UK creative industries minister Chris Bryant underlined the government’s vision for supporting the UK film industry in an emphatic speech at the Cannes Film Festival on May 16.
“We want to do two things in the UK as the Labour government in relation to film,” said Bryant. “We want to be the best place in the world to make film,” pointing towards the roles played by local authorities, film studios, business rates for studios, and promoting a deep pool of talent.
He encouraged the industry to continue to access funding from “the United States of America, or from India, or Nigeria, or anywhere else in the world, or France.
”But I also want to us to make films where the intellectual property stays in the UK and people make a long-term living. That’s what we’re focused on.”
Bryant was speaking at the United reception, arranged jointly by BFI, Bafta, BBC Film and Film4.
The audience of UK industry figures included BFI, BBC Film and Film4 heads Mia Bays, Eva Yates and Ollie Madden; Bafta CEO Jane Millichip; producers and filmmakers Elizabeth Karlsen, Mike Goodridge, Gurinder Chadha, Tom Wood, Ameenah Ayub Allen and Yvonne Isimeme Ibazebo; executives Alison Thompson, Mark Gooder and Daniel Battsek; and festival heads Paul Ridd and Kristy Matheson.
While Bryant did not directly address US president Donald Trump’s threat of introducing 100% tariffs on all international films coming into the US, he underlined his commitment to maintaining international ties. He talked about the need to maintain the film industry’s global outlook, saying, “Film is nearly always a multinational thing. You cannot create borders around filmmaking.”
“Where Britain really excels is where we’re at the crossroads of nations. Whether it’s a film like Slumdog Millionaire, it’s quintessentially British but not filmed in the UK at all.
”Or Conclave. Who would have thought there would be a British film about the election of a pope? And yet it’s quintessentially British, not only because of the acting talent, but because of the way it tells its story, and the story it comes from, the novel by Robert Harris.
“That’s part of why we are exceptional, and we create more miracles than anybody else, that internationalism we embrace. And of course that embrace [includes] the United States of America – thank god for Tom Cruise [several Mission Impossible films shot in the UK], I say. I have every expectation that James Bond will be no less British when he’s made by Amazon than he was by anybody else.”
Bryant went on to say every film that gets made “is an utter miracle”.
“Get actors together, and put them in a room, and build a set and make it look real and like they’re not wearing make-up at all, all of those elements of it tell a story that captivates somebody for 90 minutes, or two hours or three hours, that is a miracle,” he said.
“The even bigger miracle is any of you ever get to make a film at all, because the financing process is so laborious and complicated. I want you to give yourself a round of applause for every single miracle you’ve been involved in. I also want to say the UK is perhaps the most miraculous place in the world when it comes to film.”
Bryant said he would not have time to see “a single film” in Cannes but is “here to say the UK will continue making miraculous movies and make miracles in this industry for many, many years to come. We’re determined to do that…. We want to make it easier to raise finance and make the great miracles that we know you can. But we also want to make sure British audiences get to see films in the front of big screens in cinemas.”
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