Flintoff, Rooney profit from Avatar's success

British sports stars, including Wayne Rooney and Andrew Flintoff, will rake in a share of nearly 250 million pounds from the success of Avatar, the Hollywood blockbuster, as they had invested in a scheme that allowed them to cut their tax bill.

They joined a long list of cricketers, footballers, rock stars, television presenters and some MPs in funding a film partnership that ploughed almost 50 million pounds into the science-fiction epic.

All the stars now stand to make an average return of 50,000 pounds, having already earned thousands from a string of earlier hits.

These high profile investors were originally attracted to a film fund run by Ingenious Media, a London-based film finance company, four years ago as it enabled them to defer income tax and capital gains tax in return for backing British and US films.

They benefited from the tax relief irrespective of the success of the films.  

"I'm delighted the film's going so well. I shall be going to see it when I get a break from campaigning. The government set up the tax arrangement to encourage investment in the British film industry and I responded to the opportunity," The Times quoted Andrew Mitchell, the shadow international development secretary, as saying.

Ingenious Media has backed a string of hits including X-Men Origins: Wolverine, Hairspray and Die Hard 4.0, and last year it made 25.6 million pounds in pre-tax profits.

It all fades in front of Avatar, the most expensive film ever made, where Ingenious and more than 2,000 of its investors are to share 248 million pound profit, in which half will be taken by the company and the rest is to be shared between investors.