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- The combined influence of its British and French colonial past, along with waves of global immigrants and the strong culture of the country’s indigenous people, has created a fertile setting for exploring identity in Canadian films.
Cinema in Canada dates back to the earliest known display of film in Saint-Laurent, Quebec, in 1896. The film industry in Canada has been dominated by the United States, which has utilized Canada as a shooting location and to bypass British film quota laws, throughout its history. Canadian filmmakers, English and French, have been active in the ...
- The Tax Shelter Era, 1974–82
- The Quebec Cinema Act, 1983
- The Film Products Importation Bill, 1988
- CFDC Becomes Telefilm Canada
- Famous Players and Cineplex Odeon — Sales and Mergers
- Funding Cuts and Telefilm Canada Mandates
- Rising Populism
- Notable Recent Successes
The federal government proved reluctant to exert control over the distribution and exhibition of films in Canada. But it did act decisively to provide financial incentives for investment in domestic film production through tax benefits. In 1974, it increased the Capital Cost Allowance (CCA) from 60 to 100 per cent. This created a tax shelter that a...
The tax shelter succeeded in stimulating commercial activity in English Canada’s film industry. But it had a very different impact on the film industry in Quebec. The limited market for French-language films in North America provided investors with no incentive to invest in them. As Manjunath Pendakur has explained, “In 1978 and 1979, two-thirds of...
A similar situation transpired at the federal level a year later. In 1987, the federal government under Brian Mulroney attempted to address the long-standing problems faced by Canadian distribution companies. Minister of Communications Flora MacDonaldintroduced the Film Products Importation Bill. If passed into law, it would have allowed the Hollyw...
In the early 1980s, the film industry in Canada was on shaky ground. It was almost wholly dependent upon government financing and unable to secure screen time in Canadian theatres. Francis Fox, the Liberal federal minister of communications, issued the National Film and Video Policy in 1984.The CFDC was transformed into Telefilm Canada and given a ...
In 1994, the federal governmentapproved the takeover of the Canadian assets of Paramount Communications by Viacom of New York. These assets included the Canadian Famous Players theatre chain. In turn, Viacom promised to exhibit more Canadian films. It also pledged to spend more money on the marketing of Canadian films in Famous Players theatres. In...
In the mid-1990s, funding cuts at all levels of government began to take their toll on the industry. This severely affected the support offered by the provincial funding agencies. In 1995, the Liberal government under Jean Chrétien cut Telefilm’s budget from $123 million to $109.7 million. The NFB’s budget was reduced by $4 million and the CBC’s by...
Despite the failure of Telefilm’s box office mandate, a new sense of populism seemed to take hold. Many filmmakers began producing movies with broader commercial appeal that still retained a specific sense of Canadian identity. Michael Dowse followed his indie head-banger hit FUBAR (2002) with the raucous electronica extravaganza It's All Gone Pete...
The 1990s and first decade of the 21st century saw the production of world-class cinema in Canada. The industry as a whole has become a multi-billion-dollar business built over 50 years. Many American film and television productions are shot here. They take advantage of the professional crews, state-of-the-art studio space and infrastructure, tax b...
Dec 28, 2023 · Why would the Canadian government give money and tax breaks to Netflix, Amazon and Disney, just because they hire a Canadian crew and shoot in Toronto? Those companies are going to make...
Sep 25, 2023 · Letting Canadian cinema showcase the country’s natural beauty to the world with movies such as Atanarjuat: The Fast Runner, directed by Zacharias Kunuk, provides a window into the culture and traditions of Canada’s indigenous peoples while also highlighting the breathtaking Arctic scenery.
Jan 10, 2012 · The history of the Canadian film industry has been one of sporadic achievement accomplished in isolation against great odds. Canadian cinema has existed within an environment where access to capital for production, to the marketplace for distribution and to theatres for exhibition has been extremely difficult.
While watching movies at home is a more attractive (and less expensive) alternative according to more than half of consumers, the Canadian audience is more than eager to go back to the movies.
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Nov 29, 2019 · The Canadian film industry, particularly in English Canada, has struggled against the Hollywood entertainment monopoly for the attention of an audience that remains largely indifferent toward the domestic industry. The major distribution and exhibition outlets in Canada have been owned and controlled by foreign interests.
