All articles by Sandy George – Page 59
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Michael Thornhill wins Australia's Cecil Homes Award
Filmmaker Michael Thornhill has won this year's Cecil Homes Award in a unanimous vote by the board of the Australian Screen Directors Association.The award is for a filmmaker who has promoted the art of directing and advocated the role of the director and he has done that tirelessly -- often ...
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Global Rule One relaxed in Australia for the first time
After months of negotiation, an agreement has been reached that relaxes the effect of Global Rule One on Australian productions, particularly where budgets are low, and where the cast on these productions are Australian, New Zealand or other non-US members of the Screen Actors Guild (SAG). With the number of ...
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Village Roadshow buoyed by exhibition turnaround
Village Roadshow has achieved a remarkable turnaround in its exhibition division, with the ongoing policy of selling off certain territories clearly paying off and a string of popular films and new screens adding to the bottom line. Village Roadshow's exhibition arm posted a profit of A$28.6m for the 12 months ...
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Linda Tizard tipped to become FFC boss
The close-knit Australian film industry is awash with talk that Linda Tizard is to become the new chief executive of the Film Finance Corporation (FFC), arguably the most influential film job in the land. But the FFC says that no selection has yet been made and no ministerial stamp given, ...
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The Illustrated Family Doctor gets the greenlight
Acclaimed commercials, short film and documentary director Kriv Stenders has finally got his dark and irreverent debut feature The Illustrated Family Doctor over the financing line. He wrote the script in conjunction with David Snell, author of the novel on which it is based.The commitment of UK-based sales agent ...
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The Illustrated Family Doctor gets the greenlight
Acclaimed commercials, short film and documentary director Kriv Stenders has finally got his dark and irreverent debut feature The Illustrated Family Doctor over the financing line. He wrote the script in conjunction with David Snell, author of the novel on which it is based.The commitment of UK-based sales agent ...
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Epic Matrix shoot wraps in Oz as runaway production levels rise
The 12-month Sydney shoot of The Matrix Reloaded and The Matrix Revolutions has just wrapped, leaving the legacy of a $110.6m contribution to the state economy and a host of titles lining up to shoot in production-friendly Australia. Brothers Larry and Andy Wachowski shot the futuristic films simultaneously and will ...
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Sex and religion prove winning formula in Melbourne
Writer/director Pan Malin's debut feature Samsara proved the most fashionable film of the 51st Melbourne International Film Festival when it won the Stella Artois Award for most popular feature. The India/Germany/Italy/France production is about the sexual awakening of a young Buddhist monk in the Himalayas. Another directorial debut, Paul Goldman's ...
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Roadshow triumphs at annual Australian box office awards
Australian distributor Roadshow trounced the opposition at the annual Australian box office awards taking the gold prize for Lord Of The Rings, which attracted A$47m in ticket sales, as well as the honours for the most number of films to gross over A$10m. Roadshow's seven films, out of a total ...
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The Deserted Valley takes Melbourne first
Vietnamese director Pham Nhue Giang's The Deserted Valley (Thung Lung Hoang Vang) from Vietnam has won the 51st Melbourne International Film Festival's first FIPRESCI (Federation Internationale de la Presse Cinematographique) and FCCA (Film Critics Circle of Australia) Prize. The film was included in the International Forum of this year's Berlin ...
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Seven titles selected for this year's Australian Movie Convention
Australian teen comedy Blurred, which is being released by Becker locally in October, and 8 Femmes, which Dendy is releasing during the peak December period, are among seven films to be screened to hundreds of exhibitors at the annual Australian International Movie Convention, to be held from August 13-17 on ...
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Rosenthal joins Australia's Beyond Films
Isabel Rosenthal has been appointed acquisitions and development manager for sales agent Beyond Films and will be based in the Sydney head office. She has previously worked in similar roles in the US for Visual Media, 20th Century Fox and New Line Cinemas. The appointment comes three months after London-based ...
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Seijun Suzuki's comeback film is honoured in Brisbane
Pistol Opera, (pictured) the first film in eight years directed by Japanese master Seijun Suzuki, has won the first FIPRESCI (Federation Internationale de la Presse Cinematographique) Award to be presented at the Brisbane International Film Festival (BIFF), which ended yesterday. Chair of the FIPRESCI jury, Chicago Reader critic Jonathan Rosenbaum, ...
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Emmy winner from last year to direct first feature
As bets start being placed on which of the finalists will win Emmy Awards this year, one of last year's winners, the acclaimed theatre director Gale Edwards, has signed up to direct her first feature, The Dressmaker. Set in the in 1950s, The Dressmaker is about a woman who has ...
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Macquarie Film Corp. - from Dirty Deeds to Wannabes
At the same time as Australia's Macquarie Film Corp. was celebrating the successful weekend opening of its first backed film Dirty Deeds; it was also announcing the eighth and final film to be backed under its current scheme: The Wannabes.Dirty Deeds, the first film to benefit from Macquarie's interest in ...
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US productions running away to Australia, says new research
Australia is the first choice when shooting abroad for 60% of Los Angeles-based film and television producers that have worked there, according to a new survey released this week. "Australia is seen as more competitive than Canada because of the exchange rate and the climate," the survey states, "and more ...
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Two Australian production companies established
Two Australian companies, leading TV commercials producer Film Graphics and top visual effects outfit Animal Logic have simultaneously, but separately, launched into feature film and television programme production.And while each company's methods are different - Australian Rules producer Mark Lazarus has been appointed executive producer and head of development for ...
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Further claims emerge from collapse of Australia's HIH
The extent of the damage caused by its involvement in the film financing business is emerging as further evidence is given to the on-going Royal Commission into the 2001 collapse of Australia's HIH Insurance Group. This week documents were tendered that show outstanding claims could be as high as $225.5m, ...
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Box-office still going up Down Under
Australian cinemas have sold $240m (A$423m) worth of cinema tickets in the six months to June 30, a 6.7% rise on the same period last year and an indication that a growth pattern spanning more than a decade is not yet over.Motion Picture Distributors Association of Australia chair Mike Selwyn ...
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The Next Big Thing to be April's first production
A production deal signed this week signals that The Next Big Thing, a feature written by and to star Magda Szubanski, is likely to be Australia's April Films' first production. The private owners of the Sydney-based company have put $1.7m (A$3m) of their own money into project development since establishing ...