Canadian Journal of Communication, Vol 20, No 2 (1995)

Font Size:  Small  Medium  Large

The Audiovisual Locations Industry in Canada: Considering British Columbia as Hollywood North

Mike Gasher (Concordia University)

Abstract: The purpose of this article is to characterize the audiovisual locations industry in Canada, an industry which attracted $500 million in direct spending by foreign film and television producers in 1994. Two questions are posed: What is the locations industry? and What is its significance as an emerging cultural industry in the Canadian context? The paper first situates the locations industry in its theoretical, historical, and sociopolitical context. It explains its economic rationale and considers the extent to which the locations industry integrates audiovisual production within the Hollywood industry. A case study of British Columbia, Canada's largest centre for locations production, is then presented to consider how the locations industry defines place. The paper concludes with a discussion of how the promotion of locations production in Canada speaks to a larger debate over the nature of Canadian cultural production.

Résumé: Le but de cet article est de caractériser l'industrie de tournage étranger au Canada, une industrie de 500 $ millions en 1994. Cet article pose deux questions: quelle est cette industrie? et, quelle est son importance comme une industrie culturelle émergente dans le contexte culturel canadien? Tout d'abord, l'article situe l'industrie dans ses contextes théorique, historique et sociopolitique. Il explique son raison d'être économique et il examine l'intégration de la production audiovisuelle dans l'industrie hollywoodienne. Ensuite, l'article analyse la construction matérielle et symbolique du lieu à travers l'exemple de la Colombie-Britannique, le plus grand site de tournage étranger au Canada. Enfin, cet article considère l'intervention de la promotion de cette industrie dans le débat général qui s'addresse à la nature de la production culturelle canadienne.

Introduction

Once sporadic and unorganized, the industry which serves film and televison producers on location in Canada has emerged since the early 1980s as a cultural industry in its own right. Reflecting continued growth, the locations industry--known in Hollywood as "off-shore," "absentee" or "runaway" production--accounted for more than $500 million in direct spending in Canada in 1994. The largest location production centre in Canada was British Columbia, which attracted more than $300 million in spending by foreign audiovisual producers (Natalie Lapointe, receptionist, British Columbia Film Commission, personal communication, March 9, 1995). The time has come to account for this industry, and this paper poses two fundamental questions: What is the locations industry? and What is its significance in the Canadian context?

The paper argues that a distinction needs to be made between the cultural and industrial priorities of this cultural industry, and that location production in Canada must be seen principally as industrial development. It is first and foremost a commercial endeavour which has everything to do with investment capital and job creation and very little to do with indigenous storytelling. Hollywood locates in Canada because it is advantageous economically, particularly given the increasing sophistication of the production and post-production services offered. Hollywood is not interested in telling Canadian stories or even setting its stories in Canada.

The location production industry is thus significant for four reasons. First, news media coverage of what is commonly referred to as "Hollywood North" has blurred distinctions between domestic production and locations production and between audiovisual production as an industry and as a medium of cultural expression. Second, because of its growth, the locations industry has increasingly integrated film and television production in Canada within Hollywood's audiovisual production sector. Whereas the distribution and exhibition sectors of the film industry in Canada and the United States have been integrated for most of this century, little attention has been given to the gradual integration of the production sector through co-ventures and location activity. Third, the promotion of the locations industry by film commissions, film liaison offices, and/or local government departments devoted to assisting film producers in every province and territory in Canada (Maddever, 1994, pp. 4-11) intervenes in a larger debate over what cinema, specifically, in Canada is and should be. Canadian cinema, without the guaranteed access to screens that Canadian television enjoys, struggles continually to define itself. Fourth, these promotional efforts contribute to the much larger debate over the role of the media in how we imagine community--a prevalent theme of communication studies in Canada--and how we perceive the role of Canada's governments in that debate.

The paper will begin by grounding the discussion theoretically and historically. It will consider place as both an experiential and representational space. It will then examine the degree to which the media's role in imagining Canada as a national community has been part of historical debates informing the development of radio, television, and cinema. The paper will subsequently situate the locations industry within its historical context, both nationally and internationally. This section will explain its economic rationale and consider the extent to which it integrates audiovisual production internationally within the dominant Hollywood industry. Finally, the paper will present a case study of British Columbia, where the locations industry overshadows an emerging indigenous film industry. An analysis of the promotional materials of the B.C. Film Commission will show how this literature defines place. It will describe how place is commodified in the sense that what is being sold to producers is an industrial setting (physical site and services) rather than a cultural and historical site (a source of stories and characters). The promotional discourse will then be considered as it speaks to the larger debate over the nature of indigenous cultural production in Canada.

Meanings of place

In a detailed survey of geographical conceptions of place and space, Edward Relph (1986) argues that identities of place result from a complex and dynamic interrelationship between nature and culture, and "landscapes change their identity according to the way in which we experience them" (p. 133). Citing Susanne Langer--"places are culturally defined"--Relph offers the example of a gypsy camp being a very different place than an Indian camp, even though the two "places" may have shared the same geographical site at different historical periods (p. 29).

The identity of a place comprises three "interrelated components": physical features; activities and functions; and meanings or symbols. For each setting and each person, Relph argues, there is "a multiplicity of place identities, reflecting different experiences and attitudes" (pp. 61-62). He concludes:

Places are fusions of human and natural order and are the significant centres of our immediate experiences of the world. They are defined less by unique locations, landscapes, and communities, than by the focusing of experiences and intentions onto particular settings. Places are not abstractions or concepts, but are directly experienced phenomena of the lived-world and hence are full with meanings, with real objects, and with ongoing activities. (Relph, 1986, p. 141)

Place, for Relph, is occupied space, a social and cultural space. Its identity and its boundaries are never fixed, but derive from the social activities which occur on this site, the functions it serves, how its inhabitants define and delimit "here," and the symbols they attach to "this place." What Canada is, for example, depends on how its constituents live it and assign it meaning.

Communication scholarship approaches the question of place as a social space by assessing the role communication plays in defining, delimiting, and binding community. On the one hand, communication is a signifying system. The media and other cultural institutions--the means of symbolic production--construct the meanings and symbols Relph's schema calls for. Raymond Williams, for example, gives communication a central place in the construction of societies. Society, he argues, is a form of communication; communication is the process of community (Williams, 1965, p. 55). The process of communicating place is both symbolic and material. We imagine community, certainly, but at the same time and inseparably we also live it. The media become valuable objects of study in this regard because they manifest social relations.

On the other hand, Williams acknowledges, terms such as nation, people, nation-state, society, and community create confusion because the loss of direct human relationships puts "certain of the basic elements of our social life beyond the reach of both direct experience and simple affirmation." Social identity in contemporary terms must account for modern social relations which "happen in complex ways over very large areas," relations which are often "distinct and dehumanized: the apparent opposites of community" (Williams, 1989, pp. 116-117). This includes communicatory relations which are highly mediated.

Cultural production is an important site on which particular meanings are attributed to place, and communities are delineated in particular ways. It is here that places are represented. A pertinent question becomes: How do we represent place?

Linguist Émile Benveniste maintains that language operates in both the domains of sémiotique, or signs, and sémantique, or discourse, bringing together language and society (Benveniste, 1974, pp. 64-65). More specifically, he claims that certain signs are empty of meaning in and of themselves, obtaining subjectivity only through discourse. Pronouns are his principal examples, but the category also includes demonstrative pronouns and adjectives (e.g., this, that) and adverbs of time and place (e.g., here, now) (Carontini & Péraya, 1975, p. 33). Benveniste's argument is analagous to the perceived need in Canada to define "here" through media discourse, to give Canada a particular meaning through indigenous cultural production. The media in federal cultural policy have been recognized historically as reality-defining institutions, and it is the definition of the Canadian reality which is at stake in the struggle for control of the mediascape.

The policy field, for example, has been a critical site of struggle for definitions of community as national community in the Canadian context, particularly as it concerns communication. A predominant theme of Canadian cultural policy has been an insistence upon treating place as material, social, and national, and film and television productions as representations of that material, social, and national space. Ted Magder argues that two distinct objectives motivate state intervention in the cultural sphere: issues of image, identity, and values, and economic growth. In Canada, "particular emphasis is placed on the need to protect and nurture the values and practices that constitute a national identity" (Magder, 1993, pp. 10-11). Paul Audley writes: "When the Government of Canada is called upon to explicitly state the basis on which it develops and implements policies affecting the cultural industries it almost always does so within the framework of a cultural model, rather than a market model" (Audley, 1994, p. 331). Federal cultural policy documents repeatedly situate cultural production in Canada within the ongoing struggle to assert Canadian identity and foster national unity.

Marc Raboy argues that it was the Royal Commission on Radio Broadcasting of 1929 (the Aird Commission) which "infused broadcasting with a national purpose" (Raboy, 1992, p. 7). The commissioners defined the goal of their inquiry as determining "how radio broadcasting in Canada could be most effectively carried on in the interests of Canadian listeners and in the national interests of Canada" (Canada, 1929, p. 5). Canada's national interest was also a central theme in the terms of reference to the Royal Commission on National Development in the Arts, Letters and Sciences 1949-1951 (Canada, 1951, pp. xi-5).

While economic objectives have come to share the foreground with issues of image, identity, and values, federal policy documents nonetheless maintain an investment in national identity and national unity. The federal Department of Communications' 1987 report on the cultural industries is prefaced with this comment from Communications Minister Flora MacDonald: "Culture is the very essence of our national identity" (Department of Communications, 1987, p. 6). The 1985 Federal Film Industry Task Force states in the introduction to its report: "The Canadian film industry plays a unique role in our cultural expression. It defines our identity, creates jobs, and has considerable economic ramifications" (Canada, 1985, p. 7). The report situates Canadian cinema within industrial production, but it nevertheless privileges its cultural dimension in making its recommendations to shore up Canadian film distributors. Finally, the Report of the Standing Committee on Communications and Culture was commissioned as a study of "the implications of culture and communications for Canadian unity" within the context of constitutional negotiations (Canada, 1992, p. ix). The report states: "Culture and communications are fundamental investments that will help to achieve renewal of our sense of pride and unity as a nation" (Canada, 1992, p. xvii). In an extensive review of cultural industries policy in Canada, Paul Audley concludes: "Public policy debate and action has from the beginning focused on the theme of facilitating cultural development in Canada in the context of market forces which work against that development" (Audley, 1994, p. 318).

The logic behind such cultural development is that which is concerned with defining place in social and cultural terms. Place is delineated, it is peopled, it comprises a particular community which has a history in this place. The geographical and political space we call Canada is specified in cultural terms.

Hollywood on location

Audiovisual location production invokes a different logic. Its place is defined, in economic terms, as a site of industrial production. Its particularity is not measured culturally, but is evaluated in terms of competing and alternative production sites. It is a very different kind of place.

Location production dates from the earliest days of cinema. When subject matter demanded, film production companies travelled with their cameras to shoot "found events." As early as 1897, Niagara Falls attracted filmmakers from France and the United States. In 1899, filmmakers representing Edison, American Mutograph, and Biograph filmed Canadian troops training and departing for the Boer War (Morris, 1978, pp. 244-245).

But if location production was subject-driven in its infancy, it became economics-driven as fictional feature film became the dominant commercial form. Off-shore production became part of Hollywood's overall strategy to reduce costs, gain access to markets and thus maximize profitability.

This development was prompted largely by the post-war debt crisis in Europe. European nations could no longer afford to import luxury items like films--and export their earnings--when the need for more vital commodities was pressing. A common remedy to these states' balance-of-payments problems was to freeze funds; films were allowed entry, but only a portion of their earnings could be withdrawn. In 1948, Great Britain became the first European territory to freeze funds. Britain lifted its 75% import duty on motion pictures, but restricted U.S. film companies to withdrawing $17 million (U.S.) annually over the next two years. France, Italy, and Germany followed suit (Balio, 1985, p. 407).

The Americans concocted elaborate schemes to retrieve their blocked funds in the form of goods they could subsequently liquidate, including motion pictures. Initially they invested in ship-building, and bought wood pulp, whiskey, and furniture abroad to sell for U.S. dollars (Guback, 1985, pp. 477-478). But ultimately, "[t]he availability of unremittable funds drove companies to shooting abroad, and films were made, partially or entirely, in Europe." Runaway production in Britain, Italy, France, and Spain was "a direct result of blocked earnings and company desires to spend them" (Guback, 1969, pp. 164-165).

Location shooting proved to be economical and had fewer union constraints than domestic shoots. As foreign audiences became increasingly important to Hollywood's solvency, the use of foreign actors and foreign settings broadened the films' international appeal. Gradually, as blocked earnings were spent and remittance liberalized, U.S. film companies rearranged their corporate structures to take advantage of available production subsidies. Thomas Guback writes: "While blocked earnings were responsible for the first wave of runaway production, the availability of subsidization was the cause of its perpetuation and development into a second wave which cannot be attributable to unremittable revenues." The availability of subsidies and sufficiently large markets determined the countries in which American investment would be made (Guback, 1969, pp. 165-166). Subsidization laws defined "national" as it applied to producers and films, but "these laws did nothing to prevent foreign subsidiaries of American companies from conforming to the decrees so as to become `national' producers of `national' films" (Guback, 1985, pp. 478).

While runaway production world-wide accounted for just 19 Hollywood films in 1949, it yielded 183 films in 1969 (Izod, 1988, p. 119). Hollywood's movement of capital in the film industry became a microcosm of American capital expansion into overseas markets, which multiplied ninefold from 1950 to 1973 (Izod, 1988, pp. 160-161). Guback writes: "What is happening is the extension, on an international scale, of industrial production applied to culture" (Guback, 1969, p. 178).

Location production is volatile, with periods of expansion and contraction governed by the state of the world economy, currency fluctuations, labour costs, restrictions on foreign earnings, and available tax shelters. Runaway production by the major Hollywood studios, for example, dropped off in the late 1970s and early 1980s, then picked up again toward the late 1980s (O'Regan, 1993, p. 78).

Recently, political and economic motives have been cited to explain an expansion of European-American co-ventures in film and television. Politically, the U.S. seeks to ease European concerns about Hollywood dominance of cinema and television screens. Economically, co-production satisfies European producers' desire for foreign distribution. Penny Britell insists, "the explosion of outlets including cable channels and pay-per-view on both continents and the hunger for product to fill the media maw is another force pushing the two sides together" (Britell, 1994, p. 51).

If runaway production has been beneficial to Hollywood, host countries see the benefits as mutual; competition for location activity is fierce. A number of countries are seeking to attract foreign producers with lower costs, subsidies, and tax breaks. And within countries, regions compete with one another for both foreign and domestic production activity. The attraction to the host is significant capital expenditure and the opportunity to develop a new industrial infrastructure: studios, ancillary services, post-production facilities, etc. A more contentious argument posits location film activity as a spur to the development of a viable indigenous cinema.

Poland, which hosted $9 million (U.S.) worth of shooting for Schindler's List, promises potential 40% savings to U.S. producers. The Polish Film Ministry will contribute up to 50% of a film's costs, depending on the size of its budget (Richardson, 1993, pp. 28, 34).

Puerto Rico is seeking international co-productions with tax breaks and a private fund of $10 million (U.S.) available to foreign producers (Young, 1993, p. 12). Holland is encouraging American producers to co-venture in order to meet European Union directives and quotas for European film and television (Fuller, 1994, pp. 47-48). Ireland's Section 35 law allows foreign producers to retrieve between 15 and 65% of production money spent in Ireland (Kemp, 1994, pp. 37, 46).

Variety describes Luxembourg as the most determined European country trying to attract foreign producers. Luxembourg instituted a tax shelter in 1988 to promote capital investment in audiovisual production, a scheme which attracted $33 million (U.S.) on 13 film and television projects in 1991. Investors in local productions obtain an investment certificate which permits tax relief on Luxembourg income. Overseas investors can sell these certificates to nationals through Luxembourg banks. The principal requirement is that productions meet "certain moral standards" (Fuller, 1992, p. 291).

Within the United States there is competition to lure film projects away from southern California. While in the late 1970s the chief rivals were New York, Texas, Nebraska, and Florida, by the mid-1980s all 50 states and more than 40 cities had established film bureaus (Izod, 1988, p. 191). California retains approximately 60% of Hollywood's $8-billion (U.S.) annual production budget for film and television, and between 80 and 90% of post-production work (O'Steen & Cox, 1993, pp. 1, 62). But the remaining 40% is substantial and it can fluctuate dramatically. New York remains a key player (Fleming, 1993, p. 20), but Florida attracted $300 million (U.S.) worth of location activity in 1992. Florida hopes to hit $1 billion (U.S.) by 2000 with the creation of Entertainment Florida Inc., which offers investments of up to $3 million (U.S.) to projects which spend at least 40% of their production in the state (Zink, 1993, pp. 222-223).

It is in this way that location production integrates local film and television activity within Hollywood's global organization of audiovisual production. Host communities become part of the Hollywood industry as branch-plant facilities, investing capital, labour, and sometimes government subsidies in what remains Hollywood production. The cultural particularity of these places is rendered irrelevant; they are defined instead by their value to Hollywood producers as location sites.

Hollywood North

British Columbia and Ontario are the key Canadian sites for location activity. B.C. attracts the lion's share of foreign audiovisual production while Ontario's foreign location activity augments much more significant indigenous film and television production. In 1994, for example, B.C. hosted 85 audiovisual shoots with expenditures of $401.97 million; three quarters of that spending came from foreign producers. The total includes 32 feature films, of which 17 were Canadian (Natalie Lapointe, receptionist, B.C. Film Commission, personal communication, March 9, 1995). Ontario hosted 128 film and television projects in 1994, with spending totalling $501 million. Of that spending, only $141.7 million was foreign, mostly American. Of the 34 feature films shot in Ontario in 1994, 23 were Canadian (Cuthbert, 1995).

Within Canada, British Columbia is a particular case for three reasons: it is Canada's largest centre of location production; the province has never had its own film and television industries; and a local film industry has now begun to emerge, having done so in a context dominated by foreign location production, most of it driven by Hollywood companies. This has resulted in a struggle of definition over what B.C. cinema is and should be.

At the same time, the B.C. example has relevance for other Canadian communities which seek to attract location production in the absence of viable audiovisual industries of their own. While location production remains marginal in Ontario and Quebec, 60% of Alberta's $62.2 million in audiovisual production in 1994 came from foreign companies on location. None of the films shot in Alberta in 1994 was Canadian. Manitoba, Saskatchewan, and Nova Scotia, regions with their own audiovisual traditions, are also beginning to attract foreign location production (Cuthbert, 1995; Morgan, 1995; Mary Maddever [Ed.], Canada on Location, personal communication, March 13, 1995).

A closer look at the B.C. example reveals how distinctions between domestic and foreign production become blurred and demonstrates to what extent local audiovisual activity is integrated with the Hollywood industry. Similarly, an analysis of the literature published by the British Columbia Film Commission (1994) shows how the promotional discourse speaks to larger debates which define cinema, specifically, and the media, more generally, within Canada. As the locations industry grows, it gains a louder voice in this debate. Finally, the B.C. example illustrates how the locations industry denies British Columbia its sociocultural specificity. It empties this place of its sociality, its status as community, and frames it simply as geographical space.

Media coverage of what the Vancouver newspapers call "Hollywood North" has been largely enthusiastic, sometimes outright celebratory; it eagerly appends British Columbia to another place. Hollywood is perceived as glamorous and gossip columns are devoted to naming celebrities spotted in and around the city (see McNamara, 1992). Being a part of Hollywood is to be a constituent part of "the big time." Under the headline "We've hit the big time," for example, Province reporter John McCallum writes: "Finally, after years of trying, the term `Hollywood North' is legit. So much so that Hollywood craft unions are complaining loudly about Vancouver, a sure sign that if we're not yet in the big time, we're getting pretty darn close" (McCallum, 1987, p. 63). In the first two sentences of his story, Province reporter Bruce Mason greets the 1989 opening of a $25-million studio complex in North Vancouver this way: "We're no longer just a pretty face or a Super Natural location. Welcome to North Shore Studios, the largest motion picture and television centre in Canada, now open for business." Mason notes that the studios even imported trees from California in refrigerated trucks (Mason, 1989, pp. 67-69).

Part of being in the big time is big money. Newspaper coverage is largely preoccupied with the economic impact of location production and consistently ignores its cultural implications. Considerable unease about the stability of the industry is expressed in early reportage. A Province story summarizing audiovisual production in the province in 1987--accounting for $152 million and 3,500 jobs--is headlined "Figures Good, but Future's No Snap" (Tytherleigh, 1987, p. 6). A series of Sun (Vancouver) stories by reporter Tom Barrett in May and June 1989 deal exclusively with economics. The first of these stories expresses fears about B.C. losing production activity to competing Canadian provinces (Barrett, 1989b, p. C1). Two subsequent stories highlight the industry's economic significance to B.C. Under the headline "Film Industry Called Goldmine," Barrett summarizes a study commissioned by five film unions which characterized the "amusement industry" as a stabilizing influence on the provincial economy (Barrett, 1989c, p. C7). Under the headline "We're in the Money," Barrett reports that the industry attracted $157 million in spending in 1988 and was responsible for 4,000 jobs (Barrett, 1989d, pp. C1-C2).

The use of the first-person plural, particularly in headlines, reflects the news coverage's frequent failure to distinguish between the domestic and location industries. For the most part the articles refer simply to "the B.C. film industry," by which they mean all audiovisual production in the province, including television. Stories which summarize annual production activity do not distinguish between indigenous and location production (Tytherleigh, 1987; Barrett, 1989d; Sagi, 1988; "Film Industry Shoots," 1992; Bell, 1992; Armstrong, 1992; Potter, 1993). Even government ministers can be guilty of totalizing the industry. Bound for the American Film Market and Location Exposition in Los Angeles, B.C. Tourism Minister Darlene Marzari told the Sun (Vancouver): "I'll be letting these people know that our government considers the B.C. film industry to be a key sector, one that is making an increasing contribution to our economy" (Daniels, 1992, p. D3).

There are exceptions to this. A Province story addressing the audiovisual industry's economic impact underlines the importance of domestic production as "value-added" production (Luke, 1991, p. A54). A Sun story describes spending on indigenous production--$3 million in 1987, $30 million in 1988--in terms of competition from other Canadian provinces (Barrett, 1989a, p. B5). Still, however, the distinctions are confined to economic parameters.

Rare are stories which cast the locations industry in a critical light. In a business story, Sun reporter Greg Ip reports the comments of B.C. film director Charles Wilkinson on the fragility of location production due to its Hollywood dependency. The story also cites the concerns of producer Tim Gamble, who describes location production as "Mexico North" because, Ip paraphrases, it "remains predominantly a factory for foreigners" (Ip, 1989, pp. B8-B9). Sun editor in chief Ian Haysom treats location production in cultural terms in a 1994 "Editor's View" column. Acknowledging the news media's role in sensationalizing Hollywood, Haysom laments the lack of an indigenous cinematic culture. He concludes:

Though this town is full of movie stars, film crews and movie making, the Canadian film industry is in a desperate state. Vancouver pretends to be Seattle or generic big-city America. Meanwhile, our own cinematic culture is non-existent. Movies help us understand more about ourselves. Who we are. If that's the case, here in Hollywood North, we're invisible. (Haysom, 1994, p. A22)

Most of the critical reportage has come from national publications like The Globe and Mail and Cinema Canada (see Brunet, 1988; O'Neill, 1988; Lacey, 1989; Dafoe, 1992, 1993).

In sum, press coverage of the audiovisual industry in B.C. too rarely distinguishes between domestic and foreign production (or between film and television), and it frames the industry almost exclusively in economic terms. This discourse constructs British Columbia as a strictly economic place, reminiscent of some of the province's own company towns. Its status as a cultural place is overlooked. The idea that British Columbians could, and perhaps should, represent their own experiences in film and television is not considered.

Historically, audiovisual production in British Columbia has been marginal to both the U.S. film industry based in Hollywood and the Canadian film industry concentrated in Ontario and Quebec. British Columbia has been a territory "in between," making only the occasional indigenous program and hosting, sporadically, foreign productions. Until the 1980s, B.C. had not had much of a film industry at all.

British Columbia has a long history of foreign location shooting, however. Colin Browne (1992) notes that the first filmmakers to photograph British Columbia were from the United States and Great Britain. G. W. Bitzer made at least six short films for the American Mutoscope and Biograph Company of New York, beginning in 1899. "Ces films, tournés dans les montagnes de l'intérieur et à Vancouver, prophétisaient l'avenir: ils ont été tournés par un studio étasunien pour un public d'abord et avant tout étasunien." Joseph Rosenthal of Great Britain subsequently filmed at least 21 short features in B.C. between 1900 and 1902 (pp. 174-175).

The most vibrant period of filmmaking in British Columbia, until the present, occurred from 1928 to 1938 when Central Films of Victoria, a subsidiary of Columbia Pictures, shot 14 films, "quota quickies" designed to circumvent the 1927 British quota law (Miller, 1988, p. 131). In all, 22 quota films were shot in Canada (Pendakur, 1990, p. 134). The British screen quota, which began at 5% and climbed to 20%, reserved a minimum amount of screen time for films made within the British Empire. Largely because of Canada's lenience toward American production of quota films on Canadian soil, the act was revised in 1938 to exclude films made within the British Empire by Hollywood companies (Morris, 1978, pp. 177-182). Browne writes: "... ces quatorze films représentent néanmoins la première vague de production cinématographique significative qu'a connue le Canada avant les années soixante-dix" (Browne, 1992, p. 176).

Between the 1938 revision of the British quota law and the 1960s, there was little independent audiovisual production in British Columbia. Those artists in B.C. who chose cinema as their medium largely avoided feature film because of its costs, and the lack of film schools, technicians, post-production facilities, and a narrative tradition. "Chaque fois que quelqu'un se lançait dans l'aventure, il devait presque recommencer à zéro. Et les chances que son film soit distribué ou exploité de façon satisfaisante étaient presque nulles" (Browne, 1992, pp. 176-177).

Canada, too, suffered a balance-of-payments crisis in the late 1940s, and films imported from the United States were identified as commodities contributing to the crisis. Canada's response was to negotiate the Canadian Cooperation Project with the U.S., but there is no evidence that this program had any impact on either the currency crisis or the amount of location film activity by Hollywood film companies in Canada (Berton, 1975, pp. 167-191; Pendakur, 1990, pp. 136-141).

The British Columbia Film Commission was created by the provincial government in 1978 to generate activity in the audiovisual industry by promoting B.C. locations. Initially, it promoted the province's natural attributes--the beauty and diversity of its landscapes, the proximity of such diverse locations to Vancouver, British Columbia's proximity to California, a shared time zone with Los Angeles--and a favourable currency-exchange rate. Part of the B.C. Trade Development Council, the B.C. Film Commission has evolved significantly since that time, promoting a wide-ranging service industry which includes a growing post-production sector. Most of the activity is servicing American productions on location. By 1987, for example, 95% of audiovisual production budgets in British Columbia came from U.S. sources (Therrien, 1992, p. 189).

British Columbia played a negligible role in Canadian audiovisual production, too, until B.C. Film--not to be confused with the B.C. Film Commission--was created in 1987 to provide financial support for indigenous film and television production, primarily in the form of equity financing. In each of the two years preceding B.C. Film's creation, the province accounted for just 1% of Canadian film and television activity (based on aggregate production budgets). That share reached a more respectable 10% by 1991, thanks primarily to the leverage provided by B.C. Film investment (Audley, 1992, pp. i-iv). Within B.C., indigenous audiovisual production remains small-scale. While accounting for between 30 and 40% of total productions between 1991 and 1994, domestic production accounts for a peripheral share in dollar terms: 24.45% in 1994 (Natalie Lapointe, receptionist, B.C. Film Commission, personal communication, March 9, 1995; B.C. Film Commission, 1994). The B.C. Film Commission does not break down budget figures project by project, but as Ian Hunter has argued, it would take "dozens" of indigenous productions every year to maintain the "American-inspired infrastructure" of production and post-production services which feed off of American location activity. Each American shoot can spend between $10 and $40 million in B.C. (Hunter, 1988, p. 36). The budgets of domestic productions are miniscule in comparison.10

As discussed earlier, the opportunity to qualify for "national" subsidies and tax concessions has been a principal lure for Hollywood location activity internationally. A number of funding schemes developed in British Columbia, ostensibly to boost indigenous production, are also available to production partners in co-ventures, or to companies which incorporate within the province.

In its Fall 1992 edition, Canada on Location, a trade journal which covers the locations industry, advised American producers on how best to conduct business in Canada. It described the procedures for, and the relative advantages of, incorporating Canadian subsidiaries and establishing joint ventures with Canadian companies. Service contracts and joint ventures, for example, permit American companies to avoid Investment Canada review and maintain a high degree of financial, creative, and copyright control over their projects (Barrett & Kelterborn, 1992, pp. 22, 41-42). The British Columbia Trade Development Corporation's Loan Guarantee Program, which guarantees film production budgets (up to a maximum $2.5 million or 75% of total costs), is available to any company incorporated in B.C. which has a pre-sale agreement in hand (B.C. Film Commission, 1994).

The failure of press coverage to characterize adequately B.C.'s audiovisual production industry becomes more understandable in light of the film and television community's increasing affiliations with Hollywood. Since 1978, for example, the participation of indigenous labour in American location projects in B.C. has grown from 40 to 97% (B.C. Film Commission, 1994). This means that B.C. film and television workers are no longer relegated to the unskilled labour and peripheral tasks of audiovisual production, but are participating increasingly in more coveted roles: principal actors; directors of photography; production designers; even directors, particularly in television ("Designs," 1992-93, pp. 23-26; Mary Maddever [Ed.], Canada on Location, personal communication, March 13, 1995). This has not translated into any evident Canadianization of Hollywood productions, but must be regarded as an appropriation of the B.C. audiovisual production community by Hollywood.

Hot property

An examination of the BCFC's promotional materials reveals the extent to which the location production industry serves industrial and economic objectives and the degree to which it excludes cultural considerations.11 Under the slogan "Hot Property," the BCFC promotional literature sells place in two registers: place as backdrop or setting and place as commercial site. In casting place as backdrop, the BCFC promotes the province's penchant for proteanism. The region, that is, can play any number of narrative settings, depending on the needs of the production. Typically, Vancouver is transformed into an American city such as Seattle or San Francisco, and British Columbia becomes part of the United States' Pacific Northwest. In this way, place becomes a natural resource whose physical geography and architecture can be framed to represent any desired space. Both the social and geographical identities of place are thereby effaced.

In casting place as a commercial site, the promotional literature peddles the region's economic, topographical, climatic, architectural, and human resource attributes as advantageous to film and television in a range of ways, from the aesthetic to the cost-effective. It is a discourse of regional economic and industrial development which integrates the B.C. audiovisual production community within a larger industry based in southern California, prompting the sobriquet Hollywood North.

The purpose of the B.C. Film Commission is to promote B.C.'s locations and industry personnel to international film, television, and commercial producers. Its mandate comprises the following roles: scouting locations; providing information on crews, technical facilities, and support services; assisting producers with budgeting and scheduling; acting as a liaison between producers and the general public, governments and the private sector; and supporting co-ventures with resident producers. The B.C. Film Commission also strives to keep the general public informed about industry activities (B.C. Film Commission, 1994).

How the BCFC literature empties place of its specificity and constructs British Columbia as unplace or anyplace merits particular attention. In promoting an industry devoted to serving Hollywood productions for economic purposes, it runs contrary to the dominant Canadian perception of media as cultural institutions concerned with defining Canadian experience. For the purposes of this analysis, I will concentrate on the locations brochure, The British Columbia Shooting Gallery, as an example of how the literature denies the particularity of place. I will pay particular attention to the use of language, which emphasizes the malleability of B.C. as a place, and the framing of the imagery, which negates particularity to emphasize variability and adaptability.

The locations brochure foregrounds setting as backdrop, but it also alludes to place as commercial site. The front cover, for example, features a dramatic aerial view of a shoot in downtown Vancouver, a photograph framed by the brochure's title and the claim: "We can give it to you for a song." The text refers to the affordability of shooting, production and post-production, an advantage which is more clearly articulated and elaborated upon inside the brochure and in considerable detail elsewhere in the promotional package.

The brochure's first inside page situates the backdrops the region offers within a fuller industrial context, promising three kinds of services to the audiovisual production community: locations; "know-how"; and assistance throughout audiovisual projects. Subsequently, on pages 3 and 4, the brochure outlines the BCFC's specific roles. Like the photograph on the front cover, the two photographs which accompany the BCFC text show actual film shoots: a set from the 1990 Hollywood feature Bird on a Wire on "the world's second largest special effects stage"; and another shoot in front of the provincial legislature in Victoria. The Bird on a Wire photo foregrounds the technical capabilities of the province as a production centre, while the Victoria photo emphasizes locations.

The back cover of the brochure reads like a BCFC advertisement. Under the provocative title "Come and get it...," we see an aerial postcard image of Vancouver--the urban core in the foreground, Stanley Park, the Strait of Georgia, and the mountains beyond--with a supporting text summarizing what the BCFC offers: "superb locations"; "full production facilities"; and "step-by-step assistance." The image graphically situates Vancouver as an urban site and service centre within close proximity to ocean, forest, and mountains, themselves diverse locations.

The remainder of the brochure is devoted primarily to picturesque images from throughout B.C., organized by genre--"The Big City"; "Urban Ethnic"; "The Wild West," etc.--and speaking to British Columbia as backdrop. I want here to touch on two particular points, which are crucial to understanding how the BCFC promotional literature constructs place: the visual depiction of B.C. as anyplace any time, and the use of language to invest the images with meaning.

The first point concerns the photographic images themselves and, specifically, how they are framed to emphasize their malleability as stages on which to set audiovisual productions. Organized by the generic heading "The Big City," for example, are four urban landscapes. While each is identified by a fine-print caption, the images themselves are composed to assert their unspecificity, their potential as urban anyplace. The images denote urban waterfront rather than Vancouver waterfront, an urban alley rather than a Vancouver alley. The photographs could have been taken in any number of cities. The text which accompanies these photos reinforces this point: "What do New York, Hong Kong, Los Angeles, turn-of-the-century Boston, Detroit, London, and San Francisco all have in common? Answer: We've been stand-ins for all of them, right here in versatile British Columbia."

With the exception of the photograph on the back cover, none of the photos in the brochure signifies Vancouver or British Columbia (except, possibly, for B.C. residents). Photos of industrial plants in Vancouver and Campbell River, for example, merely signify "industry." Similarly, mountainscapes, seascapes, and rural landscapes are malleable as anywhere settings.

A second striking feature of the photographs is the absence of people, or, at least, the de-emphasis of the social dimension of these landscapes. If people are not completely absent--as in photos of downtown Vancouver, various industrial sites, a Kerrisdale street scene, Gastown--then they are framed as an insignificant part of the landscape. Some of the photos are more remarkable than others in this regard, as if the photographer removed those who would normally occupy these spaces. A photograph of the lobby of Vancouver's Pan Pacific Hotel is a case in point. A site accustomed to heavy human traffic, it is hard to imagine when it would not be busy with people. Other photographs present, quite explicitly, location sites as empty film sets waiting to be peopled by actors. The text which accompanies photographs of the legislative chambers in Victoria and the Orpheum Theatre in Vancouver refers to such indoor locations as "standing sets."

Two notable exceptions to the unpeopled landscapes are a photograph of Barkerville's Main Street and a photograph of three costumed Native Indian dancers performing at the University of British Columbia. In both of these cases, the people depicted are themselves theatrical performers. Barkerville is a kind of theatre, a museumized gold-mining town staffed by actors in late-nineteenth-century costume.

The photograph of the Native dancers is worth particular attention as an exception which proves the larger rule of the BCFC promotional material. Of all the images and their accompanying texts, this is the most explicitly peopled, as the dancers are foregrounded both in the picture and in the text. The photograph, in other words, is of them, not the site upon which they are performing. The text, too, draws attention to the "rich and unique culture" of the Haida, Kwakiutl, Kootenay, and Kitsilano people, "Proud people willing to share their heritage with you." This page of the brochure constructs a message which is distinctly contrary to the rest of the literature, in that it is the only part of the larger BCFC discourse which constructs place in social and cultural terms. These people have their own stories to tell, and the international production community is invited, for once, to leave its scripts behind and tell a local story. This, of course, is not what location production is about.

The brochure also uses contrasting imagery to assert malleability, and the text accompanying these images demonstrates the degree to which discourse--that of the brochure, that of the feature-film narrative--defines place. The last two inside pages of the brochure--entitled "Fruit Farms" and "Coastlines"--are indistinguishable from those of a tourist brochure. The two images under "Fruit Farms" are pastoral scenes from the Okanagan Valley: a Penticton apple orchard and an Osoyoos vineyard. Nothing in either of the images or in their accompanying text makes reference to audiovisual production. Similarly, the "Coastlines" page features a sweeping aerial photo of ocean waves crashing onto Long Beach on the west coast of Vancouver Island, with well-treed mountains forming the backdrop. Again, there is no visual or textual reference to the film and television industries. The arrival of tourists to these locations would render place as tourist destination. The arrival of film crews would render place as film set.

In striking contrast, in terms of both text and imagery, are the two facing pages entitled "Industrial." Four photographs depict a North Vancouver industrial plant; the Burrard Thermal Plant; the Vancouver docks; and the smoky Campbell River skyline at dusk. While none of these photos is particularly unsightly, their subject matter is a radical departure from the imagery of the preceding examples. But more importantly, it is the text which frames these industrial sites as "ugly," "gritty, sooty, back-breaking," and "down and dirty," and assigns their place as: "The wrong side of town." Clear reference is made in the text to "script action," emphasizing the sites' potential for particular kinds of movie scenes. The slogan, "Bend me, shape me . . . ," which runs across the top of the two pages, alludes to the power of the filmmakers to manipulate these settings to suit their narrative needs.

Language plays a key role throughout the literature, especially as it establishes the BCFC's familiarity with the audiovisual industry, its vernacular and American popular culture in general, and as it constructs British Columbia as shared ground in a service-industry relationship. The BCFC locations brochure, for example, employs first- and second-person personal and possessive pronouns--me, you, we, yours, ours--to assert an industrial partnership between an unspecified "we"--understood as the BCFC--and "you"--the foreign audiovisual production community, but primarily Americans. Examples include: "We can give it to you for a song" and "This land is your land.... This land was made for you and me." "We," in other words, are here for "you" and "we" will work in partnership to exploit the natural and human resources of British Columbia.

At the same time, the discourse commodifies place as a resource to be employed in the manufacture of audiovisual products. "We can give it to you for a song" asserts that the BCFC can offer British Columbia locations cheaply to foreign producers. "Bend me, shape me" instructs the audiovisual client to do what s/he wishes with those sites. "Come and get it..." reads like an advertising slogan for the product that is, in this case, British Columbia.

But language serves another purpose in the brochure; it expresses the BCFC's familiarity with the industry, its jargon, and with American popular culture, in order to establish its credibility as a partner in American popular culture production. This language asserts familiarity in a number of ways: using film industry vernacular; making reference to Hollywood films and film genres; and by quoting lyrics and song titles from popular music.

The brochure employs theatrical terms like "stand-ins" and "Hot Property" and makes the claim "We know the biz" to demonstrate its aquaintance with film industry idiom.12 Jargon is exclusive speech; its use and understanding is exclusive to those who know the territory to which the language belongs. In this case the territory is film and television production and the BCFC speaks its language.

The use of film titles and film genres--"mean streets" (referring to the 1973 Martin Scorsese film), Clan of the Cave Bear (Michael Chapman, 1986), Border Town (an American television series), We're No Angels (Neil Jordan, 1989), "the Orient Express" (which invokes the 1974 Sidney Lumet film Murder on the Orient Express), "The Wild West"--and the use of song titles and lyrics--"Downtown... everything's waiting for you," "If you go out in the woods today . . . ," "Mountain's high... valley's so deep . . . ," "Take me home country roads..."--express in a similar way the BCFC's familiarity with American popular culture and reinforce its claim to insider status.

On one level, the promotional literature effaces the particularity of British Columbia as a distinct social, cultural, historical, and geographical place. On another level, the literature positions British Columbia as an active partner in Hollywood's audiovisual production industry. The result is that the literature integrates the audiovisual production industry in B.C. with the global Hollywood industry. This integration of the industries in the symbolic domain is realized in the material domain where Hollywood location production appropriates "the B.C. film industry." British Columbia becomes Hollywood North, an appendage of a transnational organization of cultural production.

Conclusion: Where is here?

What is lost in audiovisual location production is a sense of appartenance; neither the industry itself nor the cultural texts this industry produces belong to the production site. The locations industry is transient. It is lured to a place, but it never belongs to that place. In the same way that producers assemble a cast and a crew, they cast a location. The producers make an economic, logistical, and aesthetic investment in the location, but, as part of a cast, it remains always a replaceable part.

Nor do the audiovisual texts produced have any necessary bond to their locations. Their scripts have not grown out of this social, cultural, historical milieu. Instead they have been brought to this site where a substitute environment will be manufactured. As Bernard Nietschmann writes of such filmic geography, "all is context, not content" (Nietschmann, 1993, p. 5).

Indigenous audiovisual production claims geographical space as a particular cultural place, a place with meaning for its inhabitants, a foundation for storytelling. Location production, on the other hand, alienates place by denying its social particularity. The place of location production is not a specific community, but a malleable site. It is not a source of stories, of characters, of history, but a resource, a raw material which only attains subjectivity through its transformation as a setting for the stories of other cultures and as a site for branch-plant industrial production.

The place the British Columbia Film Commission defines is Hollywood North, a place integrated within Hollywood's audiovisual production sector, a place which derives meaning from its service to another culture and another place. The BCFC's promotional material is distinguished by its complete disregard for national cultural development, an issue which has absorbed public policy debates for most of this century. The BCFC situates British Columbia within a nation called Canada only for the purposes of situating the province geographically, identifying public holidays, explaining customs and tax regulations, and underlining the advantageous currency exchange rate.

British Columbia is a particular case in the sense that it is Canada's largest locations centre, and, unlike Ontario and Quebec, its domestic industry is only now emerging in a context dominated by foreign production. But the recent history of B.C.'s audiovisual production sector may hold some lessons for provinces like Alberta, Manitoba, Saskatchewan, and Nova Scotia which seek to attract foreign producers and build a locations industry alongside relatively small indigenous film and television industries.

It is here that the B.C. example speaks to the larger debate which seeks to define Canadian media institutions in the tension between cultural development and market economics. What is at stake in this debate is our definition of cultural production, our sense of place, and the relationship between the two.

Notes

1
I would like to thank Charles Perraton and Maurice Charland for their comments as this paper was being formulated, and Larry Pynn for his research assistance. I would like to acknowledge the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada for its financial support.
2
The only exception to this, to my knowledge, is the 1993 Paramount Pictures film Intersection, which was shot and set in Vancouver.
3
The expression "Hollywood North" has referred at different times to a number of strategies which have tied filmmaking in Canada to the larger transnational industry based in Hollywood, positing Canadian production as branch-plant production. The term is widely used in news media discourse, especially in British Columbia and Ontario, as a label for the location production industry. Colin Browne (1992) attributes this nickname to French journalist Paul Achard, who reported on Hollywood film activity in British Columbia in 1929 (pp. 173-175).
4
This debate has recently revolved around the Liberal government's February 1995 federal budget, which hit the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation with a 4% cut, and trimmed the budgets of the National Film Board and Telefilm Canada by 5%. The budget also promised a re-evaluation of these cultural institutions (Lepage, 1995, p. A4).
5
Richard Gruneau & David Whitson (1993) write: "The distinctiveness of Quebec society alone has always lent itself to suspicions about the possibility of a homogeneous Canadian common culture and a singular national identity. Moreover, there have always been subordinated groups--aboriginal Canadians, people from ethno-cultural groups other than English and French, working-class people, and most women--who have been historically excluded from the process of imagining Canada as a national community" (p. 273).
6
Otto Jespersen called those words whose meaning differs according to context "shifters," citing as examples words such as: father, mother, enemy, home, I, me. "The most important class of shifters are the personal pronouns" (Jespersen, 1959, pp. 123-124). Following Jespersen, Roman Jakobson called these words "shifters" or "embrayeurs." "Tout code linguistique contient une classe spéciale d'unités grammaticales qu'on peut appeler les embrayeurs: la signification générale ne peut être définie en dehors d'une référence au message" (Jakobson, 1963, pp. 178-179).
7
France fought the United States hard to maintain an exemption of audiovisual products from the latest General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade accord. France is now pushing fellow European Union members to tighten quotas restricting foreign (primarly American) television programs in the EU's Television Without Frontiers directive (Stern & Schuman, 1995, pp. 173-174).
8
In 1993, British Columbia hosted 73 audiovisual shoots with expenditures of $285.965 million. That included 26 feature films, of which 11 were Canadian. In 1992, there were 61 projects worth $211.219 million, three quarters of which was spent by foreign producers, most of them American (Kelly, 1993, p. 42). Canadian projects accounted for 8 of 16 feature films that year. In 1991, there were 53 projects worth $176.014 million. Only 3 of 12 features that year were domestic (B.C. Film Commission, 1994). Ontario hosted 137 film and television projects in 1993, with spending totalling $337.8 million. Of that spending, only $69 million was foreign, most of it American. Of the 29 feature films shot in Ontario in 1993, 22 were Canadian (Adilman, 1993, p. D3). In 1992, Ontario hosted 97 projects, worth $326.4 million. Foreign production accounted for $71.7 million of that total. Eighteen of the 23 feature films shot were Canadian (Harris, 1993a, p. A9).
9
Indigenous feature film production in B.C. has shown impressive growth since 1992. While only 3 of 12 features shot in B.C. in 1991 were Canadian, domestic features accounted for 8 of 16 in 1992 and 11 of 26 in 1993 (B.C. Film Commission, 1994). The B.C. features Harmony Cats and The Lotus Eaters each received 11 nominations for 1993 Genie Awards; both were nominated as best motion picture (Harris, 1993b, p. A14). The B.C. film Whale Music opened both the Toronto International Film Festival in September 1994 and the Vancouver International Film Festival the next month ("Made-in-B.C.," 1994, p. C7). Double Happiness, a first film by B.C. director Mina Shum, won two 1994 Genie Awards (Dansereau, 1994, p. D9).
10
The average Hollywood film cost $29.9 million (U.S.) in 1993, excluding the average marketing cost of $14.1 million (U.S.) (Bart, 1994, pp. 14,20). The average negative and print-and-advertising costs for a Hollywood feature film were $42.3 million (U.S.) in 1992 (Brosnan, 1993, p. 41). By comparison, the average Canadian feature film cost $2.5 million to produce in 1993. Atom Egoyan's Exotica, which won the International Critics' Prize at Cannes and eight 1994 Genie Awards, including best film, cost $2.3 million (Pierre Pontbriand, director of communications, Telefilm Canada, personal communication, March 8, 1995).
11
I wrote to the British Columbia Film Commission on February 25, 1994, and the promotional package I received is that which is cited in the body of the text. The package consists of:

- a 30-page locations brochure entitled, The British Columbia Shooting Gallery;

- a locations brochure from the Okanagan Similkameen Film Commission (one of four regional commissions within British Columbia);

- the Spring 1994 edition of Canada on Location, a twice-yearly periodical which documents location film and television activity throughout Canada;

- "Quick Facts" sheets on the B.C. Film Commission, the B.C. motion picture industry, breakdowns of film and television projects for 1991, 1992, and 1993, contacts for nine industry union locals, and a description of the British Columbia Trade Development Corporation's Loan Guarantee Program;

- a 90-page Production and Budget Guide outlining the cost breakdowns for a myriad of film-related services as well as Canadian immigration and customs regulations, a metric conversion guide, a sunrise/sunset chart, a list of Canadian holidays in 1994 and 1995, shooting guidelines for the Greater Vancouver area, and B.C. weather information;

- the 1994 Reel West Digest, a 300-page services directory for audiovisual production in Western Canada;

- a British Columbia Travel Guide from Tourism British Columbia;

- a B.C. Road Map and Parks Guide.

12
Frequent use of this idiom can be found in the Hollywood trade publication Variety. In Variety, a studio head is a "prexy," executives who leave for another company "ankle," a film reporting strong box-office returns is described as "socko," and television networks are "webs."

References

Adilman, Sid. (1993, December 31). Ontario has a record year as location for filming. The Toronto Star, p. D3.

Armstrong, John. (1992, January 3). Vancouver now No. 3 in North American film production. Sun (Vancouver), p. A1.

Audley, Paul. (1992). A cost-benefit analysis of B.C. film: 1987-88 to 1991-92. Toronto: Paul Audley and Associates.

Audley, Paul. (1994). Cultural industries policy: Objectives, formulation, and evaluation. Canadian Journal of Communication, 19(3-4), 317-352.

Balio, Tino. (1985). Retrenchment, reappraisal, and reorganization, 1948-. In Tino Balio (Ed.), The American film industry. Madison: University of Wisconsin Press.

Barrett, Douglas, & Kelterborn, Ted. (1992, Fall). A producer's legal guide: What Americans should know about shooting in Canada. Canada on location, pp. 22, 41-42.

Barrett, Tom. (1989a, February 14). Film-makers in B.C. fear eastern pitch. Sun (Vancouver), p. B5.

Barrett, Tom. (1989b, May 26). Provincial tax incentives threaten booming B.C. film production. Sun (Vancouver), p. C1.

Barrett, Tom. (1989c, June 15). Film industry called goldmine. Sun (Vancouver), p. C7.

Barrett, Tom. (1989d, June 23). We're in the money. Sun (Vancouver), pp. C1-C2.

Bart, Peter. (1994, March 14-20). Numbing numbers. Variety, pp. 3, 70.

Bell, Stewart. (1992, August 22). Vancouver's big take. Sun (Vancouver), p. B1.

Benveniste, Émile. (1974). Problèmes de linguistique générale II. Paris: Éditions Gallimard.

Berton, Pierre. (1975). Hollywood's Canada: The Americanization of our national image. Toronto: McClelland and Stewart.

Britell, Penny. (1994, March 21-27). U.S.-Euro prod'n pacts soar. Variety, p. 51.

British Columbia Film Commission. (1994). Promotional literature for location filming in British Columbia. (Available from Dianne Neufeld, Commissioner, British Columbia Film Commission, 601 West Cordova Street, Vancouver, BC, V6B 1G1)

Brosnan, Bruce. (1993, March 22). Uphill battle to bankroll movies, Variety, p. 41.

Browne, Colin. (1992). Il était une fois Hollywood North: Colombie britannique: 1929-1986. In Sylvain Garel & André Pâquet (Eds.), Les cinémas du Canada: Québec, Ontario, Prairies, Côte ouest, Atlantique. Paris: Centre Georges Pompidou.

Brunet, Robin. (1988, April). Hot damn: The B.C. film industry's busting out all over. Cinema Canada, pp. 9-10.

Canada. (1929). Report of the Royal Commission on Radio Broadcasting. Ottawa: F. A. Acland.

Canada. (1951). Report of the Royal Commission on National Development in the Arts, Letters and Sciences 1949-1951. Ottawa: King's Printer.

Canada. (1985). Canadian Cinema: A Solid Base. Report of the Film Industry Task Force. Ottawa: Minister of Supply and Services Canada.

Canada. (1992). Communications and culture: The ties that bind. Report of the Standing Committee on Communications and Culture. Ottawa: Minister of Supply and Services Canada.

Carontini, E., & Péraya, D. (1975). Le Projet Sémiotique: élements de sémiotique générale. Paris: Jean-Pierre Delarge.

Cuthbert, Pamela. (1995, January 16). Boom goes 1994. Playback, pp. 1, 5.

Dafoe, Chris. (1992, August 28). Filming up a storm. The Globe and Mail (Toronto), p. A5.

Dafoe, Chris. (1993, October 6). The West Coast: What a star! The Globe and Mail (Toronto), p. A12.

Daniels, Alan. (1992, February 28). Tourism minister L.A.-bound to sell B.C. movie potential. Sun (Vancouver), p. D3.

Dansereau, Suzanne. (1994, 8 décembre). Les Génies: un gros zéro ou presque pour le Québec. La Presse (Montréal), p. D9.

Department of Communications. (1987). Vital links: Canadian cultural industries. Ottawa: Minister of Supply and Services Canada.

Designs on the future. (1992, December; 1993, January). Reel West Magazine, pp. 23-26.

Film industry shoots for new record. (1992, July 28). Province (Vancouver), p. B14.

Fleming, Michael. (1993, December 27). Gotham film shootings up. Variety, p. 20.

Fuller, Chris. (1992, May 4). Luxembourg angling with a tax shelter. Variety, p. 291.

Gruneau, Richard, & Whitson, David. (1993). Hockey Night in Canada: Sport, identities and cultural politics. Toronto: Garamond Press.

Guback, Thomas H. (1969). The international film industry: Western Europe and America since 1945. Bloomington: Indiana University Press.

Guback, Thomas H. (1985). Hollywood's international market. In Tino Balio (Ed.), The American film industry. Madison: University of Wisconsin Press.

Harris, Christopher. (1993a, January 1). Through the lens brightly: Film and TV production in Ontario was recession-proof in 1992. The Globe and Mail (Toronto), p. A9.

Harris, Christopher. (1993b, October 20). 2 B.C. films lead Genie nominees: 14th awards to be held Dec. 12. The Globe and Mail (Toronto), p. A14.

Haysom, Ian. (1994, March 19). Hooray for Hollywood! Sun (Vancouver), p. A22.

Hunter, Ian. (1988, September). Training reels. Equity, pp. 35-66.

Ip, Greg. (1989, September 30). Getting in on the action. Sun (Vancouver), pp. B8-B9.

Izod, John. (1988). Hollywood and the box office, 1895-1986. New York: Columbia University Press.

Jakobson, Roman. (1963). Essais de linguistique générale. Paris: Les Éditions de Minuit.

Jespersen, Otto. (1959). Language: Its nature, development and origins. London: George Allen & Unwin.

Kelly, Brendan. (1993, November 22). Focus sharpens on prod'n. Variety, pp. 39, 42, 52.

Kemp, Philip. (1994, March 21-27). Subsids cloud prod'n costs. Variety, pp. 37, 46.

Lacey, Liam. (1989, January 6). How the West was won: Better funding for B.C. films leads to a homegrown boom. The Globe and Mail (Toronto), p. A13.

Lepage, Jocelyne. (1995, 28 février). Les premiers touchés sont Radio-Canada, Téléfilm et l'Office national du film. La Presse (Montréal), p. A4.

Luke, Paul. (1991, October 13). Banking on the movies. Province (Vancouver), p. A54.

Maddever, Mary. (1994). Cross country scouting. Canada on location, 4(1), pp. 4-11.

"Made-in-B.C.-film to open Vancouver Film Festival." (1994, September 9). The Gazette (Montreal), p. C7.

Magder, Ted. (1993). Canada's Hollywood: The Canadian state and feature films. Toronto: University of Toronto Press.

Mason, Bruce. (1989, September 10). Studio opens. Province (Vancouver), pp. 67-69.

McCallum, John. (1987, November 8). We've hit the big time. Province (Vancouver), p. 63.

McNamara, Lynne. (1992, December 18). It's just a zoo out there in TV land. Province (Vancouver), p. C2.

Miller, Robert E. (1988). The Canadian feature film conundrum: 1894-1967. In Bruce A. Austin (Ed.), Current research in film: Audiences, economics and law (Vol. 4). Norwood, NJ: Ablex Publishing.

Morgan, Joanne. (1995, January 2). Hopes as high as production levels. Playback, p. 18.

Morris, Peter. (1978). Embattled shadows: A history of Canadian cinema, 1895-1939. Montreal: McGill-Queen's University Press.

Nietschmann, Bernard. (1993). Authentic, state, and virtual geography in film. Wide Angle, 15(4), 4-12.

O'Neill, Mark. (1988, April). Development, diversification and the dollar. Cinema Canada, pp. 17-19.

O'Regan, Tom. (1993). The international, the regional and the local: Hollywood's new and declining audiences. In E. Jacka (Ed.), Continental shift: Globalisation and culture. Sydney: Local Consumption.

O'Steen, Kathleen, & Cox, Dan. (1993, September 20). Coast into overdrive: Hot Hollywood bolsters limp L.A. Variety, pp. 1, 62.

Pendakur, Manjunath. (1990). Canadian dreams and American control: The political economy of the Canadian film industry. Toronto: Garamond Press.

Potter, Greg. (1993, January 6). Boomtime for movie-makers continues in Hollywood North. Sun (Vancouver), p. C4.

Raboy, Marc. (1992). Missed opportunities: The story of Canada's broadcasting policy. Montreal & Kingston: McGill-Queen's University Press.

Relph, Edward. (1986). Place and placelessness. London: Pion.

Richardson, Rick. (1993, August 16). Big buck bonanza in local shoots. Variety, pp. 28, 34.

Sagi, Douglas. (1988, May 18). B.C. film office chief denies Canadian industry declining. Sun (Vancouver), p. C10.

Stern, Andy, & Schuman, Joseph. (1995, February 20-26). French fried in quota quibble: EU partners won't back tighter foreign controls. Variety, pp. 173-174.

Therrien, Denyse. (1992). L'insoutenable précarité du cinéma d'auteur. Colombie britannique: 1986-1992. In Sylvain Garel & André Pâquet (Eds.), Les cinémas du Canada: Québec, Ontario, Prairies, Côte ouest, Atlantique. Paris: Centre Georges Pompidou.

Tytherleigh, Mike. (1987, December 21). Figures good, but future's no snap. Province, p. 6.

Williams, Raymond. (1965). The long revolution. London: Pelican.

Williams, Raymond. (1989). In Robin Gable (Ed.), Resources of hope: Culture, democracy, socialism. London: Verso.

Young, Deborah. (1993, December 6). Puerto Rico courts co-prods with money, tax breaks. Variety, p. 12.

Zink, Jack. (1993, February 22). Florida subsidy scheme in trouble. Variety, pp. 222-223.