Tom Perlmutter reupped at Canada film board

NFB undergoing budget slash amid digital push

Tom Perlmutter has been reappointed head of Canada's National Film Board, government heritage minister James Moore announced Tuesday.

Perlmutter enters his second five-year term in the wake of federal budget cuts that will slash $6.7 million of its annual contribution to the NFB's $74 million 2011-2012 budget, which also includes outside revenues, by 2015.

The NFB will also lose 73 full and part-time jobs and shutter screens in Montreal and Toronto.

The government agency produces and distributes auteur-driven docs, animation, alternative drama and cross-platform media.

Under Perlmutter, the NFB has shifted 20% of its production budget to interactive media, producing Web docs including Michael Simons and Paul Shoebridge's "Welcome to Pine Point," which records the memories of residents from the former mining community in the Northwest Territories, and Katarina Cizek's "Highrise," about life in tower blocks around the world.

In 2009, the agency also embarked on an ambitious digitization initiative, which has made more than 1,500 NFB films available via its online screening room, which had 6.3 million views in 2011, and range of free mobile apps.