About Canada: Canada at the movies

When filmgoers think of movies, they usually think of Hollywood. Canadians have for years enjoyed and supported American films, accepting the images, themes, and stories these films had to present. In 1922, one of Hollywood's pioneer producers, Lewis Selznick, was asked about the prospects of a feature film industry in Canada. He remarked: "If Canadian stories are worthwhile making into films, American companies will be sent into Canada to make them." In fact, between 1910 and the late 1950s, Hollywood companies made more than 500 feature films about Canada. That's about ten times the number of feature films that Canadians made about themselves. Ironically, most of Hollywood's 'Canadian' films were shot on the backlots of Hollywood studios or in the California countryside. Their portrayal of Canadian life was stereotypical. In these films, Canada was basically about 'moose and Mounties'. There were no cities in Hollywood's Canada and little industry. Canada was a wild outback, sparsely populated by prospectors, lumberjacks, fur traders, and Indians. And, of course, there was always snow, snow, and more snow.

From the beginning, the Canadian film industry has lived in the shadow of Hollywood. By 1930, feature films were the most successful form of popular entertainment. At that time, virtually all of the movies shown in Canadian theatres were movies from someplace else -- some from France and Britain, most from the United States.

Gradually, over the course of the last 60 years, Canada has developed its own film industry. However, even today less than five percent of the movies seen by Canadians are made by Canadians. Why is this the case? Does it matter that Canadian mostly watch films from other countries, and especially from Hollywood? What steps have been taken to offset the influence that foreign films have on Canadian culture? To answer these questions we must explore the relationship between feature film (and other forms of popular culture) and the development of national identity. Also, we must understand something about the ways in which popular culture is made and marketed in modern societies.

Movies, Culture, and National Identity

When we think of feature films (or television for that matter), we tend to think of them only as entertainment. Movies are something that we watch when we want to relax, to unwind, and to escape from the routines of daily life. But feature films and television, do more than entertain. They provide us with ideas and images about the world around us. Social scientists who study the mass media -- everything from newspapers and magazines, to feature films and television -- have concluded that movies help form and transmit society's most important beliefs, attitudes, and values. Consequently, the culture of a society -- its key ideas and practices -- is in large part a product of the messages conveyed by the mass media. Movies (and the mass media in general) teach as they entertain and thus help to create the culture that makes us Canadian.

Since the 1920s, Canadians have been concerned about the flood of foreign mass media that washes over Canada's borders. And it is a flood. As Table I shows, Canadians spend an enormous amount of time reading foreign magazines and books, listening to foreign music, and watching foreign movies and television programming. These media forms transmit and often transfer culture. For example, the fashions worn, the music heard, the expressions used in films, if experienced often enough may be adopted by audiences for whom these behaviours are not the norm. Similarly, media presentations that regularly depict different values or beliefs may alter the viewpoints and practices of those who consume them; they may even change their culture. Some commentators have suggested that Canadian culture -- at least as portrayed in the media -- is an "invisible culture." Certainly, one has to look rather hard to find it.

In 1951, one of the first government - sponsored inquiries into the many facets of culture and the mass media argued vehemently that the very survival of the nation was in jeopardy. The authors of the Massey Report, as it was called, believed that culture is the glue that holds society together. Culture gives us our sense of identity, both as individuals and as members of a group. Without a common culture, with at least a basic set of common beliefs and ways of doing things, there could be no orderly discussion, and people couldn't live together.

The report warned of an "American invasion by film, radio, and periodicals" that threatened to "stifle rather than stimulate our own creative efforts." In its review of the feature film industry, the Massey Report concluded that "Hollywood refashions us in its own image." According to the Report,without a common, "home - grown" culture, nurtured and supported by all elements of the mass media, Canadians would lose any strong sense of what it meant to be Canadian.

The Government Steps In

The Massey Report said that government needed to step in to encourage the growth of Canadian culture. Government should intervene not to restrict the inflow of foreign cultural goods (such as movies), but rather to increase the supply of Canadian cultural goods. This would give Canadians a choice: the opportunity to decide for themselves whether they were interested in a culture and a mass media with significant Canadian content.

Over time, Canadian governments have developed a variety of ways of supporting Canadian culture. In some cases, as (for example) the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC), Radio Canada or TV Ontario, governments own large institutions that are designed to provide significant amounts of Canadian culture. In other cases, Canadian governments have designed laws and regulations that require private companies, such as CTV, Global, or other private broadcasters, to air a minimum amount of Canadian content. Finally, federal and provincial governments provide a whole variety of grants, loans, subsidies, and tax incentives to encourage the production of Canadian culture.

In each case the logic is the same. Without government support, the number of Canadian films, records and television shows would be much lower than it already is. As a result, Canadians would have little or no access to images and ideas that offer reflection and commentary on Canadian life.

The Business of Culture

If Canadian culture is so important to the health and survival of Canada as a nation, why isn't there more of it? Why is government support for Canadian cultural activities necessary? To answer these question, we need to understand two things. First, movies, magazines, newspapers and television are business ventures in which a lot of money is at stake. Second, the economic forces that affect the mass media do not favour the production of Canadian culture. Hollywood is one of the best examples of the business of making contemporary culture. Hollywood movies are expensive to produce. The average budget for a Hollywood film is currently just over $20 million. So - called 'blockbusters' cost many times more (True Lies, for example, cost close to $100 million). Though Hollywood films are by far the most expensively produced films in the world, feature film - making everywhere is a relatively costly undertaking. The average budget for a Canadian feature film, by contrast, is roughly $3 million.

Given the high production costs, the major Hollywood studios (such as Paramount, Warner Bros., Twentieth - Century Fox, and Disney) spend an enormous amount of money and energy marketing their films. Hollywood 'stars' are a very important part of this process; their lavish salaries reflect the fact that their names help draw people to a particular film. In an attempt to guarantee financial success, the Hollywood studios also operate on a worldwide basis. Their goal is simple: to ensure that their movies are seen by as many people as possible around the world. The large American marketplace provides a solid base for the Hollywood studios. They can recover most of their investment at home; sales in other countries typically represent extra profits. In pursuit of these profits, the Hollywood studios are very aggressive. In Canada, for example, the studios sign deals with the large theatre chains -- Cineplex - Odeon and Famous Players -- to ensure that their movies dominate theatres' screen - time. A similar arrangement exists with the major video distributors and retailers, such as Blockbuster. To get copies of the popular American films, theatre owners and video shops must agree to these deals.

As a result of Hollywood's control over the marketplace for films in Canada, most of the revenues from ticket sales and video rentals flow south of the border. The money that Canadians spend on feature films in Canada goes to the production of more films -- in Hollywood. Given these business arrangements and the economic clout of Hollywood, Canadian films have a hard time competing successfully in the marketplace without some form of government assistance.

A similar situation exists in the market for television programmes. Programmes produced in the United States, at enormous expense, are sold to Canadian broadcasters at a fraction of their cost. For example, a one hour episode of Beverly Hills 90210 costs about $1 million. It is sold to Canadian broadcasters for about $50,000. Even if similar Canadian programmes cost only $500,000 to produce, it is easy to see why Canadian broadcasters would generally prefer to buy American programmes than make their own.

As Table I shows, only about four percent of the dramatic programming on Canadian television is Canadian. This figure, however, is not a true measure of the popularity of Canadian drama among viewers (in fact, audience surveys show that Canadians watch Canadian drama in respectable numbers). Instead, it reflects the economics of television and the relatively high cost of producing Canadian versus buying American programming. Therefore, the Canadian government regulates Canadian television to ensure that broadcasters spend more money on Canadian programming than they would otherwise. The government also provides loans and tax incentives that total close to $100 million a year to help defray the costs of producing Canadian drama.

New Initiatives for Survival

Early efforts to establish a feature film industry in Canada met with little success. Canadian - produced feature films, few and far between, could not compete successfully against films from the United States, Britain, and France. Moreover, Canadian theatre owners were quite content to exhibit foreign films. These films were cheap to rent and Canadian audiences soon developed a strong attachment to the stars and stories from elsewhere.

Ironically, a pattern emerged in the 1920s that continues to this day. Many Canadians who established successful careers in feature films (directors, screenwriters, and actors) moved south of the border and worked in Hollywood. Directors such as Ivan Reitman and Norman Jewison, and actors such as Martin Short, Jim Carey, and John Candy are some of the more recent examples of a trend that started with the success of silent - film star Mary Pickford. A cynic might conclude that there has always been a successful Canadian film industry, it just happens to be in Los Angeles.

The Canadian government has been involved in the film industry since the end of the First World War. In those early days, the government used films to promote immigration and investment in Canada. In 1939, the Canadian government established the National Film Board of Canada (NFB). During the Second World War, the NFB was primarily engaged in the production of propaganda films to support the war effort. But the NFB had also been given a special mandate. It was told to make films that would "interpret Canada to Canadians." Over the last 60 years, the NFB has done just that. Quickly, it became a world leader in the production of documentary, animation, and experimental films. It has been a pioneer in the development of new film techniques and equipment.

While the NFB's productions have won numerous international awards, including several Oscars, they have done little to solve the problem posed by the dominance of foreign films in Canada. NFB films have never been widely exhibited in movie theatres (with the exception of NFB's wartime propaganda films). Moreover, in its first two decades, the NFB stayed away from producing feature length films that might offer Canadians an alternative to Hollywood.

Not until the creation of the Canadian Film Development Corporation (CFDC) in 1968 did a Canadian feature film industry begin to emerge. The CFDC was given a budget of $10 million (about the cost of three Hollywood movies at the time) and a mandate to provide grants and loans to private Canadian feature film producers. In its first 10 years, the CFDC funded a number of critically acclaimed but commercially unsuccessful movies. Goin' Down the Road, a film about two young men from Newfoundland who move to Toronto in search of jobs and a better way of life, was one that many Canadians could relate to. Mon Oncle Antoine, a gritty and romantic film about the tensions between English - and French - Canadians in a small Quebec mining town, expressed a theme relevant to Quebeckers. Films such as these revealed a Canada seldom seen in Canadian theatres; to watch these movies is to learn something about the unique dimensions of Canadian life.

Since 1968, the CFDC, (which is now known as Telefilm Canada), has provided funds to more than 500 Canadian films. Telefilm's annual budget for feature films is in excess of $21 million. In 1993 - 4 Telefilm invested in the production of 26 movies, including Atom Egoyan's Exotica, the 1994 Genie Award winner for best film. Have you seen it? Probably not.

Unfortunately, most Canadians have seen only a handful of the Canadian movies produced during the last 25 years. As Claude Jutra, one of Canada's most noted directors, once said: "Not making the films you want to make is awful, but making them and not having them shown is worse." In the 1970s, Canadian movie theatres effectively discriminated against Canadian - made films by continuing to align themselves with the major Hollywood studios.

The Canadian government has attempted repeatedly to create some space for the exhibition of Canadian films, but each time its efforts have been thwarted by the combined economic clout of the Hollywood studios and Canadian theatre chains. Video stores have done little to improve the situation. Canadian films are not widely available or prominently displayed. They are treated, in many respects, like foreign films -- of interest only to a very small and specialized audience.

Women and the Movies

One of the most important characteristics of the Canadian film industry is that it offers an alternative to the themes and styles that dominate Hollywood movies. To make this point, let's look at how women are depicted in Canadian as opposed to Hollywood movies. One of the most popular styles of moviemaking in Hollywood is the action - adventure movie. In films such as Die Hard, Lethal Weapon, and True Lies, the heroes are strong and crafty men, who seem to know how to work every weapon and technical gadget that has ever been invented. The women in these films are typically depicted as meek and helpless. They need to be saved or protected; they are rarely capable of doing much to help themselves.

Another recent trend in Hollywood movies is known as the sexual - thriller, films such as Fatal Attraction, Basic Instinct, or Body of Evidence. In each of these movies, single women are depicted as a threat to men and, in some cases, to the nuclear family. The lesson in these movies is that the 'modern' woman can be dangerous, conniving, even psychotic. To say the least, the depiction of women in Hollywood's action - adventures or sexual - thrillers is not very flattering.

Canadian films provide us with a much more sensitive and reflective depiction of what it means to be a women in the modern world. In 1974, the National Film Board established Studio D, a special unit devoted to the production of films about women by women. Over the next 15 years, Studio D produced an exceptional array of mostly short films and documentaries that focus on women's issues, including sexual abuse, stereotyping in the media, and employment equity. In 1984, Studio D produced a series of films on child abuse entitled Feeling Yes, Feeling No. The series was widely praised by social agencies, schools, and parents and it became the largest selling item in the NFB's history.

Outside Studio D, a number of Canadian women have been given the opportunity to write and direct feature films. They have produced a stunningly rich array of films that reflect upon the lives and the histories of Canadian women. Cynthia Scott's The Company of Strangers, chronicles the coming together of seven elderly women stranded in a typical Canadian landscape. Patricia Rozema's I've Heard the Mermaids Singing, parodies the competition among women in the world of work. These movies and others like them portray women grappling with the real problems and challenges of living in the second half of the twentieth century.

Seeing Canada in the Movies

Unlike their Hollywood counterparts, few of the characters (male or female) in Canadian films display the qualities so charactertistic of Hollywood's leading actors. Instead, Canadian films have focussed more on relatively ordinary people trying to cope with the trials and tribulations of everyday life. Generally speaking, Canadian films are not as fast - paced as Hollywood movies, and for some people they are not as much 'fun'. But that is also their strength.

Canadian films tell the story of Canadians, their lives and their histories. In a land as vast as Canada, we need some way to understand and celebrate our rich diversity. Canadian films give us a sense of the various ethnicities and regions that make this country. Vancouverites can see something of life in a Newfoundland fishing village; a child living near the Rockies can witness the majestic St. Lawrence River as it flows by Quebec City; Nova Scotians can learn about life on the prairies; Torontonians can come to appreciate the history and ongoing struggles of Canada's Native people.

The governments of Canada remain committed to providing financial support for the production of Canadian movies. They think it is money well spent. The Canadian film industry has become an important component of Canada's economy. In the long run, however, the biggest benefits are more cultural than economic in nature. Without Canadian movies, we would lose one of the most effective ways by which we can explore and make our own culture.

TABLE: GENIE AWARD WINNERS BEST CANADIAN FILM

YEAR FILM 1980 The Changeling 1981 Les Bons Debarras 1982 Ticket To Heaven 1983 The Grey Fox 1984 The Terry Fox Story 1985 The Bay Boy 1986 My American Cousin 1987 The Decline of the American Empire 1988 Un Zoo, la Nuit 1989 Dead Ringers 1990 Jesus Of Montreal 1991 Black Robe 1992 Naked Lunch 1993 Thirty-two Short Films About Glenn Gould 1994 Exotica

SOURCE: Association of Canadian Cinema and Television

A Sampling of Canadian Films about Women

The Company of Strangers I've Heard the Mermaids Singing Les Bons Debarras My American Cousin Dancing in the Dark Loyalties Ann Trister La Femme de l'Hotel Double Happiness

Source: Association of Canadian Cinema and Television

Canada at the Movies is the seventh in a series of articles entitled ABOUT CANADA, a collaborative effort of the Centre for Canadian Studies at Mount Allison University and the Canadian Studies Program, Department of Canadian Heritage, with financial support from Mr. Charles R. Bronfman. Other recent titles in the series are: Canada and the Pacific Basin, Work and Unions, Aging and the Canadian Population, Innovation in Canada, Poverty in Canada and Multiculturalism in Canada. The opinions expressed in this document are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect federal government policy or opinion, or that of the Centre. For additional copies or further information on the series, contact the Centre for Canadian Studies, Mount Allison University, Sackville, New Brunswick, E0A 3C0 Tel: (506) 364 - 2350; Fax: (506) 364 - 2264.

Copyright Canada and The World Jan 1995
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