A big drop in reported film industry revenue in the South can only be explained by an industry survey not capturing all the activity in the region, a local film boss says. The film industry generated about $21million in revenue for the wider Otago-Southland region in the 2016-17 financial year - down from $35million the year before. However, Film Otago Southland executive manager Kevin Jennings believes there is an issue with Statistics New Zealand's Screen Industry Survey report, which lists film industry revenue around the country each year. Mr Jennings told the Otago Daily Times the brand value the region received was possibly more important than the production expenditure. The marketing machine behind Mission Impossible had yet to fire up, but given the profile of the stars, including Tom Cruise, Henry Cavill and Simon Pegg, he expected the brand value to be ''massive''.

Source: Otago Daily Times December 05, 2017 17:03 UTC