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One of the first victims of the Coalition Government’s cuts to arts spending was the UK Film Council. Vanessa Raison evaluates its role in promoting British cinema, and supports the film-makers who mourn its demise.

Which of the following films have you seen? Fish Tank, Red Road, This Is England, In the Loop, Bright Star, Nowhere Boy, The Last King of Scotland, Touching the Void, Bend It Like Beckham, Vera Drake? None of these films

would probably have existed were it not for the UK Film Council.

Founded a decade ago, the UK Film Council used Lottery money and a government grant to fund new and established film-makers such as Andrea Arnold and Mike Leigh and promote British film-making and culture abroad. 75 people work for the UK Film Council itself, and the top eight earn over £100,000 each, but the knock-on employment effect through film crews, actors and directors to electricians, caterers and taxi drivers is huge – the Film Council claims it creates 35,000 jobs.

In ten years the UK Film council claims it has helped turn 900 ideas into films in the cinema. Each year it invests £15 million into films; it calculates that for every £1 invested, £5 is made. The UK Film Industry has a turnover of £6.8 billion a year. The Film Council also helps with distribution and export of British films and invests in digital screens across the UK, regional screenings, Skillset, FILMCLUB and First Light.

Why then did Jeremy Hunt, the Minister for Media, Culture and Sport, tell the staff they were fired and aim to dismantle the whole company by 2012?

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Cutting the CostsIn The Observer (08.08.10) Mr Hunt argues

that scrapping the Film Council will ensure ‘greater value for money:’

It is simply not acceptable in these times to fund an organisation like the UK Film Council, where no fewer than eight of the top executives are paid more than £100,000.Hunt believes that too much film industry

money goes out of the UK to the Hollywood Studios.

This is what happened with Slumdog Millionaire, a creative success for Film4, but a financial success for Fox Searchlight.... There needs to be a proper debate over what should replace the UK Film Council ... It needs to champion the British Film Industry instead of the American one.In an article entitled ‘Cut! Let’s not mourn the

UK Film Council’ (Time Out, 05-11.08.10) Dave Calhoun argues that:

a new approach to how and where we spend public money on film could be a good thing for British cinema.. . . . too many of the UKFC’s activities existed to help the industry turn a profit – is that the job of money designated to promote culture?... the UKFC is an organisation embarrassed to treat film as culture. We need to take risks. We need to be

prepared to put money into films that might not make a penny but which progress British cinema rather than just repeat past success and chase awards.Calhoun is critical of the UKFC’s high wages

because ‘so many of its execs were on high salaries compared to those doing similar jobs at the BFI.’ The BFI is a charity and its role is cultural with a focus on heritage and education; it archives film, runs the BFI South Bank and Library and promotes the London Film Festival. Ironically, £16 million of its funding comes from a government grant-in-aid distributed by ... the Film Council. Now the BFI will be funded directly by the government again.

Meanwhile the government is still committed to providing £15 million of lottery funds to the film industry, but it is not clear who will distribute it. – the BFI? The Arts council? BBC Films or Film Four?

The Film Industry Fights Back!Tim Bevan, Chairman of the UK Film Council,

believes that ‘Abolishing the most successful film support organisation the UK has ever had is a bad decision. imposed without any consultation or evaluation...’ (26.07.10) He said the decision was driven by short-term thinking and political expediency. British film, which is

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one of the UK’s most successful growth industries, deserves better.’

Ronan Bennet in The Guardian on 27.7.10 doesn’t hold back: Culturally, this crass, narrow, bigoted move impoverishes us all.

The UKFC ‘was not staffed by bureaucrats but by people who had made films, who loved film, who knew film-makers and understood their struggles.’

The following letter, published in The Daily Telegraph and signed by 55 UK actors and actresses corroborates this:

SIR – We all owe any success we have had in our acting careers, to varying degrees, to films supported by the UK Film Council. For some of us, it was the breakthrough role. For others, it was the dream part in a critically acclaimed and successful film.

But it is not out of personal gratitude that we are dismayed that the UKFC is facing the axe; it is because we fear the impact on the British film industry as a whole. Actors like us, much as we love working in Britain, can always go where the work and money are. It is, however, much harder for skilled technicians and craftsmen who are the backbone of our world-class film industry to move – and very damaging for our country if they did.

It is our camera crews, lighting experts, set builders and a whole host of other skilled people who give our film industry such an edge. Their expertise and experience, which the

UKFC has done so much to foster, is the main reason why so many top Hollywood directors choose to make films here in Britain.

The UKFC has also been invaluable in helping put together the funding to allow writers and directors to get their films made. Among those where this funding has been vital are In the Loop, Bend it Like Beckham, This is England, Gosford Park and The Constant Gardener, which have entertained audiences across the world. They have also made a great deal of money for the Exchequer.

Everyone, including those in the film industry, knows that times are tough and the Government has to make savings. But the UKFC doesn’t waste money, it makes it. For every pound it invests, the country gets £5 back. Thanks to its efforts, our film industry – worth £4.5 billion a year to the UK – has rarely been stronger or more successful.

We can’t afford to take this strength for granted. Canada, New Zealand, Australia and other countries have recognised the benefits in jobs and revenue that a thriving film industry brings. They are increasing their support to woo films away from Britain. By scrapping the UKFC, the risk is that their job is made easier.

We should think long and hard about getting rid of one of the major factors behind a great British success story.

James McAvoy Emily Blunt Dominic Cooper Ben Whishaw Bill Nighy Noel Clarke Ben Barnes Pete Postlethwaite Peter Mullan Damian Lewis Timothy Spall Sir Ian Holm Ruth Wilson Ken Cranham Kelly Reilly Sophie Okonedo Benjamin Smith Georgia Groome Georgia King Chanel Cresswell

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Christopher Hampton, screenwriter of Atonement, joined the debate:

I am sure there are things that can be done to improve its efficiency, but just to lop somebody’s arm off is not necessarily the best way of improving their tennis. I think discussion would have been better than imposition.Mike Leigh has likened scrapping the Film

Council to ‘abolishing the NHS’, while Liam Neeson calls the UKFC a ‘lifeblood for any culture.’ Even the veteran actor/director Clint Eastwood joined the fight on 9th August by writing to Chancellor George Osborne about his film The Hereafter, which was shot in London with the help of the UKFC:

‘Locals with active, knowledgeable film commissions are far more appealing to us as producers... I respectfully request the careful consideration of these concerns in deciding the fate of the UK Film Council.When Stephen Spielberg’s DreamWorks

Studios wrote to the Chancellor on 12th August, Ed Vaizey (the Minister for Communication, Culture and Creative Industries) said film tax credits, lottery funding and an infrastructure for film production would continue to entice big studios to the UK. He invited Hollywood figures to call him personally rather than speaking through the media.

What next for British film?After dismantling the Film Council, Jeremy

Hunt says he wants ‘an open debate about, for example, how we fund films of high artistic worth that are unlikely to make it to general release.’ Perhaps he could have that debate with the existing Film Council, with its ten years of expertise in funding both blockbusters like the Harry Potter series, and, I would argue, films of high artistic worth?

Fair enough, just as Mr. Hunt abolished £250,000 expenses for MPs’ cars, so he could have streamlined salaries and lunch-expenses at the UKFC. Yet making money is important in the British Film Industry. The more money British cinema generates, the more mainstream and independent films we can make. The UK Film Council has supported a wide range of films: feel-good movies like Bend It Like Beckham, gritty realism like Red Road, Brit-lit like Bright Star, political films like The Last King of Scotland, comedy like In the Loop and left-field films such as Man on Wire. It promotes British culture at home and abroad. It promotes film-makers such as Kevin Macdonald and Paul Greengrass and

women directors such as Jane Campion, Andrea Arnold, Gurindher Chadha and Sam Taylor-Wood. The confidence and profile of British Cinema is at a high, thanks to ten years of the UKFC. There will need to be some sort of body supervising film-funding in the UK. Perhaps Mr. Hunt should set up an organisation run by experienced practitioners to uncover the best of British talent. He could call it ... the UK Film Council.

Vanessa Raison teaches Media Studies at Camden School for

Girls,. London.

Stop Press!As we were preparing this article for

uploading, news has just broken that the British Film Institute (BFI) is to inherit the funding responsibilities of the UK Film Council, and to become the new champion for British film.

From April 2011, the BFI will deliver the Coalition Government’s new strategy for film, distribute lottery money to British filmmakers, decide which films will receive tax credits, and oversee any strategy to support film in the regions.

Culture Minister Ed Vaisey said on 29th November 2010 that lottery funding for the film industry will increase to £43m annually over the next four years from current subsidies of around £27m a year. The BFI will have a new board and management structure to meet its new responsibilities.

The British film industry lives to fight another day!

Read some perspectives on this decision at http://www.independent.co.uk/

arts-entertainment/films/news/revamped-bfi-to-take-over-from-uk-film-council-2146979.html

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/film/film-blog/8169074/BFI-to-take-over-from-UKFC-good-news-for-film.html

http://www.guardian.co.uk/film/filmblog/2010/nov/29/uk-film-council-bfi-ed-vaizey