Montreal City Weblog

Kate 08:17 on 2025-05-06 Permalink Reply  

• Ephraim 12:15 on 2025-05-06 Permalink

  About 70% of the gross revenue of films, worldwide is from American films. So if they put on a reciprocal tariff, that will hurt US industry more. Not to mention 50 U.S.C. § 1702(b)(3) which specifically excludes films from presidential authority, so officially it would need to go through both houses. But let’s be realistic, the largest part of foreign films aren’t getting to the US anyway… or are Americans now watching Bollywood and Chinese films? (Kungywood? Mandrywood? Hannywood?)

• Blork 13:54 on 2025-05-06 Permalink

  While it’s hard to say for sure, because nobody ever really knows WTF Trump is talking about (including Trump) most people seem to think the focus of the tariffs is on US productions that outsource part of the production to companies in other countries. Many US films are shot in Canada (and other places) standing in for US locations, and a lot of post-production work (editing, special effects, color balancing, etc.) is done by companies here and in other countries. Typically this is done because those other countries offer tax incentives that make it less expensive to do the work there than it would be to do it domestically in the US.

  So from a purely “protect our home workers” point of view you can see how it fits into the protectionist mindset that Trump puts forward to prop up support among US working people. (There are a lot of un- and under-employed production and post-production workers in the US because of these tax incentives from other countries.)

  But how do you enforce that? And at what cost?

• Joey 10:55 on 2025-05-07 Permalink

  Blork, I don’t think you can enforce it – at any cost. There’s really only three things that the US can do. First, establish federal subsidies for film production, though that will just contribute to the race to the bottom that has drawn production away from the US (and even then you have intra-US competition with states like Georgia luring productions away from California). Second, you can ensure that American production facilities are state of the art – if you can’t compete in subsidies you have to find other ways of generating value for producers. Third, build housing! Make it affordable to live in California – no easy feat, especially after this winter’s fires.

  But the idea that you would somehow impose tariffs on films – which will only lead to reciprocal tariffs around the world that will destroy American film production and cultural heft – might be the most insane of all of Trump’s foolishness.