Latest news with #BritishFilmCommission
Yahoo
06-05-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
Trump's foreign film tariffs could ‘wipe out' UK movie industry, ministers told
Donald Trump's threat to impose 100% tariffs on movies made outside the US could wipe out the UK film industry, ministers have been warned, as they came under immediate pressure to prioritise the issue in trade talks with the White House. UK government officials and senior figures from Britain's multibillion-pound production industry are to meet imminently to discuss Trump's threat, which he made after months of promising to restore Hollywood to its 'golden age'. In an extraordinary intervention, Trump announced his intention to impose the levy on all movies 'produced in foreign lands', stating that the US film industry was facing a 'very fast death' as a result of incentives being offered overseas. The UK is among the countries offering film-makers generous tax incentives. The US president said he had already ordered the commerce department and the US trade representative to begin instituting such a tariff. He said on his Truth Social platform the issue was a 'national security threat' because of the 'concerted effort by other nations' to attract productions. 'Hollywood is being destroyed,' he later told reporters. 'Other nations have stolen our movie industry.' His outburst caused immediate concern in the UK, a regular location for some of Hollywood's biggest movie productions, including Barbie, parts of the Mission: Impossible franchise and Disney's Star Wars productions. More big movies are scheduled to be shot in the UK soon, including Star Wars: Starfighter. Philippa Childs, the head of the creative industries union Bectu, said: 'These tariffs, coming after Covid and the recent slowdown, could deal a knockout blow to an industry that is only just recovering, and will be really worrying news for tens of thousands of skilled freelancers who make films in the UK. 'The government must move swiftly to defend this vital sector and support the freelancers who power it, as a matter of essential national economic interest.' One senior figure in the British creative sector said: 'If it becomes real, it will be huge. It could possibly wipe out the British film industry and its crews.' Related: Trump's movie tariffs are designed to destroy the international film industry The international feature film production spend in the UK was £1.9bn last year, with high-end TV production bringing in £2.8bn. Investment from the US on films increased 83% from the previous year. Adrian Wootton, the chief executive of the British Film Commission, said the announcement was 'clearly concerning' but said it was crucial to know more about the details of the plans. 'We will be meeting with government and our industry policy group in the coming days to discuss further,' he said. 'The UK and US have long enjoyed a strong, shared history of film-making.' Senior politicians are calling for Keir Starmer's government to prioritise the UK film industry in US trade talks, though sources have already told the Guardian that a deal is a second-order priority for Trump. Caroline Dinenage, the chair of the culture, media and sport committee, said: 'Last month the committee warned against complacency on our status as the Hollywood of Europe. President Trump's announcement has made that warning all too real. 'Making it more difficult to make films in the UK is not in the interest of American businesses. Their investment in facilities and talent in the UK, based on US-owned IP, is showing fantastic returns on both sides of the Atlantic. Ministers must urgently prioritise this as part of the trade negotiations currently under way.' James Frith, a Labour member of the committee, said any tariffs on UK film production would be self-defeating. 'Any US tariffs on foreign-made films would harm not just British jobs and creativity but also the US studios and audiences who rely on our skilled workforce and production expertise,' he said. 'It is in everyone's interest to protect this deep, highly successful partnership.' Industry insiders said it was unclear how the tariffs would work in practice, warning they would end up penalising US studios and cutting production and jobs. Trump is facing resistance in the US from the likes of Gavin Newsom, the governor of California, whose office said the president had no authority to impose such tariffs. Trump's declaration was not a complete surprise to industry and government insiders, given his previous declaration that he wanted to help 'troubled' Hollywood. Before his inauguration, he appointed Sylvester Stallone, Mel Gibson and Jon Voight as 'special ambassadors' charged with bringing back production lost to 'foreign countries'. Film and television production in Los Angeles has fallen by nearly 40% over the past decade, according to FilmLA, a non-profit that tracks the region's production. Trump's move could also be a reaction to a decision by the China Film Administration in April to 'moderately reduce the number of American films imported', in response to US tariffs on China. Related: Trump's attack on the film industry is a sign of xenophobic contempt | Jesse Hassenger Stephen Galloway, a former editor of the Hollywood Reporter, said: 'There is a gigantic problem, which Trump's social media post addresses, which is that Hollywood has been decimated – there has been a complete flight of production from Los Angeles. 'It's a locomotive that's going faster and faster and – based on the expense of living and shooting in Los Angeles, and tax breaks and subsidies from different states and other countries, and the strength of the dollar – that all makes foreign production a bargain. There's an arms race among states and countries to up the tax breaks and subsidies they offer.' Galloway suggested Trump may be acting out of a romantic fantasy, much like imagining that under steel tariffs Pittsburgh could once again become a place of US steel production, when in reality there are now about 5,000 steel mill jobs in the area. 'Hollywood is the source of all modern romantic fantasy, but can you restore it to its golden age? No, you can't,' he said. 'Everyone would love to do it, but the invention of the computer chip destroyed Hollywood as we knew it as a film manufacturing hub. 'There's a contradiction between 'let's preserve Hollywood as the centre of manufacturing' and 'let's protect ourselves from foreign propaganda'. But if foreign propaganda is a Disney movie that happened to be shot in Pinewood, what kind of propaganda is that?' A UK government spokesperson said: 'Talks on an economic deal between the US and the UK are ongoing – but we are not going to provide a running commentary on the details of live discussions or set any timelines because it is not in the national interest. 'We will continue to take a calm and steady approach to talks and aim to find a resolution to help ease the pressure on UK businesses and consumers.' Amid confusion over how any tariff could work in the complicated process of movie-making, a White House spokesperson said no final decision had been made on new levies. They said all options were being explored to deliver on Trump's concern over Hollywood.
The Guardian
06-05-2025
- Entertainment
- The Guardian
Trump's talk of film tariffs makes no sense, but it's already doing damage – to Hollywood
Another day, another bizarre, mischievous, headline-hogging pronouncement from the US president. Steve Bannon famously advised him to flood the zone with shit – a Maga-Maoist permanent revolution of provocative, toxic nonsense. Trump is flooding the zone with tariffs, then he pauses, walks back and climbs down on tariffs, and then adds more tariffs. The latest is his bizarre plan to hit movies made in 'foreign countries' with 100% tariffs. He has solemnly announced his grave concern that Hollywood was 'dying' at the hands of foreigners like the UK, who give tax breaks to multinationals. Huh? At the beginning of this second tenure, Trump unveiled his three 'Hollywood ambassadors', his like-minded guys of the silver screen: Mel Gibson, Sly Stallone and Jon Voight – and Mr Voight, it now appears, met with the president the day before his announcement, suggesting plans for restoring US film production, plans in which ideas for limited tariffs in certain circumstances featured briefly. Could it be that the president's ears pricked up at the word 'tariffs', but that he had only a hazy grasp of whatever else the star of Midnight Cowboy was saying? At all events, Mr Voight may now need all his ambassadorial tact to impress upon the president that what has imperilled US cinema admissions is the streaming industry, in turn boosted by the calamitous pandemic, and also arguably the writers' strike and the growing reality of AI. Not really foreign tax breaks. And what on earth is this 'tariff' to be imposed on? How is it going to work? The British Film Commission chief executive Adrian Wootton has described Trump's new tariff idea as 'clearly concerning': but with very British understatement wondered about the details. Because films in 2025 are not physical objects like bacon or Scotch whisky – in fact it really doesn't make sense to think of 'cinema' as 'goods'. The film industry is a complex, globalised service industry. Do you whack your 100% tariff on cinema tickets? (If so, as my colleague Andrew Pulver points out, films will simply switch over to streaming en masse and Trump will have achieved the further destruction of the US movie industry.) Do you put your tariffs on Netflix or Amazon or Apple subscriptions in proportion to the multinational origin of the streaming content? How on earth is that going to be meaningfully assessed? Perhaps with a preposterous high-school maths equation of the sort the White House unveiled the last time. In fact, the movie tariff is only slightly less baffling than the one imposed on the penguins of the Heard and McDonald Islands in the Antarctic. But this one is more insidious, because it sounds as if someone might actually try putting it into practice. Because the whole political point of this latest trolling move is that no one knows how it will be imposed, certainly not the president. The point – as must now be very clear – is not to help the American film industry, for which the president has no regard whatever. It is to prank the liberal media and the bleeding-hearts and centrist do-gooders. There will be a pause while everyone tries to work out what it all means, and perhaps it will mean some kind of imposition on streamer subscriptions or tickets, that is, a price-hike for the American consumer, like all tariffs. Or maybe Trump will 'pause' it, or change it or forget about it as he moves on to something else with which to flood the zone, such a releasing pictures of himself dressed as the pope. But in the meantime, there will be catastrophic confusion and unease, production plans will be stalled and stymied while studios work out what new costs they must now factor in. Will these tariffs actually happen? Even if not, then long after Trump has lost interest and moved on to something else, the mere threat will have damaged the industry they are supposed to have helped.
