Looking at the Impact of the Film Industry
Some years ago, I stumbled upon a category of books which explain the story construction, plots and characters in films and books. Obviously, they are always schematic, but I have learned a lot about character definition, story arcs and writing. If you only want to read one, check out “Into the Woods”.
For example, hospitals, police stations and court rooms are great environments, because people need to talk and there is a constant stream of events. On the contrary, it is hard to imagine Pablo Picasso constantly explaining what he is doing next. That wouldn’t feel natural.
Recently, I have also read the “Biography of the Pixel” by one of the co-founders of Pixar. It is a good case study how the film industry has to reinvent itself constantly as nothing is as boring as yesterday’s movie. It’s a story of constant innovation since the early days of Edison and Lumière.
Over the summer, I was working on a study which looked at the impact of the film industry. The results will be presented later this month but let me already share a few thoughts about transparency, funding and the social value of the film industry.
Transparency
I have never seen an industry with a comparable level of transparency. You have seen “Good bye Lenin!” and want to know who was the Steadicam operator? Just check any of the websites like Crew United following these details.
For the study, I have constructed a database with more than 15,000 entries with actors and crew members. That really enables high insights which are almost never found in other industries. You can also find information about the total costs for documentaries or feature film on the websites such as the Austrian Film Institute funding these productions.
Cultural value
Beyond the well-known Hollywood studios, we have film industries in every country. Of course, Bollywood is leading the global ranking with 2,500 movies produced according to numbers from the World Intellectual Property Organization.
In Europe, there are 1,460 feature films and 898 documentary films produced every year according to the latest numbers from the European Audiovisual Observatory. In addition, there was a total of 1,476 TV fiction productions in 2023.
A detailed analysis of the clusters will be a part of the study, but it is obvious that films and documentaries have led to social change. Think of US films like “Super Size Me” exposing the impact of fast food, “Blood Diamond” detailing the human costs of the diamond trade, “Philadelphia” changing how societies think about HIV/AIDS or the documentary of former US Vice President Al Gore’s “An Inconvenient Truth” raising awareness about climate change. There is also another side of the debate with research showing that Top Gun led to an increased interest in joining the US military.
In an international context, the best known example is probably “Hotel Rwanda” covering the genocide in the country.
In an European context, films have covered the life in the German Democratic Republic (“Good Bye Lenin”, “The Lives of Others”), the Holocaust (“The Counterfeiters”), fascism (“The Wave”), speech impairment (“The King’s Speech”) or Genocide memory (“Quo Vadis, Aida?”). Those films are well-known but in national contexts we have thousands of films covering assisted suicide, domestic violence, poverty, women rights, corruption, migration, organized crime, climate change or social inclusion.
Interestingly, it does not really work the other way around. There are some rumors about the oil industry funding climate change denial films but it is not a widespread phenomenon. Obviously, you will find a lot of documentaries pushing conspiracy theories in the darker sides of the internet.
Public funding
It is noteworthy that every democracy supports the film industry with a range of grant programs and tax incentives. I am not aware of any direct challenges to this idea. There are two aspects related to this observations. First, films help to shape national and regional identities. As a side note, it also shaped the way mafia members behaved after watching “The Godfather”.
This is in line with the findings of the European Audiovisual Observatory that 63% of all funding in small markets and 45% in medium-sized markets is provided by public funding programs.
That implies that societies value films and want to see films which have a plot playing in Austria, Germany, France or Spain and covering topics which are relevant for the current narratives. Personally, I find it surprising that it is not more often covered by impact investors and foundations.
