It is laudable that the First Lady, Atty. Liza Araneta-Marcos, has taken it upon herself to initiate measures to try and save the local movie industry which, although not in its death throes (yet), is moving towards Stage 3 cancer. Her first move was to meet with Movie and Television Review and Classification Board (MTRCB) chair Lala Sotto probably to pick her brains about how the film business could be pulled out of the quagmire it is currently in.
Not a bad first step. But the MTRCB can hardly see the complete picture as far as movie production is concerned. It is mainly a regulatory body that rates films that can be shown and to whom, or not shown at all. In fact, it does not even have jurisdiction over the movies streamed online, to where most of the producers — especially the smaller ones — have migrated, nor are its ratings binding when Filipino films are shown abroad. It also cannot reward good productions, or sanction lousy ones.
Mrs. Marcos’ time would have been better spent had she met with the officials of the Film Development Council of the Philippines (FDCP), whose work is beset by lack of funds, Gordian red tape, and the almost total lack of pulling power in convincing foreign producers to make movies in the Philippines. Perhaps streamlining its bureaucracy and giving it more money to fund small producers and new and promising filmmakers would make it competitive with its counterparts in Asia, at least.
If Mrs. Marcos really wants to bring her moral suasion and ascendancy to bear for the benefit of the Philippine film industry, she should focus on two things that the Legislature could do.
The first is to revive the tax incentives granted by the Cinema Evaluation Board of the FDCP, which used to rate movies (via the Cinema Evaluation Board composed of persons knowledgeable in filmmaking) for their excellence. As an aside, this Board was created during the time of her fave sister-in-law, Imee Marcos, when she was head of the defunct Experimental Cinema of the Philippines.
A rating of “A” would entitle a film to a 100-percent rebate on local government amusement taxes; a “B” rating, 50 percent. However, greedy mayors went to the Supreme Court to challenge the system and won, and thus all movies are now taxed 30 percent of gross by local government units (when the tax on box office receipts in South Korea is a mere 3 percent). This, on top of local government permits for moviemakers based on a percentage of the GROSS (not even net profits), makes it financially punishing for local producers to continue making movies. Truly, the situation is GROSS.
Another is the immediate passage of two proposed pieces of legislation that seek to block online content piracy. Two senators with direct links to showbiz — Bong “Budots” Revilla and Jinggoy Estrada — have both filed separate Senate bills that would amend the 26-year-old Intellectual Property Code (which created the Intellectual Property Office, or IPO) and which proposed laws would grant the IPO the power to dismantle access to and block websites that contain copyrighted content belonging to local movie producers. A counterpart bill (House Bill 7600) has already passed third and final reading. Yet all three have been gathering cobwebs in the Senate’s Trade and Industry Committee chaired by Sen. Mark Villar.
Local showbiz, once one of the darlings of world cinema in the 1970s and ‘80s, is slowly bleeding to death due to high taxes and production costs, a shrinking domestic market, and official indifference.
The final nail in its coffin could be the rampant online piracy that goes on unabated because our lawmakers are glacially slow in keeping abreast of technology that can cut for evil. Bollywood and Hallyuwood have already overtaken what was once a world-class industry that, in its heyday, had much prestige and contributed a lot to the economy.
It’s about time we were moving to reclaim our lost glory.
