He says Frantic – which both produces dramatic, lifestyle and doc programs, and provides animation and FX work – has received many inquiries from interested producers, and is in talks with one.

‘A very secure and specific proposal for Frantic to take on multi-millions in 2D animation work has come to us as a result of the tax credit,’ says Brown. ‘As there always is with production decisions, the tax credit is one of the factors, and it was one cited by the company’s CEO specifically.’

Alberta, meanwhile, has seen tangible success with its film incentive model, the $13-million Alberta Film Development Program, which offers a 20% rebate on a foreign producer’s provincial spend – capped at $1.5 million per shoot – as long as that producer is partnered with a local company. (The funds are administered to the Alberta partner.)

Recent Hollywood shoots, including The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford, which shot throughout Alberta and also in Manitoba, and Brokeback Mountain have taken advantage of the incentives, and according to Calgary film commissioner Beth Thompson, the AFDP has been hugely important in attracting this foreign work.

‘Without that program, so much of the stuff that has been done here in the last three years wouldn’t have been done here,’ says Thompson, who cites Brokeback and the currently shooting Merry Christmas, an MOW for ABC Family from Granada USA and producer Craig McNeil, as examples. McNeil was last in Alberta in 2005 shooting The Ron Clark Story for TNT, which, like Brokeback and Jesse James, was produced in partnership with Alberta Filmworks/Alberta Film Entertainment. *