Rachael Turk

Which Australian films are considered a must-see by Australian audiences and why (or why not) is on everyone’s mind.

And the Chauvel is bound to be full on October 22 when an industry forum is presented by Metro Screen (6.30pm–8.30pm) to discuss just this.

Why don’t the majority of Australian films attract Australian audiences? Why did Australian films represent only 3.8% of the total box office last year? What can be done about it?

All this and more at ‘OZ FILM VS. OZ AUDIENCE’. And only $5 a seat.

Moderator: Andrew Urban
Panelists:
Dr Ruth Harley – CEO Screen Australia
Troy Lum – managing director of Hopscotch Films
Margaret Pomeranz – At The Movies ABC
Garry Maddox – journalist, Sydney Morning Herald
Susan Hoerlein – publicity & promotions manager, Tsuki Marketing
Rachel Ward – actor/writer/director
Anthony I. Ginnane – SPAA

Book online here at Metro Screen.

In the Line of Fire
Robert Connolly

From The Boys to The Bank to Three Dollars, Robert Connolly’s films have always had a political dimension. In Balibo, he turns his eye to the international arena with his depiction of the death of six journalists in events surrounding Indonesia’s invasion of East Timor in 1975.

See my review of the film here.

Time: 5-6pm
Date: Friday, August 7
Venue: AFTRS Theatre, Fox Entertainment Quarter

Friday On My Mind is AFTRS‘ weekly event bringing you face to face with the industry’s brightest thinkers.

Free entry. Free 2-hr parking. All welcome.

Making Art Accessible
MCA’s Liz Ann Macgregor

The director of the Museum of Contemporary Art, Liz Ann Macgregor talks to us about the state of contemporary installation and the importance of integrating art within the public, urban experience.

Time: 5-6pm
Date: Friday, July 31
Venue: AFTRS Theatre, Fox Entertainment Quarter

Friday On My Mind is AFTRS‘ weekly event bringing you face to face with the industry’s brightest thinkers.

Free entry. Free 2-hr parking. All welcome.

The Australian Film Television and Radio School has continued its “rethink” of the screen sector with the launch of its new film journal Lumina.

David Stratton cut the tape on what is a dedicated space for examination and rumination on the current state of the Australian screen sector – in particular, as the cover implies, the nexis between art and industry.

Lumina‘s editorial team comprises AFTRS CEO Sandra Levy, Head of Business Studies David Court, Head of Screen Studies Karen Pearlman and yours truly. The leading essay is by Baz Luhrmann.

Other contributions to the 180-page publication include select transcripts from Friday on My Mind, as well as from Andrew Urban’s The Knowledge, genre essays including David Stratton’s ‘Origins of Horror’, and Vincent Sheehan’s argument for ‘Why Australian Producers Should Think More Like Distributors’.

Stratton welcomed Lumina as a “journal that is provocative, insightful and entertaining.”

Lumina will be sold at selected bookshops. Issue 2 is already underway – may there be many more.

A regular and brand spanking new showcase of cutting-edge short films and music clips is set to launch in Melbourne on July 3.

Red Hot Shorts is a venture by a Gus Berger, whose track record spans music and film industry. I like his style.

First session includes Nash Edgerton’s Sundance hit Spider, as well as Bertie Blackman’s ‘Heart’ clip and Bjork’s ‘Human Behaviour’.

Studio 1, Australian Centre for the Moving Image
Federation Square, Melbourne
From 7.30pm

$10 Adult / $8 Conc. Tickets from the ACMI Box Office

For details on submitting your film, email
films@redhotshorts.com.au

My short film Feeling_Lonely? (produced with Melissa Beauford), which toured LA Shortsfest, Manhattan Short Film Festival, Sydney, Brisbane and Rome Film Festivals before winning Best Short Drama at the WOW Film Festival, will screen at ACMI, Melbourne this Saturday at 4pm.

Friday On My Mind is delighted with the official news that Bright Star (dir. Jane Campion, prod. Jan Chapman) and Samson & Delilah (dir. Warwick Thornton, prod. Kath Shelper) have been selected to screen at the 2009 Cannes International Film Festival.

Bright Star will screen in Official Competition while Samson & Delilah has been selected for the Festival’s Un Certain Regard section.

Samson and Delilah screened to a full house tonight at Friday On My MInd after the news came through late yesterday. Jan Chapman also had the theatre full to overflowing when she joined us on April 3.

Friday On My Mind is AFTRS‘ weekly event bringing you face to face with the industry’s brightest thinkers.

If work drinks weren’t unruly enough, all hell breaks loose when God is picking up the tab.

Look out for this riotous short written and directed by Angus Sampson and shot by the supremely talented Adam Arkapaw.

I haven’t seen it yet but I have read the script and, knowing those concerned, am laughing already.

With cast & crew screening happening March 31 in Melbs, it won’t be too long before we see it on the international circuit.

Miss it at your own peril.

As I’m researching an essay on Self-Help Genre on Screen, I find a Yahoo 7! clip I was involved in with He’s Just Not That Into You author Liz Tuccillo about the single scene in Sydney.

Catch my brief cameo at 0:23!

(Thankfully, I have not had to visit The Establishment since.)

Filing from the Broadcasting Summit in Sydney this morning…

NBC Universal’s VP of Technology, Standard & Policy, Sheau Ng acknowledged to the summit that, in order to build a platform beyond television, the individual features and capabilities of new platforms needed to be put to good use.

This is a considerable evolution from the launch two years ago of NBC’s “TV360” – advertising packages that encompassed TV, internet and mobile – in which the emphasis was still on distributing the same content across a diverse set of platforms.

“In the future, the specific benefits of each technology will increasingly influence the content itself,” Ng said.

This was mirrored in a later session in which Foxtel’s Executive Director of Sales and Product, Patrick Delaney conceded that mobile hadn’t been perceived by the cable network as snack content in its own right to date but that this will change.