Vancouver: Telefilm Canada’s fluctuating funding levels to b.c. feature filmmakers are a function of business cycles, not systematic discrimination, according to Telefilm boss John Taylor.

Responding to an article in the August/September issue of Western trade magazine Reel West, Taylor says the sharp drop in feature film investment in the West is open to interpretation.

‘How are we measuring success?’ Taylor asks. ‘Quantity or quality? Political and cultural questions are not for Telefilm to answer alone.’

According to the Reel West article, Telefilm’s investment in b.c. feature films, as a proportion of the organization’s total funding, dropped from 20% to 6% between fiscal years 1988/89 and 1994/95. Movies funded in 1994/95 were Once in a Blue Moon and Starlight. (The article excludes Margaret’s Museum from the 6% because the film, though funded here, was shot in Nova Scotia.)

Broadcast funding, on the other hand, improved from 5% to 14% over the same period.

The Prairie provinces show no feature film funding for 1994/95 and Alberta shows a large increase in broadcast program funding, from 0.4% to 15%.

Ontario and Quebec, meanwhile, shared 80% of the feature film funding in 1994/95 and 67% of broadcast funding.

Telefilm’s own numbers, however, show that 1988/89 was a bumper year for the feature film business and that subsequent years have been more in line with 1994/95’s tally. In 1991/92, there was no Telefilm money placed in b.c. features at all.

Paradoxically, the fortunes of broadcast funding rise when feature funding falls away. Television funding has swung from a low of $3 million in 1988/89 to $15.5 million in 1991/92.

Nonetheless, critics of Telefilm say the poor investment showing in b.c. flies in the face of a thriving industry that spends more than $400 million in the economy yearly and employs 6,000.

Taylor says the bustling business is pulling local filmmakers away from their own projects to participate in lucrative service work from the u.s.

In 1994/95, which he admits is clearly a dismal year, there was a dearth of scripts and projects qualified for funding.

‘There would be more project applications if there were more dependence on local productions,’ says Taylor.

The Canadian film, he explains, is typically auteur-driven, meaning that the development process can take up to three years. In other cases, as in Saskatchewan and Manitoba, there were no applications to consider at all.

Taylor points to the shift to broadcast as another reason behind the recent decline in feature film funding in the West. That, too, may be a blip in the graph since the Premiere Program – a co-ordinated funding program of Telefilm, the National Film Board and British Columbia Film – attracted 59 applications.

The finalists have been shortlisted and winners will be announced this month.