“We Have Made The Bottom Line Better For Production Companies Up & Down The Country”: UK Culture Secretary Says “Game-Changing” Indie Film Relief Will Bring Balance To A Sector Too Reliant On Big-Budget Fare
deadline.comEXCLUSIVE: UK Culture Secretary Lucy Frazer has said the 40% indie film tax relief will bring balance to a movie sector that has swung too far towards big-budget fare in recent years.
The Conservatives unveiled the relief yesterday on films below £15M ($19M) budget, which was celebrated as a “game-changer” by figures ranging from Christopher Nolan to Ridley Scott to Gurinder Chadha.
Frazer said the latest set of tax reliefs brought in by the government, which it predicts will be worth £1B in additional relief over the next five years, are the “continuation” of a decade’s worth of work and will level the playing field between big-budget U.S.
movies like Barbie that filmed in the UK and smaller indie fare. “We’re supporting big productions and big international films on British soil but we need to do both and help indie films as well,” she said, as she sat down with Deadline at the National Theatre in London. “We’ve listened to the sector,” Frazer added. “It became really clear that although people of course want to make films here, what matters is the bottom line.
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