2009 has seen the best of times and the worst of times. Despite immense achievements, this year will be remembered for its challenges. The very public collapse of the SABC as a viable funder of local content ushered in bankrupcies, layoffs, mass protests and hunger strikes, while the service sector also struggled, with Cape Town crewing agencies calling this the worst year since 2001. Of course, the entire world was dealing with a global economic meltdown, so we were hardly the only industry required to innovate this year. We asked a variety of industry professionals for their reflections on these tumultuous 12 months.

WHAT WAS GOOD IN 2009?

Anthony Silverston, Triggerfish:

Triggerfish was very fortunate in that we managed to finalise funding for our first feature, Zambezia, as well as secure production funds from the NFVF to complete a pilot for Khumba, which has since been used to raise pre-sales of almost half a million dollars.

This proves that there is a market for South African content, which is good news for anyone wanting to create original, local animated content. It has also allowed us to set up a large infrastructure to cater for such a large-scale production and employment for more animators, which is in turn good for the greater industry. In terms of the South African industry in general, there have also been many achievements in other companies, such as Clockwork Zoo’s major expansion with their co-production with Cookie Jar.

Sunrise’s Jungle Beat has also been doing well and is the first local animated property that I know of which is being successfully exploited in the world of merchandising. Animation SA has also been receiving more recognition and support from organisations such as the Services SETA and the Department of Trade and Industry. The successful launch of the Animation Industry Development Initiative has also resulted in an opportunity for people without any art training to get into the industry.

Colin Howard, Egg:
The fact that we managed to stay busy (most the time) and even managed to produce some good work and all the directors have new work for their reels. We didn’t retrench anyone...

David Wicht, Film Afrika:
The crisis besetting our industry – local and international – has served to unite our industry in a manner we have not seen for a long time. The crisis has helped a traditionally fragmented industry realise that we share common goals, and that if we work together we can put together fundamental changes in the financing environment that will help put the industry on a more secure footing over the longer term.

Jacques Stoltz, Gauteng Film Commission:
The revised DTI rebate which was introduced last year has gone a long way to support the local feature film industry. We’ve certainly seen an increase in local features. 2009 also saw the filming of major projects such as Invictus and The Bang Bang Club.

2009 also saw good local audience responses to features such as White Wedding while the box office was generally quite busy. This was of course also the year of District 9 – arguably South Africa’s first global blockbuster. From a GFC perspective, we believe the Gauteng brand is now firmly positioned here and abroad. We’ve also increased our investment in local productions to counter the impact of the financial crisis at the SABC and the recession.

Mike Schalit, Net#work BBDO:
It’s a very exciting thing that South Africans are becoming more and more confident in our own colloquialisms and vernacular. I think that’s why we’re winning less awards internationally, but I think the more we use our uniqueness, the sooner we’ll have a breakthrough. People don’t understand South Africa - our brands, our language and our quirks - like they understand Australia or America. But with movies like District 9 and next year’s World Cup, there might be a shift taking place.

Philip Key, Moonlighting:
We had a fairly good year mainly because of Invictus, The Philanthropist and Atlantis. It seems that there is a lot more growth in television and long form. There’s nothing like difficult times to force you to re-examine where you are. We’ve reduced overheads quite signifi cantly and the industry has managed to keep prices down. Clients are getting more attention and are certainly getting better deals.

South Africa remains good value for money. A British production company told us their costs here were half what they are in London. A focus puller in the US state of New Mexico comes in nearly $3 400 dollars a week after their rebate, whereas it would cost about $1 000 a week here (also after the rebate).

This year, we had an increase of 20% in the value of our currency against the dollar, while Argentina devalued by the same amount so there was a 40% difference in currency.

However we are not seeing that amount of difference in the budgets so they are likely pricing in dollars... It’s one of the saving graces of the SA industry that we have avoided the temptation of pricing in foreign currency when our currency was weak. What was bad about 2009?
Colin: We worked twice as hard for half as much. We had way more jobs where we won the pitch, but they didn’t happen, 10 times up on previous years. Budgets were very tight. If you don’t come in on budget, most of the time you lose the job or it does not happen. Clients have been more conservative/ scared because the economy is so slow.

David: 2009 was a very tough year, especially for the television sector. At the same time, co-production and foreign funded films that were planned while the Rand was strong finally ran out in about March, and left a huge vacuum that is still being felt. According to suppliers, there is about a 50% drop in production since last year. Smaller, marginal businesses are closing (sadly, many of these are new BBBEE entrants). Capital expenditure has halted. Development funds have all but dried up. Training opportunities have been radically curtailed.

Film Afrika, thankfully, enjoyed a reasonable year and have managed to keep going, albeit at a slower pace than last year. It has brought home the fundamental importance of long-term relationships, and the need to be completely Flexible in the way we approach films. Budgets are tighter, so films need to be made with less fat while not sacrificing quality. We need to start going back to the smaller production teams we worked with 10 years ago!

Jacques: For local production companies it was a particularly bad year due to the impact of the global recession as well as the crisis at the SABC. We saw production companies close and staff being retrenched. We are currently conducting an industry employment survey to determine the full extent of the crisis.

Philip: Clearly the turnover hasn’t been here for the industry this year. The biggest drop off has been in commercials. Our bidding hasn’t fallen off, but the conversion rate has. In commercials, there’s a tendency for people to travel less.

Before we would lose work to other territories, but now a more significant amount of the jobs we lose are because people are staying at home. They’re having to make do with smaller budgets. Before, in the European winter, it was standard practice to travel, whereas now they are having to make it happen at home.

This isn’t just effecting South Africa: our office in Chile has almost identical trends. We’re working in a stagnant market in South Africa. The total number of commercials has moved between 320 and 400 a year, and some of those peak times have been as long ago as six to seven years back, so there’s been no real growth for some time, especially when you factor in the increase in the number of production companies competing for the available work.

Pros to remember
•South Africa had its first global blockbuster in District 9
•Television productions shot in Southern Africa – Generation Kill, 24: Redemption, and No. 1 Ladies Detective Agency – were nominated for 19 Primetime Emmy Awards, winning three
•Diamonds and Crusoe, TV productions shot in South Africa, were nominated for 11 Gemini Awards
•The Devil’s Whore, another miniseries shot here, won seven international awards, including a BAFTA
•South Africa won two Grand Prixs at Cannes Lions
•The Soweto Gospel Choir won a Grammy and was nominated for an Oscar for Down to Earth, their Wall-E duet with Peter Gabriel. They also became the first South African musical act to sing at the Oscars
•Shy the Sun won a Silver Clio for animation for their debut commercial, United: Sea Orchestra
•Sokhulu & Partners is up for an International Emmy
•The Silent Army screened in competition at Cannes Film
•Gavin Hood’s Wolverine topped $100 million at US cinemas
•Photo and Film Expo, Profoto Awards, Imbongi Awards, and Discop Africa all launched or relaunched, while Durban Int. Film Festival celebrated its 30th edition
•South Africa hosted Oscar winners Clint Eastwood, Morgan Freeman and Matt Damon, Emmy winners Loni Price and Tom Fontana, three-time Emmy nominee Peter Horton, and commercials directors Danny Kleinman and Dante Ariola
•Slumdog Millionaire, the movie adaptation of Pretoria-based Vikus Swarup’s novel, Q&A, cleaned up at the Oscars. South African Telfer Barnes pulled focus on the job to help Anthony Dod Mantle win the Oscar for Best Cinematography, using the Si2K camera which was partly developed by South African Simon Hansen for his feature film, Spoon
•Mr. Bones 2 became the country’s top grossing fi lm of all time, making more than R35 million at the local box office
•Rough Aunties, about Bobbi Bear, a KZN child abuse NGO, won Best World Cinema Documentary at Sundance
•Clockwork Zoo pioneered an animation service industry, while Jungle Beat pioneered content related merchandising
•Film & Event Publishing launched its monthly wrap parties in Cape Town, as well as The Callsheet’s website, www.thecallsheet.co.za
•The Department of Trade and Industry revises its incentive to pay out at key milestones
Kevin Kriedemann