Donald Trump on Monday reiterated his plans to levy tariffs as high as 100% on movies filmed outside of the United States, whether they are produced by foreign-owned film companies or Americans.
The president wrote on Truth Social that the fault of America’s supposedly “stolen” movie business lay with California’s Democratic governor, whom he frequently targets for scorn.
He added that the would be imposing a 100% tariff to stop what he called a “never ending problem”, though it was not stated when those tariffs would be put into place.
News agencies are reporting the wrong thing here.
They’re presenting as if the point of contention is whether or not this is a bad idea, but in this case that’s a meaningless question to ask.
This idea isn’t bad, it’s nonsense.
There’s literally no such thing as a tariff on movies; it’s not something that is even possible even if it were legal.
Tariffs are taxes on the import of goods; no goods are being imported when a movie is filmed in another country, so there’s nothing you can charge a tariff on.
So, this is a case of Trump demonstrating that he has no idea what tariffs even are.
Reporters aren’t reporting on that at all, though… they’re just taking it as a given that Trump’s threats are coherent and then looking for counter arguments using that as a given.
The result is that they completely miss the biggest part of this story; Trump has no idea what tariffs actually are.
Im not so sure this is exactly true as I’ve had to take web based training for years telling me that even sending IP over email from the US to a coworker in some other country is considered an “export.” It still doesnt answer the question of how they’d assign a value to film shot in another country but I think the import/export mechanism is there.
Sounds like other countries should legalize piracy of american movies
And maybe make American copyright invalid in their territories. Might actually be good for their economies.
And creators, the only people benefiting from 100+ year copyrights are lawyers and oligarchs.
So what you wanted the Midwest to be Middle Earth? Fuck off.
Why didn’t the Fellowship just take I-71 to Mordor?
One does not simply walk on the Interstate.
Because it’s on I-75
I knew Mordor was in the UP.
Could be Florida as well. 75 goes all the way down
So what I’m hearing is that film industries outside the US are getting a boost?
Hollywood studios famously don’t pay taxes and make their accounting show no profits so maybe there’s a possibility to figure a way around this.
This “never ending problem” is that he knows he can’t control the contents of the movies from abroad, like he will be able with domestic movies. This is a way to make them inaccessible to Americans.
China is doing something similar with their censoring of American movies for their domestic market, they have a little bit of a different approach but the goal is the same.
Its honestly scary to see what is being unfolded.
K, I should probably read the article, but a) this is nonsense, and b) I’d be curious how this impacts American films that shoot in Canada, which are many because of our various credit systems for film and lower costs (cheaper to shoot in Toronto and pretend it’s NY or Chicago, or the Ottawa Valley and pretend it’s Anywhere USA - or so I’ve been led to believe).
Hang onto your mistletoe, Hallmark film fans - things might get interesting.
If he can’t control the narrative of foreign movies x his agenda, all he have to do is to tax them out of the country. Prepare to see a lot of ass-kissing from Hollywood in future.
Gilead, here we come.
Also kinda curious what Newsom will reply 🍿
Good news! Those sci-fi and post-apocalpytic environments we’re used to seeing in high budget movies are about to look at lot more familiar.
Bad news: Those sci-fi and post-apocalyptic environments we’re used to seeing in high budget movies are about to start looking a lot more familar in real life too.
How do you film a Hollywood movie outside the US? Does he not know that Hollywood is in the US?
I think they’re talking about US studios filming on locations that aren’t in the US, which is gonna make them more reliant on CGI and generative imaging (AI) to create certain architectural styles or certain important locations. Wanna film at the Hagia Sophia? Better figure out a way to make it in Burbank.
yay more AI slop!
Instead of filming scenes for Jason Bourne in Paris, you can do it with AI.
A ton of Hollywood movies are shot in Toronto because Ontario offers huge incentives to filmmakers
If it’s shot in Toronto it’s not a Hollywood movie…
Why not? A lot of movies have a narrative which happens in different places.
Hollywood is a city. In California…USA.
Yeah, a city where movie studios are located. And scripts are written. And casting calls are done. And editing, and special effects, and marketing, and a hundred other things that go into making a movie. But sure, filming location is the only one that matters, whatever you say.
That does not mean that a Hollywood Movie is only filmed in this city. Let’s look of one of the most famous Hollywood movies “The Godfather” and it’s film locations: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0068646/locations/
- Sicily, Italy
- New York, USA
- Beverly Hills, USA
- Las Vegal, USA
- Los Angeles, USA
- Jersey City, USA
- Hollywood, USA
- Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic
- Lake Tahoe, USA
From what I understand, at least the locations outside of California can not be considered “Hollywood is a city. In California…USA.”.
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