Okay Screen Australia, I take some of my past erh…blessings back. So you all know what I’m talking about, I’m talking about the new film Daybreakers funded by Screen Australia itself. Of course the film has the ANZAC appeal (athankyou Mr. Sam Neill) and of course the overseas bait of Willem Dafoe and Ethan Hawke and with a trailer like this you can’t say it looks like my stereotyped Australian arthouse bungle.
No, Daybreakers is a science fiction film set in 2019, where all of mankind have become vampires (as you would) from a plague. The human population is nearing extinction and so therefore the vampires themselves face starvation, thus begins vampire hematologist Edward Dalton’s (Ethan Hawke) hunt for salvation.
Of course the appeal to this film is that it does not look that Australian, but of course this lends itself to an awareness of the audience from the wizards at Screen Aus.
The project itself is headed by the boys who brought you Undead, the Spierig brothers.
So read more shit here or take it from me thay January 21, 2010 (the picture’s release date) might be a touch to far away for your liking.
Will be opening a new page on my bog for my end-of-year major. Think how much you hate your life sometimes, and all the waiting you do to ‘make it’. To make anything.
The Australian flick: The Combination received so much media hype after it had to pulled from cinemas, that media watcher Media Monitor said that the amount of coverage on the news equated to $9 Million AU being spent on advertising.
So it’s getting close to Andy Cox’s debut screenplay coming to the screen. July 16th to be exact. Lucky Country (click here for the trailer) helmed by director Kriv Strenders the film depicts life in (you guessed it) outback Australia, 1902 where a father has taken his family out to a cabin at edge of the woods with the desire to farm the land. It doesn’t bode well and shit turns sour.
Of course the writer Andy Cox mus be fucking insane as he actually went out to a cabin, occupied by a family and watched them at night. Or something like that, I call this possible felony: method writing. The film has potential, but of course as we haven’t heard shit all about it on screen on in print, nothing’s certain.
Regardless, keep an eye out for Lucky Country.
Meanwhile, to fans of novelist: John Marsden, Screen Australia has recently given the green light to the adaptation of Tomorrow When The War Began. Check the release here.
This is writer Stuart Beattie’s debut directing project, Beattie having written screenplays for films such as 30 Days Of Night, the Pirates of the Caribbean trilogy and even for videogame Gears of War 2. Interesting. Oh shit, and he’s also somewhat involved in Halo (check the archive for more on that Hollywood clusterfuck).
Of course the release also states there will be a second Wog Boy. Eeerrrhhh.
Shout out to Jonathan Auf Der Heide who will be bringing us his debut feature:
This is something to look out for. Truly. Shot on the bad boy of digital, the RED One and telling the story of Alexander Pearce: an Irish convict who escaped from Tasmania’s infamous Port Arthur prison with seven others. Unfortunately these Einsteins of the 1800’s were ill-equipped to survive in the Tasmanian forests and soon started to eat each other.
For those of you lucky enough to see it at Sydney Film Festival, or the number of other festivals it screened at then: screw you! The rest of us chumps will have to wait till August 27th.
It’s sleek, and if it’s shot digital then cheap too, it’s a production style we could see more of in Australia. More details everywhere else, or specifically on their website.
Yeah Screen Australia! If you haven’t heard Screen Australia has had a facelift, and change of management. This means they’re changing and they say this, they promise to be starting making films that appeal to the audience. Unfortunately they fucked up
Case in point: Wolf Creek vs. My Year Without Sex. Wolf Creek was made in 2005 under the old funding body, it sold overseas and was one of the most successful Australian films for a long time. Fuck, the sale to the USA alone was $11 million dollars, not to mention the other approximately $16 million the film made from screenings there. Check these little dollar factoids here.
Anyway, why did this film do well? Mass appeal. Everyone likes a horror story, and the fact it was based around true happenings is even cooler. It was very appealing film, to a lot of demographics. And, hey, it’s pretty fucking cool too.
Then My Year Without Sex…here it is. My Year Without Sex is Australian director, Sarah Watt’s second film. It is all about a woman who can’t have sex for a year because of her heart condition. Now that is pretty funny, of course you couldn’t tell by the ad cos the ad doesn’t explain this. But fuck what would I know? I’m only the audience. Now Sarah Watt, if you’re a fan (shit, I know I am!…that was sarcasm), brought you the equally appealing: Look Both Ways (which I don’t mind, but the USA didn’t care for it much). Sarah is not a bad filmaker, she just makes film for a very exclusive audience the 30+ white parents and it’s a problem that her latest film cost us four Wolf Creeks. Check it nyah.
What’s my point? Shit and get off the pot Screen Australia, you’ve done it again and sure there are fuck ups like Rogue or Dying Breed but still doesn’t mean you can’t broaden your mind. I think the main task at hand is breaking the stigma that all Aussie flicks are shit or arthouse/wanky and also getting boot to arse on advertising. People don’t know half this shit is coming out.
