Those who've gone to see an independent film lately might be familiar with an ad that warns against movie pirating. According to this ad, consumers (understandably sick of being gouged $14 to catch a movie) who download and burn movies are undermining the ability of the Australian film industry to grow and survive.
That's a pretty big call. Other times, critics of Australia's film industry point to a lack of corporate sponsorship and private investment, or say that Australian-made films are "too niche" for consumers to want to pay money to see.
It's certainly not the case that Australians aren't interested in films — over the last 10 years, Australia's box office gross has averaged $803.03million. But each year, Australian films only gross $34.7million, or 4.3% of this total, compared to 77% for US films. So it's not that there is no market for films, it's just that the majority of films viewed in Australia are Hollywood in origin.
Here's one fact that most contemporary discussion about the weakness of our film industry neglects: Australian film is completely tied to corporate Hollywood.
Art isn't just a cultural good, the arts are an industry, and this industry has an economic imperative. In a market-based system, overwhelmingly, films exist to meet the demands of the market and are produced by corporations whose aim is to produce films to generate profit.
In other words, corporate interests rule. And furthermore, Hollywood interests rule. In fact, Australian governments subsidise Hollywood all the time.
Just look at the recent New South Wales state government support for international film production within NSW. Superman Returns, a Hollywood film shot in NSW in 2006, received big-time financial support from the state government via the refundable film tax offset, just one of many protective and supportive measures for Hollywood.
This tax scheme, introduced in 2002, allows large-budget film productions to offset their tax, provided their Australian expenditure totals more than $15 million. Superman Returns grossed $391million worldwide, and its producers publicly congratulated the NSW state government in assisting the film's overall financial success.
This begs the question — why the hell is our state government subsidising corporate film interests? It's not like Hollywood needs it. If Hollywood majors want to shoot films in Australia, that's fine, but surely they can pay their own way!
After all, Hollywood is a large-scale industry, with an average production cost for a film was US$65.8 million in 2006, usually with the same amount for marketing/advertising again. That's a lot of money to invest. By contrast, the total average budget for an Australian film in 2005/2006 was A$3.8 million.
The mass of Hollywood films undoubtedly has an impact on the viewing trends — tastes are shaped toward Hollywood films. And so the cycle continues — quality independent films are less likely to be made, marketed and seen, not just because of economic, but also cultural reasons.
There have been some really important films that have come out of Australia over the past few years, but the reality is that very few people will see them.
It's a such a shame that many people will never see films like Ten Canoes, by Rolf De Heer (2001). Its budget was tiny — $2.4 million, and it was financed largely by the Australian Film Commission. The style of story-telling and voice-over narration follows Aboriginal oral traditions, and there is a distinct absence of Hollywood production hallmarks like fast-paced editing.
There was genuine collaboration with the Ramingining people throughout production (including a public meeting with the community to decide whether the film should be made and a even legal agreement between De Heer and the Yolngu people recognising their rights to the story), and the film is in the Aboriginal dialect of Ganalbingu with subtitles in English.
It's cross-cultural, self-representative and non-exploitative, and that's about as "non-Hollywood" as movies come.
All the values that usually underpin the iconic films of Australian cinema — competition, masculinity, land belonging to traditional male figures, the Aussie battler — are totally absent from Ten Canoes. Instead, we see values of collectivity and clanship, and harmony with, not domination over, the land.
Ten Canoes doesn't base its values on inherited and outdated colonial foundations. It's Australian-made, but not nationalist, and that's a big break with "old" Australian cinema. It actually values the original and valid inhabitants of Australia — the Aboriginal people.
It's a record of cultural preservation for the stories of the Yolngu people, in the context of a country with an unresolved colonial history.
That's the kind of culture that I would love to see more cultivation of.
Culture in Australia has always developed under the monolith of Hollywood — even in the 1920s, 95% of films seen here were from Hollywood. You can't grow a self-sustaining arts community with that burden. This is the impact of transforming culture into a commodity. Commercialisation cramps creativity.
And this is why Australian cinema is stumped. It is being crushed by an inherently restrictive industry structure. It can't compete with Hollywood. Nothing can compete with Hollywood.
If we want a thriving arts scene, we need to bust out of the industry framework and start afresh. We need to start taxing the big productions that are currently being subsidised by the NSW government, and use this money to seriously fund public art projects.
Whether it's giving grants to film-makers, providing walls for local street artists, opening up new community-art spaces or sponsoring up-and-coming artists, its time to start giving art and culture the appreciation it deserves.