Thank you.
I agree with my colleague. There's no point in putting money into a film that nobody wants to watch. That's a fact. Why make films if they aren't going to be seen?
The question I have is why someone would see a Canadian film. It doesn't matter. We can do all the script development we want, and we can announce that we've made a great Canadian film, but people go to see Canadian films because they know who's in them. Witness the success of Trailer Park Boys. Trailer Park Boys is very cheap television to make. Everybody knows Randy and everybody knows Mr. Lahey. People see it because they know them.
I would say it's a very similar situation to Second City. Second City was very cheap television to make. It created a generation of big movies. We would go to see John Candy because we knew him. Eugene Levy, Joe Flaherty, Catherine O'Hara, Harold Ramis became big U.S. and international stars as well.
I'd like to talk about the connection between television and film. If we don't have in English Canada--and we don't have it--the star system of creating systems for getting new talent, even if it's the cheapest television being made, we're not going to have film.
Quebec, on the other hand, has created a television industry that has launched the careers of many people. People will see the films because they know what they're going to see. It should be a no-brainer.
I'd like to ask what you think is the importance of maintaining a strong domestic television industry in terms of actually being able to maintain a domestic or even an international film industry.