Robbing Peter to pay Polley

Sarah Polley is an irksome creature. The child actress turned adult director turned professional activist has a marvelous talent for getting on people’s tits. So much so that back in ’95 a police riot officer knocked out two of her teeth at a protest she was involved in at Queen’s Park in Toronto. I can sympathize with the officer in question as Ms. Polley tends to evoke similar feelings in yours truly.

Her latest crusade is to prevent the federal government from passing Bill C-10, a piece of legislation that would remove government tax credits from Canadian productions deemed “too violent” or “too offensive”. Ms. Polley wants the bill killed as she feels that this could amount to censorship of her work as a film director.

Well, no, not really.

Removing the government tax credits that fund a creative endeavor is not the same as an outright prohibition of said endeavor. If Ms. Polley has an artistic vision that she wishes to pursue, she can still shop it around to studios, find investors for it, or hey, even fund it out of her own pocket. This is the way most film productions are done in every other country in the world.

No, the problem that Ms. Polley has is very few members of the public are willing to pay to see her work, which means that it will be difficult to find wealthy people to bankroll her work, which is why she requires the Canadian government to forcibly remove money from the pockets of its citizens to fund it. If all of her films are going to be like Away From Her, Ms. Polley’s directorial debut, I can see why. In the words of Calgary Sun columnist Ian Robinson this was “…a love story about unattractive old people, one of whom is suffering from Alzheimer’s disease, which means it’s the perfect Canadian movie.” Quite. My own description of the film is much less charitable so it’s best if we stick with Mr. Robinson’s instead.

The point of Ms. Polley’s latest outburst is that she wants to continue creating tepid movies and handing me the bills for them. I don’t like that. I will admit that I do agree with Ms. Polley to a limited extent: we do not need the federal government as an arbiter of what is tasteful and what is not. Her solution is to fund practically every proposed Canadian production through tax credits. My solution is to fund none whatsoever.

Look, I consider myself an artist as well, and I have my own creative vision that I pursue on a regular basis. Well, whenever I can afford to, which, with fuel at $1.17 a litre, is not so affordable these days. If I could get Ms. Polley’s hand out of my pocket, perhaps I could pursue my own vision just a bit farther. And not just myself, but all the others who quietly follow their own artistic vision in this country. I’m talking about grannies having a little extra dosh left in their pocket for buying yarn or needlepoint supplies. Or painters having money for buying better oils and acrylics and more of them. Or potters being able to buy, throw, and fire more clay. We’re the silent art majority and we manage just fine without having the government forcefully extract money from our fellow citizens on our behalf.

And then there are the art consumers. I firmly believe that Canadians should have a choice over whether or not they want to become patrons of Ms. Polley’s work. I’m betting that most wouldn’t, and that’s perfectly okay. Maybe they want to spend that money on a new sofa instead, or beer and popcorn, or maybe even groceries. This is as it should be. If our art work doesn’t sufficiently captivate the attention of a consumer to warrant his parting with his hard-earned money, this is a failing on the part of the artist, not on the part of the consumer. This alarms Ms. Polley, and she states her case quite bluntly:

“I wouldn’t have a career if it wasn’t for public money,” said Polley. – CanWest News.

Don’t worry, Sarah. I’ll still fork out to see an on-screen scantily clad version of you (with the fewer lines, the better) getting chased around by zombies. So you’ll always have a career. I just won’t pay to see the films you’ve directed. At least, not if I get a say in things.