California voters have overwhelmingly rejected Proposition 21, a measure which would have provided funding for state parks by instituting an extra $18 charge on the annual registration fee for most vehicles. Assorted film industry groups, including the Association of Independent Commercial Producers (AICP), supported Prop. 21 on the grounds that without such an additional revenue stream, a number of parks could close or at least have curtailed hours and not enough staff to facilitate activities such as location filming.
The parks represent one of the California’s biggest location draws for motion picture lensing and professional still photography. Not only does this activity generate dollars from production but the screening and airing of breathtaking vistas in these projects in turn promote the parks as tourist destinations, another major contributor to the state’s economy.
According to the California Film Commission (CFC), state parks account for the majority of the state filming permits it issues. In the latest available figures–which are for 2009–parks represent 62 percent of state permit filming days. Caltrans properties (roads, highways) are a distant second at 30 percent. California’s network of state parks cover 1.5 million acres and one-third of the state’s coastline.
Based on the importance of location lensing, such groups as the AICP, The Location Managers Guild of America, San Diego Film Commission, Sacramento Film Commission, Santa Cruz County Film Commission, Monterey County Film Commission, Mendocino County Film Office, Santa Barbara Film Commission and the Humboldt Film Commission endorsed Prop. 21.
Now that Prop. 21 has been defeated, the industry is hopeful that location filming will still be not only welcomed but also fully facilitated in a timely fashion–despite the dramatic budget shortfall being felt by state parks. Tough economic times certainly make it all the more prudent to make efforts to accommodate revenue-generating production shoots.
In the past decade, California lost more than 36,000 jobs and $2.4 billion in wages because of production leaving California to film out-of-state. California’s 278 state parks rank as the state’s most popular state-owned location for filming, offering low-cost and diverse locations to help keep film and commercial production and jobs in the state. In 2008 and 2009, California state parks hosted more than 400 television commercial and print advertisement shoots.
Martin Scorsese On “The Saints,” Faith In Filmmaking and His Next Movie
When Martin Scorsese was a child growing up in New York's Little Italy, he would gaze up at the figures he saw around St. Patrick's Old Cathedral. "Who are these people? What is a saint?" Scorsese recalls. "The minute I walk out the door of the cathedral and I don't see any saints. I saw people trying to behave well within a world that was very primal and oppressed by organized crime. As a child, you wonder about the saints: Are they human?" For decades, Scorsese has pondered a project dedicated to the saints. Now, he's finally realized it in "Martin Scorsese Presents: The Saints," an eight-part docudrama series debuting Sunday on Fox Nation, the streaming service from Fox News Media. The one-hour episodes, written by Kent Jones and directed by Elizabeth Chomko, each chronicle a saint: Joan of Arc, Francis of Assisi, John the Baptist, Thomas Becket, Mary Magdalene, Moses the Black, Sebastian and Maximillian Kolbe. Joan of Arc kicks off the series on Sunday, with three weekly installments to follow; the last four will stream closer to Easter next year. In naturalistic reenactments followed by brief Scorsese-led discussions with experts, "The Saints" emphasizes that, yes, the saints were very human. They were flawed, imperfect people, which, to Scorsese, only heightens their great sacrifices and gestures of compassion. The Polish priest Kolbe, for example, helped spread antisemitism before, during WWII, sheltering Jews and, ultimately, volunteering to die in the place of a man who had been condemned at Auschwitz. Scorsese, who turns 82 on Sunday, recently met for an interview not long after returning from a trip to his grandfather's hometown in Sicily. He was made an honorary citizen and the experience was still lingering in his mind. Remarks have... Read More