Newly hired Telefilm chief Michael Jenkinson says there's no doubt Canadian movies are world class - he just wants to get more people out to see them.

Jenkinson, who will officially become the federal cultural agency's feature film executive on May 15, views his new gig as an opportunity to get Canadian films to advance beyond the mere 1.2 per cent of the movie-theatre market they currently command.

He's confident that margin can be improved, although he offered few specifics Monday on how he'll achieve such gains.

"Canadian filmmakers generally enjoy a world-class reputation for originality, vision, craft," he said during a chat with reporters. "The difficulty in reaching Canadian audiences and achieving greater market share, I think there's an excellent base at this point for the solutions to that."

As for the perennial tug between funding "art films" or more mainstream fare, Jenkinson believes it's not necessary to choose, citing this year's Academy Awards.

"The types of films that have succeeded as art and commercially, you have Brokeback Mountain and Crash and Capote. All very, very strong, excellent entertainment as well as with a lot of artistic integrity."

Telefilm has said a committee will no longer decide which Canadian-made films get funding. Instead, the decision for English-language feature film projects will fall solely to Jenkinson, who insisted Monday that regional directors will still be extremely influential.

Last year, Telefilm's total budget for English and French projects was $80 million.

As for the complicated point system for grading a film as Canadian - used to determine government tax breaks and whether a movie qualifies for the annual Genie Awards - Jenkinson admitted he's somewhat hamstrung by existing rules.

"There are existing guidelines and definitions and rules, and I'm constrained by that. I'm not here to make policy. I'm following the existing policy."

Jenkinson's boss, Telefilm executive director Wayne Clarkson also conceded that 1.2 per cent of the box office is not good enough for English-language Canadian films, but said finger-pointing is not the answer.

"Surely we must all take our fair measure of responsibility," Clarkson said about producers, distributors and exhibitors as well as Telefilm.

Born in Jamaica and raised in Toronto, Jenkinson graduated from the Canadian Film Centre, has an MBA from the University of Western Ontario and Osgoode Hall Law School. He worked at New York's Chase Manhattan Bank before moving to Hollywood where he became a vice-president of production and acquisitions for 20th Century Fox. He also founded his own production company, the Los Angeles-based Urban Entertainment.