top of page

Canadian Bacon - History of Canadian Filmmaking (Part Nine)

“There is no point in using the word 'impossible' to describe something that has clearly happened.”
― Douglas Adams, Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency

Regulation

Regulating streaming services like Netflix could change the stability of the industry by ensuring they meet the bare minimum in promoting, distributing, exhibiting, and producing Canadian content, compelling them to participate in the cultural economy they now dominate. As members of this industry, it's our job to prevent the total annexation of cultural identity and creativity from the art form we love to participate in; if we don't, we will be forced to continue to deal with its instability.

But we also need to convince the world to invest in Canadian stories and films, and sell the country more than we ever have before. Canada has had notable success with serialized dramas and comedy shows, including Heated Rivalry (2025), Kim's Convenience (2016-2021), and Orphan Black (2013-2017). But most of the country’s successes have come from low-budget comedy productions, not large-scale shows that can support other sectors of the industry. Quite often, Canadian productions are limited to such a shoestring budget that any post-production, animation, VFX, or finishing is outsourced to countries such as India instead of to Canadian studios to keep costs down.

Canadian films have also traditionally been dismissed by many film critics as bad. English Canadian film, for a long time, lacked a distinct Canadian identity and, in some cases direction. However, there is no pure Canadian identity due to our geographic sparseness, lack of cultural cohesion, and the influence of our neighbors to the south. This lack of identity led to a lack of confidence, where our industry and government allowed American companies to intimidate their way into our box offices. Then American propaganda eroded our already dwindling sense of national identity and resulted in Canadians being hostile towards homegrown film, which resulted in the possibility of creating a successful film about Canada, for Canadians nearly impossible.

Next Steps

We need to overcome the Canadian industry’s historically constructed sense of inferiority in production capabilities and media quality compared to America. This cannot be done without a national focus and a game plan based on two major goals: developing a Canadian product that will be enjoyed at home and abroad, and strengthening our position as a reliable producer of foreign products (not just American).

But fixing our industry really comes down to one thing: Where are we getting the money to fund this change?

Let’s do some wishful thinking.

As Canadians, the best people to run our film industry are ourselves. Historically, when the power of filmmaking has been in the hands of Canadians themselves, they have always placed Canada first and reinvested their knowledge, contacts, and time to make the industry better for all.

Using Associated Screen News as an example of a successful canadian company their recipe for success came down to, listening to their filmmakers that were producing their content., collaborating instead of competing with other Canadian production houses, allowing their staff to inject a certain amount of creativity into productions for new excitement in products, and the most important aspect of all; their cashflow came from The Canadian Pacific Railway which guaranteed a distribution of their products and as a natural resource company backed them financially. That's the key here: natural resources.- Something that Canada has a lot of

Various countries around the world with populations smaller than or comparable to Canada’s have had remarkable success in their film and external industries by maximizing revenue from natural resources to fund social programs, while combining this with a tax credit structure that works for them.

One of these countries is Norway. Norway is special because it has done something the rest of the world has failed to do: used its lucrative natural resource, Oil, to sustain the country's economy while providing social services without fear of funding shortages. Norway operates the Oil Fund, formerly known as the Government Pension Fund Global, the world's largest sovereign wealth fund, which supports public services such as healthcare, education, and infrastructure.

When oil reserves began to be discovered off the coast of Norway, the state-owned oil company Equinor (formerly Statoil) was established in 1972, with the principle that 50% of each oil license should be state-owned. The Norwegian government currently owns 67% of Equinor, ensuring that oil profits benefit the public.

To manage this wealth responsibly, the Norwegian government established the Government Pension Fund Global. The oil fund invests surplus revenue from the petroleum industry to secure long-term financial stability for future generations. The fund is tightly regulated and highly transparent. It is managed by Norges Bank Investment Management (NBIM) and adheres to strict ethical guidelines, avoiding investments in industries such as tobacco and weapons.

While oil wealth has contributed to Norway’s social model, including universal healthcare, education, and welfare, it has also funded pensions, unemployment benefits, infrastructure, and public health. Because of the wealth this provides for free education in the country, Norway’s creative surge can be directly correlated with its tuition-free film education. The Norwegian Film School in Lillehammer was founded in 1997 to serve as a national film academy. It now offers bachelor’s and master’s degrees in filmmaking – all free of charge – with faculty drawn from active industry professionals. Since its first class, the school has graduated over 350 filmmakers, many of whom are now working in Norwegian film and TV. The wealth of their natural resources also funds public broadcasters. Norway’s public TV (NRK) and commercial channel TV2 commission high-end dramas for Norwegian audiences, often with Nordic partners.

Norway, as of 2024, is in a golden age of its cinema, with numerous acclaimed directors, festival successes, and films and TV series that have blown up in the collective consciousness worldwide. Shows like State of Happiness(2018-2024), Makta (TV Series 2023–2024)
, So Long, Marianne (TV Series 2024) is also a good example of this. The last one is a Canadian-Norwegian co-production.

Notable filmmakers of modern Norway include: Joachim Trier, three time Palme d'Or contender and Academy Award-nominated filmmaker, and the creator of the internationally acclaimed Oslo trilogy, Morten Tyldum, an Academy Award for Best Director nominee, best known for the thriller Headhunters (2011), the 2014 historical drama The Imitation Game, and the science fiction drama Passengers (2016); and other notable directors including Eskil Vogt, Bent Hamer, Nils Gaup and Espen Sandberg.

To push their success even farther, Norway is now collaborating with the rest of Scandinavia’s largest commercial broadcasters in what is called The Scandi Alliance. The core idea is to develop and co-produce high-end drama that resonates with audiences across all three moderately populated countries.

Another country in its golden era of filmmaking is South Korea.

The South Korean Film Industry has undergone a remarkable transformation over the past two decades, becoming one of the most influential forces in global cinema. South Korea’s film scene has earned both critical acclaim and commercial success worldwide.

Some of the landmark films to come from South Korea include the Academy Award-winning Parasite (2019), which made history in 2020 by becoming the first non-English-language film to win Best Picture, and Train to Busan (2016). The film grossed over $98 million worldwide and quickly became a cult classic, along with The Handmaiden (2016) and Oldboy (2003).

In the late 1990s, the Korean film industry began to blossom again and has since shown impressive success in the domestic market. Korean films have averaged an international market share of 54 percent over the last decade, with peaks of 60-65 percent.

The Korean film industry is also an anomaly. Its success cannot be attributed to any protective
policies the country has implemented, including import and screening quotas, subsidies, and tax rebates. The Koreans have just made a damn good product in their K-dramas, films, and animations, and have allowed the American film market to enter their country at the right time. Because of this success, large Korean companies have challenged the Hollywood blockbuster model. Their proactive responses to maximize revenue amid domestic and international changes have ultimately delivered the ultimate competition.

Platforms like Netflix have invested heavily in Korean content, helping the South Korean film industry reach new audiences across continents. This expansion has led to more co-productions, international film festival entries, and streaming hits that continue to elevate Korea’s status in the global film landscape. As of 2022, Netflix is “doubling down” on its South Korean content, investing nearly C$3.7 billion over the next four years to produce Korean TV series, movies, and reality shows.

Last but not least, we have Australia, which is sort of the ‘sister industry” to Canada. Australia, like Canada, has grown as a service industry for America and has its own branch of the Motion Picture Association of America, the Motion Picture Distributors Association of Australia (MPDAA). It’s also faced similar issues in developing stability for its technicians and artists, and also been a backdrop for countless American productions as well, such as George Lucas's Star Wars: Episode II(2000) – Attack of the Clones and Episode III(2005) – Revenge of the Sith, and the Wachowskis's The Matrix(1999). It’s also become a hotbed for post-production and animation, as well as a lucrative television market. However, the country has also watched its most successful Australian actors and filmmakers lured away by Hollywood.

Just like Canada, Australia has struggled to get its own population to enjoy its own films. It has watched as the majority of its theatrical audiences have sought out foreign films. As with Canadian films, Australian films tend to be limited to comparatively short seasons at independent cinemas, with fewer screenings. It’s an interesting observation that countries that have shifted their film and television markets to serve Hollywood are the ones craving their own culture on their own screens, with their creativity molded to what sells.

The End?

Throughout this chapter, I, the author, have included quotes from The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy and various Douglas Addaams works, simply for a parallel comparison with the work of the Canadian Audio Visual Industry. In The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, the story follows the misadventures of the last surviving Earthman, Arthur Dent, after Earth is demolished to make way for a hyperspace bypass. The few humans who are “resuced” from the destruction are those whom the Aliens pity, need for their own benefit or profits, or simply because they have some level of social attraction to them. It wasn’t because they actually cared about their well-being or the fact that their home was being blown to smithereens. It was about how much they had to benefit from them.

For too long, Canada has been in the way of the international space highway known as Hollywood. We’ve let our home be mined for resources, and have had no defense for it. We can’t keep waiting for something that can tell us the Answer to the Ultimate Question of Life, the Universe, and Everything; we need to find it for ourselves.

In The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, the supercomputer Deep Thought, specially built for this purpose, takes 7+1⁄2 million years to compute a meaningless answer, and gets destroyed before it can successfully communicate it. We don't have that time on our hands, but we have an open Universe at our disposal and unlimited creativity and passion to choose where we would like to head in it.

42.

END TO NEXT CHAPTER

bottom of page