from Star News On Line

State incentives help recharge film industry

By Amy Hotz
Amy.Hotz@StarNewsOnline.com



North Carolina’s film industry is booming because of the recently increased film incentives, and the state and regional film commissions are working hard to keep that boom alive.

But officials said the public needs to understand that film incentive money positively affects the community and isn’t being handed out just to film companies and actors.

That was the general message at In Focus: Film Industry in the Carolinas, a joint-economic growth summit held at the University of North Carolina Wilmington in collaboration with Coastal Carolina University, a South Carolina school.

“This is looking to be a banner year in North Carolina,” said Wilmington Regional Film Commission director Johnny Griffin. “In Wilmington, we think this could be the best year in 10 years, if not longer.”

He and N.C. Film Office director Aaron Syrett as well as Heath Franklin, a Wilmington filmmaker who owns Galvanized Films, and Tom Clark, grants/project manager for the S. C. Film Commission, all spoke at the summit about the health of the film industry in the state and in the Southeast.

Syrett backed up Griffin’s comment about the banner year with numbers.

In 2007, when the state offered a 15 percent incentive, film companies’ direct spending in the state totaled $160 million. Of that, $117 million was qualified expenses – items purchased in-state that production companies were allowed get a rebate on. And the state paid out $17.5 million in incentive money.

In 2008, films spent $92 million in the state. In 2009, they spent $79 million, and in 2010 $80 million was spent.