Should films be governmentally funded?

[etimh]

Man, this is seriously the most insane thread yet. Just take a second and look back at the last page of posts--truly wacky. But entertaining, in an absurdist sort of way.

Tim

[Alex_W]

Films shouldn't be government funded ofcourse, it would be best if the film industries could survive on their own because investors would be happy to put in money in them and films would make a lot of profit. But hey, i live in the Netherlands, where the average person goes to the cinema 1,1 times a year. And we're not really a big country, so that's not helping either. Films cost millions of euros to make, but there's hardly any people who want to invest such amounts, unless it's for Paul Verhoeven or another one of those films-from-famous-dutch-literature. A couple of years ago the government came up with the CV-deal, which in short meant that people could invest without many financial risks. This caused a small explosion of quality movies, but now the government has decided to stop the CV-deal again, god knows why.
So it really depends on the country you live in. Films cost the same everywhere, but in small countries it's really hard to get those amounts through investors, because they're unsure about profits. Which makes you dependent on the government, which in fact hasn't been doing shit to build a film industry for, let's say a 110 years. That's kind of where we're at.

[npcoombs]

From my perspective I have no issues where the money comes from, only who is going to, for what projects and why?

The inherently conservative nature of capitalist funded productions is unlikely to deliver us many cutting edge, subversive or interesting productions in the future.

Other sources include major festivals, which have got involved in funding features such as Ceylan's Uzak.

The Film Council in the Uk tends to be as conservative as the capitalist model, only more hapless and pulling the strings to meet social engineering targets.

I would like to see more films funded through festivals, galleries and Art Councils: who would take a more long term, critical view of work: it's meaning, importance and how it will stand the test of time in decades to come.

[MovieStuff]

Man, this is seriously the most insane thread yet. Just take a second and look back at the last page of posts--truly wacky. But entertaining, in an absurdist sort of way.

:lol: I'll say. Funny stuff but pretty civil, oddly enough.

Roger

[sunrise]

The only thing free under a Socialist System is the right to dispense money to any good friend of the persons who write the cheques or are willing to promote the Socialist Agenda, such as: "the nobility of the Common Man" or artificial concepts such as "multi-culturalism is good in our country and better than if we were all just proud to be in the country which we now live" and "let us ignore the fact that we emigrated because our country of origin was rubbish and we were smart enough to leave."

By God, film-makers are free to pick their own financiers in a free system. They do not rely on a Socialist System driven by overblown Superegos owned by those in power to empower their friends by writing cheques using money which is not their own and does not come from their own bank accounts or credit lines like it does for the financiers. Under the Socialist System, and it is a perfect illustration of its perversion, multi-million dollar films are made on a regular basis which the citizens of that country do not want to see though they paid for them by the sweat of their brow.

Come on, you are either joking, misinformed or plain stupid!

The system you describe is not socialism but corruption which takes place in any system no matter what ideology it is based on. And I don't really now any place in the world today or the past 100 years where film makers where not free to choose their financiers.

In the socialistic system the film maker where never forced to advocate for his financiers more than in the free market system. Can anyone explain the socialistic message in Kuleshov's Chess Fever? Cause I missed it if it was there.

Whether you agree wit the system or not, and choose to make films that hail the system are your own choice. I don't think that neither Eisenstein nor Riefenstahl would say that they where forced or they had a hard time under the system.

Tax payers are forced to pay a lot of money to causes they do not necessarily agree with, but that is the purpose of democracy, isn't it? To give everyone his say?

Communism is great for animators!

Communistic systems supported the arts lavishly, especially modern film arts because it could be spread to the masses and help educate people. Contrary to many people's beliefs not all films produced in the Soviet were propaganda.

Even the profesional moaner Tarkovskij found himself in hard times when he travelled to the "free world" to make films.

I say, Africa is a tremendous example. Left to their own devices, as you point out, all plummets under the guise of Socialism. Under the strong hand of a fatherly sovereign, there is justice and profit.

I don't see many great films comming out of Zimbabwe these days...

a) You have no idea of the rich complexities of Aboriginal cultural (and dietary!) life

Scott, do you know of the TV station run by Aboriginals. It's supposed to be an almost sacred thing since they transformed the old way of story telling to a modern media. And people from a western culture say that it is hard to make any meaning from it that we can understand.

michael

[timdrage]

The official ideology abounds with contradictions even when there is no practical reason for them. Thus, the Party rejects and vilifies every principle for which the Socialist movement originally stood, and it chooses to do this in the name of Socialism.

[Evan Kubota]

"I don't see many great films comming out of Zimbabwe these days..."

Not Zimbabwean, but you didn't like Schroeder's "General Idi Amin Dada"?

A lot of my studies have been of Polish films... it's hard to argue that the "free" market now does a more effective job of controlling content than the government did, particularly in the 50s and in the early 80s under martial law. In free markets it's relatively rare for films to be held for 5-7 years before release, whereas in the Eastern bloc it was practically par for the course...

[sunrise]

In free markets it's relatively rare for films to be held for 5-7 years before release, whereas in the Eastern bloc it was practically par for the course...

Excatly. The practise from Mosfilm was to give the artist more or less free hands to produce the film and when it turned out to indesirable content they would shelve it for years. There was, however a big pressure from other artists and interest groups that eventually lead to the domestic release of a film. One of these ways was to have the film submitted to an international festival, but the western festivals were not always that coorperative. The idea of the struggling surpressed artist who "spoke his critique in codes too clever for censors, but clever enough for the people" was a great and favoured publicity stunt though.

michael

[Evan Kubota]

Do you think that process is more conducive to great filmmaking than the free market, though?

I agree that some great work was produced from that region during that period, but it seems to me like a case of the result coming about despite the government's efforts to restrict it. Arguing that Wajda or Tarkovsky's work was actually improved by the restrictive regime seems speculative to me.

From what I know of the Polish film units the government did attempt to control productions closely - the script had to be approved (although they usually wrote a version which wasn't followed closely to receive official approval), production was periodically monitored, and so on. I guess in the editing room was one chance to put something together to surprise the censors. Frequently the restrictions were content related rather than because of technique or style.

[reflex]

In free markets it's relatively rare for films to be held for 5-7 years before release, whereas in the Eastern bloc it was practically par for the course...

What I find really interesting about films from the USSR was that most of the latter ones were full of sly little political jokes -- heck, even the Russian cartoons from the 70s and 80s constantly dallied in political territory.

My wife recently showed me a harmless Russian comedy from the early 1980s -- a man from Moscow gets drunk at his stag party and ends up on a plane heading to Leningrad by mistake. When he arrives, he tells the taxi driver his address and gets dropped off at what turns out to be an apartment complex that is identical to his own on "Worker's Street" in Moscow. He goes up to what he thinks is his apartment, unlocks the door, and steps into an awkwardly timed romance.

The humorous jab at Soviet city planning was definitely not lost on audiences who lived in various cookie-cutter "Lenin Prospekts" throughout the Soviet empire. Nor was the message so out of the ordinary that it suffered undue attention from the Mosfilm censors.

[Scotness]

Scott, do you know of the TV station run by Aboriginals. It's supposed to be an almost sacred thing since they transformed the old way of story telling to a modern media. And people from a western culture say that it is hard to make any meaning from it that we can understand.

michael

I've heard of it (little bits about it on telly) but never seen one of their broadcasts - I think it only broadcasts in Central Australia - over about half a dozen language areas I think. It wouldn't surprise me if westerners find it hard to follow as the Aboriginal take on things can be quite different in some ways. Apparently it has a huge positive effect in the areas it goes to.


Scot

[fritzcarraldo]

indeed. in the past all artists were either independently wealthy or sponsored by someone who was.

/matt

Well, that's very funny, to continue mixing art with economy, but let's remeber that art exists a long time ago, before man could even write about it.

So, we can still talk and write about it, but it is still much more than words, or euros.

So, i still think that art is independent from everything,

I've seen it all, rich and miserable, man and women, old and young, can all make art.

Let's stop mixing art with culture.

[timdrage]

Scott, do you know of the TV station run by Aboriginals. It's supposed to be an almost sacred thing since they transformed the old way of story telling to a modern media. And people from a western culture say that it is hard to make any meaning from it that we can understand.

That sounds really interesting, I'd love to see that!

I find it hard to make any meaning from TV here in the UK these days, on the rare occasions that I actually watch it!

[steve hyde]

Let's stop mixing art with culture.

....hmmm. I suspect you may be on your own with this one.

[mattias]

Well, that's very funny, to continue mixing art with economy, but let's remeber that art exists a long time ago, before man could even write about it.

the reason art and economy weren't mixed up before there was economy* was because, well, there was no economy. as soon as there was they got mixed up. the reason is that art is part of our existence, and anything that's part of our existence is thus mixed up with art.

* i truly think that economy was always around though. it played a lesser part when we were still nomads, but it was there, and i'm sure it had a play in the creation of the cave paintings too...

/matt