While other provinces are upping tax credits, some in Alberta’s production community are pushing for different ways of attracting bigger productions.

Unlike any other province, Alberta does not offer a tax credit based on labor. Instead, the Alberta Film Development Program offers a 20% rebate on a production’s entire Alberta spend, and requires producers from outside the province to partner with a local producer in order to access funding.

As a result of the AFDP, there is little pure service production in the province, but rather a mixture of coproductions and coventures. While a significant percentage of coventures in Alberta are with U.S. partners, interprovincial coproductions are still important to the local industry, says Alberta Filmworks principal Doug MacLeod, who is also president of the Alberta Motion Picture Industries Association.

MacLeod is one of few who is openly concerned that tax-credit increases in B.C., Ontario and Quebec have the potential to negatively affect the local industry.

‘If our traditional coproducing partners in Canada were to come to the conclusion that the benefits had been enhanced in their own home provinces enough that they could do the job there without needing partners, that could create a problem for sure,’ he says.

Another source of concern among Alberta producers is limits placed on the size and type of production the AFDP can support. The program is currently worth $11 million per year and has a cap of $750,000 per MOW or feature. As a result, Alberta coproductions tend to be MOWs and don’t often exceed budgets of $10 million, something MacLeod would like to see change.

He says the province has the manufacturing and technical capacity to produce features with budgets of up to $50 million, and in order to grow the provincial industry, its funding structure has to grow also.

To this end, MacLeod, along with a coalition of Alberta stakeholders, hopes to encourage the provincial government to increase the overall size of the AFDP and its caps on individual productions. The group recently submitted a three-year business plan to the provincial government that outlines an aggressive strategy aiming to dramatically increase production volumes. Although the plan does not directly address tax-credit hikes in the major production centers, MacLeod says the proposed adjustments to the AFDP ‘would have the net result of keeping the playing field level.’

AMPIA executive director Alan Brooks would also welcome adjustments to the AFDP, as American producers are becoming Alberta’s primary coproduction partners.

‘There is some dialogue with other provinces, but the focus seems to be heading toward coproducing with the U.S.,’ says Brooks.

According to Calgary film commissioner Beth Thompson, all dramatic productions shot in Alberta last year were coproduced with foreign partners. One of the biggest was the gay-themed Hollywood western Brokeback Mountain.

Thompson says director Ang Lee (Hulk, Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon) fought hard against shooting in Alberta. He would have preferred to shoot in Wyoming, where the story takes place, but the state did not have the necessary infrastructure.

‘Ultimately it came down to cost and infrastructure,’ says Thompson. ‘But, in the end, Lee fell in love with Calgary, and when he was leaving, he told me he wanted to come back to shoot a hockey movie.’

Lee, who had never seen a hockey game before, fell for the sport while shooting Brokeback, which happened to coincide with the Calgary Flames’ 2004 Stanley Cup playoff run.

While Thompson does not have any big upcoming service productions to announce at this time, she confirms rumors that Hollywood hunk Brad Pitt may be coming to town. Calgary is up against New Mexico and Colorado to land a big-budget western about outlaw Jesse James, starring Pitt, that would start shooting in the fall.

-www.albertafilmworks.com

-www.ampia.org