The Topline
- Vancouver City Council has asked the province to create an immigration pathway for film and TV creatives, so Hollywood talent can permanently move to B.C.
- Supporters say it could help build a locally driven film economy. Critics say it risks crowding out Canadian grads and sidesteps real issues like underfunding and federal caps.
Let’s Make Canadian Content Actually Canadian
If Vancouver really is Hollywood North, it’s more like the film industry equivalent of a mailroom – efficient, low-key and mostly devoid of any creative work. About 85 per cent of all B.C. film work is producing American content with virtually no creative input from Canadians.
Now, some American filmmakers are trying to make their ties to Canada more permanent. According to the Vancouver Sun , filmmakers like Longlegs and The Monkey director Osgood Perkins – whose last three films were shot in Vancouver, including the upcoming Keeper – have been trying to move to Canada for good.
But there’s no direct pathway. For now, Perkins and his family bounce between work permits, forced to leave every time a project ends. He can’t even buy a home, due to the federal foreign buyer ban.
He’s not alone, either. Mike Flanagan – who has filmed several series in B.C., and is currently shooting Carrie in B.C. for the streaming site – has reportedly been waiting two years for Permanent Residency. Podcaster and actor Marc Maron has stated on his podcast WTF that he applied for his PR several years ago (though that has more to do with political weirdness down in the U.S. than anything else).
Chris Ferguson, a Vancouver producer who worked with Perkins on all three films, is pushing for an immigration pathway for U.S. creatives
“If we relocate the people in charge from L.A. to here,” he told the Vancouver Sun, “they’re going to be even more motivated to make their next movie here, because they will want to make it at home, where they live.”
In other words, the more creative leadership that’s physically based in Vancouver, the more likely that projects will originate here, not just pass through on their way to a Netflix drop date.
These productions are coming here anyway
On July 23, Vancouver City Council unanimously approved a motion titled Building B.C.’s Creative Advantage: A New Immigration Pathway for Cultural Entrepreneurs. It recommends the province create a pilot Creative Talent Stream under the B.C. Provincial Nominee Program (B.C. PNP), similar to what already exists for tech and healthcare workers. This would give film creatives a dedicated immigration pathway and help establish Vancouver as more than a backdrop and to boost its creative ecosystem.
The jobs are already here. According to 2022 stats from Creative B.C., the film and TV industry added $4.4 billion in direct spending into the province and supported 90,000 jobs, 40,000 of which were full-time. Ontario, which has a marginally larger film and TV sector, is also primarily a service industry to U.S.-based productions, but so far, no official attempts at a similar pathway through the Ontario PNP have been made.
The only thing missing, according to Ferguson, is ownership.
“If we can start bringing some of these people here,” Ferguson argued, “it changes that whole model. Suddenly, we’re making stuff for ourselves, and we’re building companies.”
In a r/Vancouver Reddit thread about this story, user u/recurrence commented, “What Canada effectively needs is a program like the U.S. O-1 visa… It's recognition that extraordinary people drive economic growth regardless of whether they work in Film or Tech.”
The B.C. PNP already fast-tracks talent in in-demand sectors like tech, healthcare, and trades. Once nominated, applicants get 600 extra points added to their Express Entry score, which is essentially a golden ticket to Permanent Residency. The Tech stream even issues invitations weekly, with priority processing.
The City of Vancouver’s pitch is simple – film should get the same.
Let’s Not Dilute the Pool
Some local creatives are warning that importing more talent could make a competitive job market even more challenging.
“There are so many talented and passionate people coming out of Vancouver-based film and television schools who never get a shot at doing what they love,” wrote Reddit user SmoothOperator89 . “We should not be adding even more uncertainty to graduates trying to get a job by importing foreign talent.”
For many of the B.C. PNP pathways, you must have a valid job offer from a B.C. employer, which can be a barrier for anyone applying from abroad or without strong networks. Even the B.C. PNP Entrepreneur Immigration stream, which is technically available to cultural workers, comes with stiff requirements: a business plan, a minimum investment, performance benchmarks, and the looming threat of nomination loss if goals aren’t met.
More fundamentally, critics argue this is all beside the point. Canada’s problem isn’t a lack of creative talent—it’s a lack of money. As one user argued on r/Filmmaker, “Canada's problem isn't creative talent, our problem is investment. We have fantastic filmmakers that go to the U.S. to get their films funded.”
Ottawa has higher priorities anyway
Immigration caps for the B.C. PNP are federally controlled, and the feds have reduced the number of people allowed into the country last fall.
According to the Sun, B.C.’s Ministry of Post-Secondary Education and Future Skills is working to identify “key worker shortages” for admission through the B.C. PNP, particularly physicians and nurses. (So far, “film director” isn’t on that list.)
Premier David Eby has been critical of the federal government’s cuts to the PNP program, calling the cuts “an insult” to provincial economic priorities, especially as the province – and the country as a whole – facing rising demand from skilled workers in the U.S. across sectors.
While Eby hasn’t addressed the creative pathway specifically, he has been a vocal advocate for the film industry . In December, the BC NDP unveiled plans to increase the Production Services Tax Credit for international productions from 28 per cent to 36 per cent, and Film Incentive B.C. (which supports Canadian content) from 35 per cent to 36 per cent, plus a 2 per cent bonus for blockbuster projects over $200 million that started filming in 2025.
