Spring Cleaning

I was just doing a bit of cleaning when I found some older stuff behind the couch that I hadn't posted. (ed. Not covered in dust bunnies, are they?)

My editor as usual, is my friend Lunchmeat Harold. (ed. Howdy)

Halifax Film raised another $16.5 Million through a share offering some weeks (months?) (ed. It's all a blur to me too) They already have a lot of cash on hand and the government still owes them a lot of money from tax credits. (ed. Now we have to cash flow the government? Pay up you high rollers.)

So we're flush with cash (ed. Note: the author owns 1000 shares of DHX). And DHX intends to buy more and more companies that produce kids shows like the ones they already bought Decode and Studio B.

Sidebar, your honour, re share prices and Decode. (ed. relevence?) Isn't everything relevent, your honour? Aren't the singing birds relevent to a butterfly in Brazil who are relevent to the wrinkles on Abe Vigoda's scrotum? (ed. Whatever. Proceed.)

Per allnovascotia.com, a while back (ed. weeks? Months?) Yes, one of those, Exec VP at Decode, Beth Stevenson sold 200,000 shares of DHX stock at $1.05 to $1.16 a share. Over the last year she sold 400,000 shares, 169,000 of those @ $ 0.63 last June. Jeesh, somebody needed the cash. Should have waited, because they're trading at OVER $1.00, now. Whatsamatter, a temporary loss of faith? I wish I had the cash at the time, I would have bought them because I have the highest confidence in DHX. More than "some people" I could mention.

BTW, congrats to Beth on being a finalist in the IPF Multi-media o-rama. This was a "competition" where the winners would receive cash to finance web based entertainment shows. You know, TV on the internet that's so much more than TV on the internet. The competition is usually a place where struggling writer/director/animators get some money to live on while trying to develop projects and break into the business. Gosh, maybe Beth is struggling, after all.

Speaking of allnovascotia.com, yesterday they reported on an interview with Michael Donovan on the financial well being of Halifax Film. Although revenues are down because broadcasters are ordering fewer programs (ed. sigh, remember Global Television's early mornng kid's shows'o'rama?), an 11% cut in operational expenses (ed. the espresso/biscotti cart is no longer coming around?) should ease the pain of a Q1 loss.

And things are looking up (ed. look way up and I'll call Rusty. Heh, remember humans on kids shows?), one might say things are looking "toyetic". Animal Mechanicals, a hit in "Canada...U.K., Brazil and Poland" could be the knight in shining armor that we need. Toyetic, our word for the day, means this show will genrate sales of toys, games, T-shirt's, mongrammed L'il junior bathrobes, lollipops and all kinds of fine merchandise that kids will scream to own. The show, which I haven't seen, is apparently a Transformers for pre-schoolers but is supposed to teach co-operation (ed. Or some such crap. Who cares? I want my Animal Mechanical jumpsuit.

The key is a deal with a network in the states called The Hub. (ed. um, I fear that's not on basic cable.)

Speaking again of allnovascotia.com (ed. jeesh, why don't you just marry them?) they printed a letter (ed. I think you mean posted his e-mail, you hick.) from Paul Donovan who has nothing to do with DHX. Paul, apparently has just returned from working in Germany, on what, I do not know. I hope he was here in time to catch up on his old pal Rutger Hauer who just finished working on Hobo With a Shotgun, a local film produced by Paul Gross about a Hobo with something. (BTW, Paul Donovan, whatever happened to The Conclave?)

Anyway, Paul's letter was in support of PowerPost Productions Ltd which recently filed for bankruptcy protection. PowerPost, which does post-production work on TV and films, had started life as an arm of Salter Street Films. But they sold it to the Power Brothers (ed. just thinking out loud, that sounds like a cool name for a superhero show.) The company did a lot of work for DHX until they didn't anymore. Paul thinks the company is too inportant to the local industry and the government should step in and help them. (ed. tax credits, maybe?) Most production companies "are all struggling to get their next project financed" . "I think the film industry will soon discover that it's best days are behind it unless the province steps in and exerts some larger picture influence."

Troubling words indeed.

If PowerPost shuts down, DHX will have to ship stuff to Montreal for Post-production. Not only does that mean shipping costs but the post costs themselves won't count for the provincial film tax credit. (ed. Other local filmmakers may also - ).

This government better get off it's high horse soon if it wants to seen any return on it's investment. (ed. But they're not invest - ). Paul rarely speaks up about industry infastructure things (ed. Isn't he friends with - ) so you know this is important. It's time we think about others, don't you think, government with your money?

(He also mentions the millions of government dollars wasted on Elctropolis but it might not be the best time to bring that up.) (ed. Stop using brackets, that's my thing! And stop cutting me - )

So, um, yeah. I guess that's it with a few final notes. Our last post brought a few comments about Eternal Kiss, a film by Paul Kimball that had it's premier a month back (ed. or a few weeks, whatever.) A comment was made in less glowing terms that the film itself was not that good. But I've yet to hear any other reviews. Anybody else, see it?)

Film Nova Scotia was looking into setting up a local Film and TV Walk of Fame. Has this happened? Any ideas on who should be nominated to be the first filmmaker planted?






Walk of fame. Animal Mechanicals "Toyistic"

Walk of Fame