Films, funding and "censorship"

The Department of Canadian Heritage is "expanding slightly" the criteria for denying funding or tax credits to film productions featuring content deemed offensive. The Globe and Mail, true to form, tracks down some evangelist I've never heard of to take credit for the move and crow that he's stopped the federal government from funding movies that promote teh ghay:

A well-known evangelical crusader is claiming credit for the federal government's move to deny tax credits to TV and film productions that contain graphic sex and violence or other offensive content.

Charles McVety, president of the Canada Family Action Coalition, said his lobbying efforts included discussions with Public Safety Minister Stockwell Day and Justice Minister Rob Nicholson, and "numerous" meetings with officials in the Prime Minister's Office.

"We're thankful that someone's finally listening," he said yesterday. "It's fitting with conservative values, and I think that's why Canadians voted for a Conservative government."

Mr. McVety said films promoting homosexuality, graphic sex or violence should not receive tax dollars, and backbench Conservative MPs and cabinet ministers support his campaign.

"There are a number of Conservative backbench members that do a lot of this work behind the scenes," he said.

Mr. Day and Mr. Nicholson said through officials yesterday they did not recall discussing the issue with Mr. McVety.

Canadian Heritage officials confirmed yesterday they will be "expanding slightly" the criteria used for denying tax credits to include grounds such as gratuitous violence, significant sexual content that lacks an educational purpose, or denigration of an identifiable group. More details are promised next week.

Filmmakers and artists' groups, not surprisingly, are screaming that their constitutional rights are being violated, though one director seems to understand the real issue here:

Several powerful arts groups say the changes violate the Charter of Rights and Freedoms.

Yesterday, novelist Susan Swan, chair of the Writers' Union of Canada, pledged to lead her 1,600-strong membership in a protest.

"We're not going to sit back and accept this," vowed Ms. Swan, author of books such as The Wives of Bath and The Biggest Modern Woman in the World. "We don't like being told what kind of art we can make by the federal government."

Mr. Cronenberg, whose most recent film was the Oscar-nominated Russian mob thriller Eastern Promises, called the move an assault on the Charter of Rights and Freedoms.

"The irony is that it is the Canadian films that have given us an international reputation [that] would be most at risk because they are the edgy, relatively low-budget films made by people like me and others that will be targeted by this panel," he said.

"The platform they're suggesting is akin to a Communist Chinese panel of unknown people, who, behind closed doors, will make a second ruling after bodies like Telefilm Canada have already invested."

[...]

Works by Martin Gero, the director of Young People Fucking (which opens in theatres in Canada in April), could also get a once-over from the panel.

"It seems ill-conceived from beginning to end, and is less about censorship than destroying the economic foundation of our entire industry," said Mr. Gero, who shot his debut feature film for $1.5-million with support from Telefilm and other government agencies. "It's old people fucking with the Canadian film industry."

I don't think the federal government is (or should be) telling anyone what kind of art they're allowed to make - simply what kind of art the government will fund with taxpayers' money. There's a difference.

The real issue is whether the government should be funding the arts at all. If it is, I personally think the criteria for determining "offensive" content should be very, very limited - certainly, much more restrictive than what Mr. McVety has in mind. But I don't think artists have a Charter right to money from the taxpayer, no strings attached.

On the other hand, if the government has decided to fund film production but uses religious criteria for determining what kinds of movies should be funded, then there may be grounds for a Charter case. (It's a little like the Sunday-shopping controversy: in the early days of the Charter, the Supreme Court of Canada struck down Alberta's Lord's Day Act, but Ontario's store-closing law - which did not contain religious language - was upheld.) But I doubt the "Canada Family Action Coalition" (whatever that is) had as much of a role in this as the Globe or Mr. McVety seem to think.

Damian P.

Posted by damian at February 29, 2008 11:02 AM