The UK Film Council today announced plans for the biggest overhaul of how it gives out money since it was created by Labour in 2000.
Its chairman, Tim Bevan, and chief executive, John Woodward, set out proposals which they hope will make the council a leaner, more efficient body but one that can still give as much money to the movies.
The most pressing problem is a £25m cut, over three years, in its lottery money, the bulk of which is being redirected to the Olympics. Some of the money will be saved by cutting council overheads by 20%, or £2.2m a year. There will also be 22 job losses from the 94-strong staff. The Los Angeles office will be scaled back from five to two people.
Woodward said it felt like "the best of times, the worst of times".
It is not all bad news, however: £45m was recently confirmed for the new film centre on London's South Bank; the council gained £3.5m to fund Olympics films; while British films are on something of a high, artistically.
The real problems are the economic downturn, which is making it far harder to make films, and the digital revolution. Bevan said video and DVD sales had been "the engine room" of film production for the past 20 years but that was changing.
Proposals for reform are up for consultation, with one of the most significant being how the council distributes its money. At present, the council has three pots of money for film-makers to use: the development fund; the new cinema fund; and the premiere fund. In total, £17m a year. It now wants one fund of £15m.
Woodward said the aim was that the money that returns to the council when movies do well commercially would now be ploughed back into the production fund. "We are not anticipating any diminution in the amount of money available," he said.
The new fund would offer more help to first- and second-time film-makers because "the market is becoming more risk averse," said Woodward.
Bevan added: "Second-time film directors are the biggest problem in this country, they make a decent first movie and then choke on their second film." But he stressed that the change in emphasis did not mean that Britain's best film-makers would not get council money.
There will be a reduced skills training budget more focused on cutting edge technologies, such as 3D. It is also planning to halve, to £2m a year, a fund created to help difficult-to-market films advertise themselves and earn a bigger distribution. Films such as Red Road, Control and Tsotsi have all benefited from this money.
Some of the biggest losers financially would be the regional screen agencies – with a 20% cut – although the film council is trying to sweeten this with a new pledge that a quarter of all film production money will be spent outside London.
The proposals come amid changing times for British film. The department of culture, media and sport, has announced its intention to merge the film council with the British Film Institute, the protector of the nation's film heritage. Talks are continuing.
