It’s déjà vu all over again at the Joburg Film Festival, where South African film and television workers are again calling on the government to rescue a floundering rebate system and save the country’s beleaguered screen industries.
Just weeks after hundreds of film and TV professionals marched on Parliament in Cape Town, demanding immediate action to save an industry in freefall, festival curator Nhlanhla Ndaba referenced the ongoing drama in his opening remarks on Tuesday night, citing “a crisis that tested our very foundation” as an industry.
“While rebates have been delayed, our spirit has not. While international productions have abandoned South Africa for Malta and Portugal, where incentive programs function efficiently, our filmmakers have not abandoned their craft,” said Ndaba. “While we wait for a system that seems to have forgotten us, we keep telling stories.”
On Wednesday at the JBX market, an industry event running parallel to the festival, industry stakeholders gathered to present the findings of a study by Olsberg SPI, a consultancy firm specializing in the global screen production sector, to assess the impact of the film and TV production incentive on South Africa’s screen industries and plot a way forward for the struggling biz.
The study, which was commissioned by the Independent Producers Organization (IPO), analyzed a 10-year period from 2015 to 2025, during which film and television production added 26.4 billion rand ($1.6 billion) of total gross value to the South African economy.
That contribution, however, peaked in 2022, just as the Dept. of Trade and Industry Corporation (DTIC) — the government body which administers South Africa’s 25% rebate — began rolling out new guidelines for the incentive scheme that local filmmakers contend are often opaque and unnecessarily complex. At the same time, a backlog of applications that had already been approved for the rebate started piling up, with many filmmakers now facing yearslong delays for reimbursement.
Those problems have been compounded by frustration from industry bodies over what they characterize as a lack of transparency and communication on the side of the DTIC. As a result, “investor confidence has definitely taken a hit,” according to Olsberg SPI’s Leon Forde, who presented the study’s findings in Johannesburg.
On Jan. 28, hundreds of industry workers marched on Parliament under the Save SA Film Jobs banner, with the coalition lashing out at what it described as “paralysis” at the DTIC, with more than 660 million rand ($40.4 million) yet to be paid out to productions. It marked the second time in under a year that industry bodies rallied to demand answers from the government over the rebate crisis, after a similar protest on the steps of the DTIC last March.
The ripple effects have been felt across the industry. “It’s really horrific,” said Luke Rous, an actor and producer who serves on the executive committee of the IPO.
“That’s why we had hundreds, thousands of people out on the streets at both of our mass demonstrations. I had producers calling me to say, ‘I’m sorry I couldn’t be there that day. I had to pack up my house. The bank is repossessing it.’ I have constant calls from crew and actors saying, ‘What’s happening?’” Rous said. “We’ve all felt it. It’s painful.”
Producer Delon Bakker, who serves as chair of the IPO, noted that many South African filmmakers have been “blacklisted” by banks and financiers, after they were left holding the bag over the DTIC’s delayed payments. On Wednesday, he called on the South African government to pony up more resources to save the sector — before it’s too late.
“This is not a difficult thing to fix. You’ve just got to allocate more budget. And that can get things going again,” Bakker said. “There is a road to getting this moving ahead.”
In the wake of January’s protest in Cape Town, representatives of both the South African screen industries and the DTIC were invited to present their cases to Parliament, raising hopes that a productive dialogue could eventually create a pathway out of the morass. “Good strides are being made. And they need to be made,” said Rous.
Joel Chikapa Phiri, executive chairman of South African heavyweight Known Associates Group, said he recently returned from a trip to the U.S. to shore up confidence among Hollywood studio bosses, who voiced their concerns that the Rainbow Nation — long a favorite destination for foreign productions — had fallen “off the map.”
“They love South Africa. It’s the best place to make films in the world,” Phiri said. “They’re ready to come back.”
The Joburg Film Festival runs March 3 – 8 in Johannesburg, South Africa.
Thinus Ferreira contributed reporting to this story.
variety.com
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