Roger Shannon: Vital regional support for film must continue
Jul 28 2010 By Roger Shannon
Film producer Roger Shannon, a recipient of UK Film Council funding, laments the planned scrapping of the organisation and looks at the implications for regional film support.
The announcement on Monday earlier this week that the UK Film Council is to be abolished sent a jolt right through the film sector.
Ouch. I was gob-smacked to get the news.
The abolition of the UKFC leaves a bad taste in the mouth; it smacks of traditional cultural aloofness. The cultural industries of opera, ballet or drama would never have been treated with such brazen arrogance.
I have never in 30 years of professional engagement in the media industries seen an action of such ideological spite as this - the axe wielded, seemingly, without any consultation, evaluation or back lift.
The bulk of the film industry anger since the DCMS announced on Monday of this "cull of the quangos" has centred on the national industry, and the central role that the UK Film Council has played in recent years in fashioning a remarkable architecture of production, both commercial and cultural, which has harvested both box office highs and award acclaim.
Yet, crucially and damagingly, the Culture Minister, Jeremy Hunt, has not come forth at this time of
quango decapitation with any kind of road map for how the "scorched earth" of the UK film industry will now be navigated, or indeed irrigated for the future.
The fact that I have mashed up at least five metaphors in that last sentence - and me, the maestro of the metaphor - shows how flabbergasted I am by the situation.
What needs to be factored into this discussion of the UK Film Council is the regional question.
And a very pertinent discussion for Birmingham and the West Midlands.
One of the singular achievements of the UK Film Council, straight off the bat in 2001, was the regional strategy, whereby a national network of regional screen agencies was established, including for this region, Screen WM.
Without a shadow of a doubt, the regional screen agencies have delivered, culturally and economically, introducing many more people to the benefits of the screen industries, putting regional stories directly onto the world’s cinema screens and showcasing previously underused rural and urban locations. Crucially for film makers, film producers and audiences in the West Midlands, Screen WM has been to the fore in these developments.
Pre UKFC, there were partial successes in the regions - notably, in Liverpool and Sheffield - but nothing stitched together encompassing the country as a whole.
