First of all, sorry I haven’t been working very much on this blog, I have been very busy with my internship with ahimsa media and have kind of neglected this blog for my examiner article as I seemed to be writing the same stuff. I will probably start a more personal blog soon, but until then this is the only way I have to communicate with people that read my stuff.
I recently wrote an article about the BC arts cuts. It took me a long time to do that article, which is actually an essay, and I contacted a lot of people to finalize it. I started the article wanting to contact MLAs and tell them about the BC arts cuts and how that was going to affect short film but I quickly realized that yapping was not going to get me anywhere. Slowly I realized that the problem was not the government, it was everyone. The government doesn’t want to finance directors because they leave, audience members don’t care to see movies about Canada or BC more specifically, and directors complained about lack of money.
Everyone was unhappy, but no one seemed to have a tangible solution to the problem until I met Kellie Benz who realized that governments want money and so do filmmakers. The article would be completely different if it wasn’t for her and I thank her for that. Now, back to the importance of the article.
I love BC. I love Vancouver. I love film. If I am seeing the business I love fall apart in my own backyard, then I want to do something about. Will the article accomplish anything? Probably not. But it can bring light to topics like the importance of short film, the lack of support from the government, how to implement a new model to distribute and finance films, between others. I want to get more people on the record, here the side of the story from Cineworks and the BCAC but that will have to wait.
In the end, I just wrote it because I want to try and make a difference. I don’t want to insult anyone or any company, I think cineworks and the BCAC are working to their max capacity, and I admire them for that. But I do think there needs to be some reconstruction in the bureocracy of it all. Also, I want to thank all the directors that helped me, and Spencer Herbert for actually working like an MLA should and meeting with people.
