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Shot in Texas: 'Dallas' as a movie?
11:01 AM CST on Friday, January 6, 2006
BY JOE O'CONNELL / Special Contributor
If you want to know what's in store for the North Texas film industry in
2006, look no further than Dallas. The TV series that forever imprinted
Big D's image on the world is expected to become a $30 million movie
this year, with a cast rumored to include John Travolta as J.R. Ewing.
It's unknown if the film will be shot entirely in Texas, which speaks
volumes about the state of the Texas film industry.
"It will be a horrible black eye to the state if Dallas isn't made in
Dallas," says Janis Burklund, head of the Dallas Film Commission.
Lack of funds
The sticking point, of course, is money. Last year, the Legislature
approved a program to offer $20 million in incentives to lure films to
Texas, something industry leaders have championed for years, but
promptly removed funding for the program. Insiders continue to urge
lawmakers to find those funds and not wait for the next regular
legislative session in 2007.
"It's almost a daily thing," Ms. Burklund says. "Projects have an
intense interest in shooting here, but at the end of the day they have
to go where the money is."
Increasingly that has been Louisiana, which, even in the aftermath of
Hurricane Katrina, has been able to use financial incentives to attract
film projects. The Louisiana Governor's Office of Film & Television
Development estimates those projects had an economic impact of $200
million in 2005, up from $170 million in 2004. However, Louisiana is
scaling incentives back some in the new year and will no long offer
sales tax exemptions.
Meanwhile, New Mexico has taken the bold move of investing in films, up
to $15 million per project, and boasts an economic impact of $400
million since 2002, according to the state's film office.
Lost dollars
Texas Film Commission figures, which don't include commercials and
industrial shoots, both big draws in North Texas, put the combined
budgets of Texas-shot films in 2005 at just less than $140 million, down
from about $215 million in 2004 and $230 million in 2003. Ms. Burklund
says her preliminary figures have the North Texas film industry bringing
in $57.5 million in 2005.
Major North Texas projects in 2005 included the animated Ant Bully from
Irving-based DNA Productions, the independent film Night of the White
Pants and one day of the basketball film Glory Road, which opens Jan. 13.
TV series shot in North Texas also gave the industry a boost, including
Barney and Friends and National Lampoon's Eye for an Eye. The television
movie Walker, Texas Ranger: Trial by Fire harkened back to the series'
eight-year run that dropped $500 million into the area economy.
Also in 2005, the cast of TV's Dallas came to town to shoot a reunion
show. Ms. Burklund hopes it's a sign of things to come.
"In a few short months we're going to see a program that branded our
city," she says. "There's going to be a lot of buzz about this film, and
hopefully it will be positive."
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Film News

Top Stories of 2005

BY JOE O'CONNELL



Kyle Henry


1) Film incentives? Yes! Money? No!

In 2005, the Texas Legislature came to its senses and acknowledged that
filming incentives offered in Louisiana, New Mexico, and elsewhere are
sucking national film/television productions out of the Lone Star State.
Our lawmakers approved a $20 million incentives package. But then they
promptly stripped funding for it. That sound you hear is film insiders
scurrying around behind the scenes trying to find a new funding source.
Stay tuned.
2) Make "Room' for Henry

The search for the next Robert Rodriguez/Richard Linklater to pump up
Austin's homegrown film scene got more interesting this past year. The
prime contender? Kyle Henry, whose Room was chosen for both the Sundance
and Cannes film festivals. "Slacker probably is why half the people came
to the graduate film program at UT," he says, because it made true
low-budget filmmaking seem realistic. And Linklater had his hand in
Henry's success indirectly through grants from the Texas Filmmakers'
Production Fund that helped support the film.
3) Tommy Lee Jones Buries Competition

Speaking of Cannes, Tommy Lee Jones scored the best actor nod at the
festival for Texas-shot The Three Burials of Melquiades Estrada, which
Jones also directed, while Guillermo Arriaga's screenplay took top
honors. After a showing at the Toronto International Film Festival, the
film was picked up by Sony Pictures Classics and is coming soon to a
theatre near you.
4) Austin Mayor Jumps for Candler

Runner-up for shining independent filmmaker is Kat Candler, who
convinced Mayor Will Wynn to plunge into Town Lake in support of her
second feature, jumping off bridges. Did I mention that swimming in Town
Lake is illegal? Did I mention that Candler's smile can talk just about
anyone into anything? Did I mention I'm looking forward to the new film
almost as much as I enjoyed her first, cicadas?
5) Kids Get Their Sharky, Wormy, Bloody Due

Austin is the capital of films aimed at the knee-high set? For your
approval: Robert (and Racer) Rodriguez's The Adventures of Sharkboy and
Lavagirl in 3-D and New Line's How to Eat Fried Worms. And for the
creepy little kid lurking in the shadows of your soul, there's the cute
and not-so-cuddly boy Leatherface in The Texas Chainsaw Massacre: The
Origin.
6) Three's Charming for Burnt Orange

Burnt Orange Productions celebrated the premiere of The Quiet at the
Toronto festival, and shot two more films: The Cassidy Kids from local
legends-in-the-making Jacob Vaughan and Bryan Poyser, and caveman comedy
Homo Erectus. Not a bad start for the grand experiment from the
University of Texas. What's next, and what happened to country musical
Austin Angel? I'll get back to you on it.
7) Opiate of the Masses

It began when A&E (and Austin's Action Figure) shot the Lone Star
Rollergirls for its reality show Rollergirls (which began its 13-week
run this week). It continued when MTV filled the Austin drunk tank with
The Real World. Now look ahead to pilots for series based on the
Austin-shot films Friday Night Lights and Sin City.
8) What I Never Told You About Mike Judge

When he spoke at the Austin Film Festival, Mike Judge revealed he'd like
to fund his own films in the future. He also admitted he much prefers
writing to directing, and his upcoming Austin-shot Idiocracy soured him
on the sci-fi route. "I'll never make a movie set in the future again,"
Judge said. "You can't just go down to Wal-Mart and buy a chair from the
future." But he'd love to make the failed television pilot Monsignor
Martinez, about a gun-toting priest, into a film. "It would need to be
somebody like Antonio Banderas to play it," Judge said. "Somebody macho."
9) Gone but Not Forgotten

Tom Copeland stepped down in 2005 after 22 years with the Texas Film
Commission, the past 10 as director. His parting comments were aimed at
the working stiffs who make the films happen. "The crews here are
awesome," he said. "You tell them they can do things and they back it
up." Meanwhile, Suzanne Quinn this month ends a five-year run as the
head of the Austin Film Society's Austin Studios. During her tenure, a
few hangars at the old Mueller airport became home to 27 features and
dozens of other film and video projects for an economic impact AFS
estimates at more than $750 million.
10) What's in a Name?

Don't expect an Austin-shot film to stick with its original title. Dot
became The Quiet. Judge's 3001 became Idiocracy. Revolver became The
Return. Every Word Is True turned into Have You Heard?, then
transmogrified into Infamous. Richard Linklater's Fast Food Nation
adaptation was sometimes known as Coyote. And the original name I
suggested for this column was "Freeze Frame."
SXSW Film 06 announced this week that Robert Altman's Prairie Home
Companion, directed from a screenplay by Garrison Keillor, would make
its North American premiere as the festival's opening-night film. Other
premieres announced: James Marsh's The King, starring Gael Garcia Bernal
and William Hurt; Steven Cantor and Matthew Galkin's loudQUIETloud: A
Film About the Pixies; Mary Harron's The Notorious Bettie Page, starring
Gretchen Mol, David Strathairn, and Lili Taylor; and Ron Mann's Tales of
the Rat Fink,, a documentary about Ed "Big Daddy" Roth. This is the
first burst of many; the full lineup will be announced in early
February. For updates, stay tuned to the Chronicle or visit www.sxsw.com.
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