Monthly Archives: February 2012

Storytelling in Documentary

Documentary, Screenwriting, ,

STORYTELLING IN DOCUMENTARY – THE UK’S JOHN SMITHSON

One of the late entries to AIDC 2011 was this masterclass with UK producer John Smithson, of 127 Hours and Touching The Void fame. As the publicity announced, John would arrive in Adelaide hot from being nominated for 6 Oscars – and unfortunately he didn’t win any. Even more unfortunately, he had been pipped for Best Oscar by the Aussie film (sort of) The King’s Speech.

Despite that, his session on storytelling was one of the best at AIDC.

“It’s really stating the bleeding obvious that the story is the heart of everything we do,” John began. “Storytelling is what gets me out of bed in the morning and keeps me in too many bars at the small hours of the night.”

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Screen Australia at AIDC in 2011

Documentary, ,

Last year Screen Australia held a session at AIDC to talk about their new documentary guidelines. Here is my coverage of that session in Screen Hub:

SCREEN AUSTRALIA

Today Screen Australia posted their brand spanking new draft guidelines for Documentary Programs.

The surprises?

A few.

Ross Mathews announced that he is not the Colonel Gaddaffi of the film industry, and Screen Australia is not going to dictate to the industry or decide what is going to be made. However they do reserve the right to make a decision when faced with more projects than available funds, which is increasingly the case.

Screen Australia have maintained the funding available for documentary at $16.5 million over all programs, but they have shaved funds off existing programs to make room for a new program, All Media, which will cost $500,000 a year. Details on this new program to be advised.

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BOOKS at MIFF turns 5

Film, Screenwriting

BOOKS AT MIFF turned 5 in 2011, and I honoured the birthday with this coverage for Screen Hub:

MIFF turns 60 this year, and is theoretically eligible for a pensioner discount on Melbourne transport. Books at MIFF is 5. So does that mean it has learnt to walk and talk and begin to take bigger steps into the world?

I’ve been to all five Books at MIFF, and I’d say 2011 marked a smoothness of delivery, and an ever increasing signs that the world of publishing and the world of screen production are beginning to understand each other’s opportunities and limitations.

The event continues to gain critical mass, with support from Film Victoria and the Victorian Government as well as Screen Australia, and a growing influx of producers from interstate as well as locally.

Each year there is a session where ten pitches are made to the audience, and these have grown in confidence and ability too. As somebody called out, Seph McKenna from Roadshow would probably have won the prize if it had been a reality TV show for his pitch of What Makes Us Tick by Hugh MacKay, but the others were at least competent, and some intriguing enough to entice producers to check out the works later.

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Michael Rymer: Face to Face

Film, Screenwriting

Well known writer and director Michael Rymer gave an inspirational talk to the Australian Writers’ Guild last year.

He is one of very few Australians who have managed to build a career straddling Australia and Hollywood. His film Angel Baby (1995) won a truckload of AFI Awards, including Best Film, Best Director and Best Screenplay, and it also won a Writers Guild of America award for Best Original Screenplay.

As Michael told us, his career began by getting into the University of Southern California Film School, where he studied writing under Robert McKee, and learnt the principles of drama according to Aristotle. He then did a two year course in acting, where he learnt a lot having classic plays and films scripts read and workshopped.

He returned to Australia and sold his first script to Roadshow, Dead Sleep in 1992. However for Michael this became a learning experience in why it’s sometimes better to keep control of a film yourself. So when he wrote Angel Baby a few years later, he was determined to hold onto the directing reins.

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Tim Ferguson talks funny

Screenwriting

Last year, prominent comedian and comic genius Tim Ferguson talked to the Australian Writers’ Guild about how to write narrative comedy.

Tim Ferguson, comedy legend and writing guru, spoke to the Victorian branch of the AWG last night. He said he felt privileged to have the eye of the screenwriting storm that was before him, and told us the rules for writing comedy that we ignore to our peril.

Tim Ferguson is a legend of television and comedy performance since the days of the Doug Anthony All Stars, and a veteran performer and writer on shows like the DAAS Kapital, the Big Gig, Good News Week and lately WTF – With Tim Ferguson, in both Australia and the UK. Tim has recently penned a definitive manual on comedy, The Cheeky Monkey – Writing Narrative Comedy. The volume covers everything Tim knows about comedy writing for performance, which is obviously a lot.

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Best Adapted Screenplay vanishes from AACTA broadcast?

Film, Latest News, Screenwriting, , , ,

I’ve recently heard that the entire Best Adapted Screenplay category of the new AACTA Awards, formerly the AFI Awards, never made it to air via Channel 9’s broadcast. Apparently Stephan Elliott’s introduction to the award, during which he came out, was so long and controversial that audiences never got to see Shaun Grant receiving his gong for Snowtown.

True or false?

Any Questions For Ben?

Film

Working Dog, who of course made the hugely successful films The Castle and The Dish, have come up with a new film after a 12 year break, (from film, that is). Any Questions For Ben? is being released on February 9 in Australia.

There is a scathing review of the film on Crikey. Here’s the link:  http://blogs.crikey.com.au/cinetology/2012/01/30/any-questions-for-ben-movie-review-none-for-ben-plenty-for-working-dog/

Personally, I have huge respect for Rob Sitch, Santo Cilauro, Tom Gleisner, Jane Kennedy and Michael Hirsch at Working Dog, so I’m willing to head down to the cinema to check it out. And I love the way the film apparently features Melbourne as it has evolved over the past ten years.

However it remains to be seen whether Luke Buckmaster’s review is on target or not. Jim Schembri’s review of Stephan Elliott’s A Few Best Men seems out of kilter with it’s opening weekend takings of $1.9 million.