Canadian Film Development Corporation

Organisation

Canadian Film Development Corporation

1967-1984

The Canadian Film Development Corporation (CFDC) was created by an Act of Parliament in 1967 "to foster and promote the development of a feature film industry in Canada." This Crown corporation, which owes its existence to filmmakers who pressured the government for financial support, was originally given $10 million to invest in the FILM industry as a loan fund. Under its first executive director, Michael Spencer, it invested in a number of low-budget English and French films of cultural value and was instrumental in establishing the beginnings of a viable film industry.
Increasing commercial pressures were brought to bear on the CFDC as many of the films it supported went unseen by Canadians, and by 1973 international co-productions were favoured. In 1978 a new executive director, Michael McCabe, accelerated this process, encouraged the use of foreign stars and favoured producer-initiated as opposed to director-driven projects. Using the Capital Cost Allowance tax initiative he increased total Canadian investment in feature films from $19 million in 1977 to $165 million in 1980. This commercial orientation was far from successful as many films remain unreleased and indigenous artistic production virtually ceased.
In 1980 André Lamy replaced McCabe, committing himself to rectifying problems created by the CCA. In 1983 the Canadian Broadcast Program Development Fund was created to allocate $245 million over a 5-year period to films that were mainly co-financed by television networks, the private sector and the CFDC. This arrangement guaranteed the films a broadcast playdate, thereby avoiding problems of distribution that had plagued the industry. To reflect this growing emphasis on investing in television production, the organization was renamed Telefilm Canada in 1984.

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