All posts by Mark

About Mark

Mark Poole is a writer and director of both drama and documentary. His most recent film Fearless about 92 year old playwright Julia Britton recently screened on ABC1. His career began when the feature film he wrote, A Single Life, won an AFI Award in 1987. Since then he has written more than 20 hours of broadcast television drama, won a directing award for the short film Basically Speaking at the St Kilda Film Festival, and was honoured with a major AWGIE, the Richard Lane Award in 2008.

The Hollywood Reporter Roundtable: George Clooney and 6 Top Writers on Awful Agent Advice and the Accuracy Police

Film, Latest News, Screenwriting

The Writer Roundtable: From bottom left: Danny Strong (Lee Daniels’ The Butler), John Ridley (12 Years a Slave), Nicole Holofcener (Enough Said), George Clooney and Grant Heslov (The Monuments Men), Julie Delpy (Before Midnight) and Jonas Cuaron (Gravity) were photographed Oct. 18 at The Los Angeles Athletic Club.

Writer Roundtable, their Nazi art-heist drama The Monuments Men was considered likely to contend in multiple awards categories. Alas, four days after the Oct. 18 discussion at The Los Angeles Athletic Club, Monuments Men was bumped by distributor Sony Pictures to Feb. 7 — unfinished visual effects were cited as the reason — and out of the awards race (at least for this year).

Luckily, Clooney, 52, and Heslov, 50, are such good talkers, THR readers likely won’t care that their movie isn’t in contention yet. The duo joined Clooney’s Gravity writer Jonas Cuaron, 31 (he penned the action-heavy script with his director father, Alfonso), Before Midnight co-writer Julie Delpy, 43, Enough Said writer-director Nicole Holofcener, 53, 12 Years a Slave’s John Ridley, 49, and Lee Daniels’ The Butler’s Danny Strong, 39, for a conversation that veered from Paddy Chayefsky to Sarah Palin and Edward Snowden. Said Clooney, “Now we’re getting in some deep shit!”

What’s been your toughest moment as a writer?

GEORGE CLOONEY: Test screenings. (Laughter.)

JOHN RIDLEY: [Being rewritten] is not pleasant. But I know that it helped drive me forward, to try to have more ownership of my material. If it’s something that I really cared about, why did I get in a position where I gave it away too early?

DANNY STRONG: For me, the toughest part was all those years writing specs, not selling them, not progressing. I kept writing these really broad comedies, thinking, “I’m gonna break into show business writing these big, funny, Jim Carrey-esque comedies,” because that was big at the time. And then, finally, I said, “I have to give up.” Nothing against Jim Carrey comedies, but that’s when I wrote Recount [2008]. I sold it as a pitch. I still don’t know why HBO bought that project. Maybe they were drunk.

JULIE DELPY: When I wrote the first draft of Before Sunset [2004], I remember giving the script to my agent, who fired me the same day. He thought I was wasting my time. So I was full of doubt, like, “My God, am I doing the right thing? I’m crazy.”

Continue reading The Hollywood Reporter Roundtable: George Clooney and 6 Top Writers on Awful Agent Advice and the Accuracy Police →

New campaign to revive single documentaries

Documentary, Latest News

Australian documentary makers today launched a campaign to boost the ailing  numbers of single docs commissioned by the ABC and SBS and for more investment  from Screen Australia.

Indiedoco is campaigning for four key changes to the current  distribution of Australia’s public documentary subsidies, calling for:

– The ABC and SBS to follow the example of BBC2 by reinstating single documentary  strands that ‘will allow the very best filmmakers to find and tell stories that will  illuminate, provoke and reveal modern Australia in all its staggering variety.’

– Screen Australia to remove the requirement for a broadcaster pre-sale for the  National Documentary Program and to set up a new panel to select projects for NDP  funding based on creative, cultural and artistic criteria.

– Screen Australia to reinstate a slate development program for documentary  filmmakers similar to the General Development Investment Program that was  offered by the Australian Film Commission.

– Screen Australia to change the definition of ‘bona fide release’ for feature  documentaries to accept the reality that feature documentaries can reach audiences  in a myriad of different ways and to enable more feature documentaries to qualify for  the 40% producer offset.

The campaign was launched at the Australian Directors Guild conference in Sydney  and will culminate at the 2014 Australian International Documentary conference in  March.

By Don Groves INSIDEFILM  07/11/2013

Local screen industry’s strong track record provides fertile ground for Asian partnerships

Film, Latest News

Screen Australia Media Release – Thursday 31 October 2013

Screen Australia released its latest research report Common Ground: Opportunities for Australian Screen Partnerships in Asia, which explores Australia’s current engagement with the screen production sector across the Asian region.

The research findings reveal that the opportunities for Australia to collaborate with the region are likely to change significantly over the next five years as several territories, such as Mainland China, Malaysia, Singapore and South Korea, rapidly expand their screen industries. India, Indonesia, Japan and Thailand also hold great potential for the future.

Screen Australia’s Chief Executive Ruth Harley said, “Now is the time for the Australian screen industries to strengthen ties, formalise co-production arrangements and develop sound knowledge of working with our partners in Asia.

An overwhelming theme that emerged in the research was the importance of genuine collaboration that will underpin all success, and the good news is that our counterparts across Asia consider Australians to be good at collaborating. “Our attractiveness as a potential partner increases further once our professionalism and strong track record are considered. These attributes have been noticed and position Australian screen industry professionals well to build new partnerships in the Asian region,” said Dr Harley.

Asia is an increasingly significant source of revenue for the local screen industry and investment is flowing both ways. Best estimates have the value of audiovisual exports to the Asian region at around $50 million per year for the past three years. This represents around a quarter of Australia’s total audiovisual exports for those years.

Dr Harley said, “The growing opportunities and changing nature of collaboration between the Australian screen industry and Asia are being driven not only by developments in the region’s screen industries, but also the increasing confidence and diversity of our own screen production industry. Australia’s many relationships with Asia, including through our own diverse population, are increasingly being reflected on our screens.

“For the Australian screen production industry to remain relevant, it needs to be reflective of the contemporary world and Australia’s place in it. Creative collaborations with Asia not only assist us to understand our region, they enrich our understanding of ourselves. We are very excited about the new opportunities afforded by engaging with the energy and dynamism of our region and look forward to extending our relationships with the rapidly growing screen industries in Asia,” said Dr Harley.

Conducted in conjunction with PricewaterhouseCoopers Australia, the research outlined in the report is drawn from a survey of local producers and in-depth interviews with a broad range of stakeholders from across Australia and the Asian region. It aims to provide a resource for screen businesses building networks and forming partnerships in the region and will inform Screen Australia’s strategy for working with the screen industry to grow its ties with Asia into the future.

Dr Harley said that the research has also affirmed the important role of government in assisting Australian screen businesses to make inroads into new markets.

“Working together with our regional partners, Screen Australia is building on networks forged by our predecessor agencies and by the broader Australian screen industry,” said Dr Harley. “This includes the significant ties between our public broadcasters ABC and SBS and countries in the Asian region.”

Next month Screen Australia will lead a delegation of 25 producers and commissioning editors to Beijing and the Sichuan TV Festival to facilitate connections through the agency’s Enterprise Asia program. The program will involve exchanges with Chinese Government agencies, broadcasters and producers, networking events and targeted business matching opportunities.

To download the report visit:

www.screenaustralia.gov.au/about_us/pub_commonground.aspx

5 Horror Movies That Offered the Most Bang for the Buck

Film, Latest News

The top 15 horror films since 2009 with budgets of $20 million or less.

The Conjuring
Release date: July 19, 2013
Budget: $20 million
Domestic box office: $137 million
International box office: $168.2 million
Total: $297.4 million

Paranormal Activity 3

Release date: Oct. 21, 2011
Budget: $5 million
Domestic box office: $104 million
International box office: $103 million

Total: $207 million

Paranormal Activity

Release date: Sept. 25, 2009

Budget: $15,000

Domestic box office: $107.9 million

International box office: $85.4 million

Total: $193.4 million

Paranormal Activity 2

Release date: Oct. 22, 2010

Budget: $3 million

Domestic box office: $84.8 million

International box office: $92.8 million

Total: $177.5 million

Mama

Release date: Jan. 18, 2013

Budget: $15 million

Domestic box office: $71.6 million

International box office: $74.8 million

Total: $146.4 million

Paranormal Activity 4

Release date: Oct. 19, 2012

Budget: $5 million

Domestic box office: $53.9 million

International box office: $86.9 million

Total: $140.8 million

Saw 3D

Release date: Oct. 29, 2010

Budget: $20 million

Domestic box office: $45.7 million

International box office: $90.4 million

Total: $136.2 million

The Woman in Black

Release date: Feb. 3, 2012

Budget: $15 million

Domestic box office: $54.3 million

International box office: $73.4 million

Total: $127.7 million

The Devil Inside

Release date: Jan. 6, 2012

Budget: $1 million

Domestic box office: $53.3 million

International box office: $48.1 million

Total: $101.4 million

Evil Dead

Release date: April 5, 2013

Budget: $17 million

Domestic box office: $54.2 million

International box office: $43.3 million

Total: $97.5 million

Insidious

Release date: April 1, 2011

Budget: $1.5 million

Domestic box office: $54 million

International box office: $43 million

Total: $97 million

Insidious Chapter 2

Release date: Sept. 13, 2013

Budget: $5 million

Domestic box office: $74.8 million

International box office: $12.6 million

Total: $87.3 million

The Purge

Release date: June 6, 2013

Budget: $5 million

Domestic box office: $64.5 million

International box office: $22.6 million

Total: $87.1 million

Sinister

Release date: Oct. 12, 2012

Budget: $3 million

Domestic box office: $48 million

International box office: $29.6 million

Total: $77.7 million

The Last Exorcism

Release date: Aug. 27, 2010

Budget: $1.8 million

Domestic box office: $41 million

International box office: $26.7 million

Total: $67.7 million

10/21/2013 by THR Staff

God squad doc nets $55k via crowdfunding

Documentary, Latest News, Online Media

Melbourne filmmakers Don Parham and Warwick Vincent have raised $55,000 via a crowdfunding campaign for a feature-length documentary called Smithy: Something
In Every Hue. Before getting too excited about a new film on the pioneer aviator, this one is about John Smith, the Australian founder of Christian motorcycle club God’s Squad. His fans include Bono, who backed the Pozible campaign by describing Smith as a preacher who is ”a very eloquent speaker with a brilliant mind”.

Screen Aus 2013 Enterprise recipients announced

Film, Latest News, Television

Screen Australia media release – Tuesday 22 October 2013

Screen Australia today announced $2.4 million in support to production companies and producers under the fifth round of its Enterprise Program.

The four successful Enterprise Program companies are (in alphabetical order):

 Carbon Media Pty Ltd (Wayne Denning)

 Eye Spy Productions Pty Ltd T/A Northern Pictures (David Haslingden, Sue

Clothier, Sandy Cameron)

 Porchlight Films Pty Ltd (Anita Sheehan, Liz Watts, Vincent Sheehan)

 The Feds Australia Pty Ltd (Elizabeth Nash, Michael Cook)

“These companies are all looking to expand their presence in international markets in Asia, Europe and the US and represent a cross section of our industry, developing and producing film, television and original multi-platform content,” said Ruth Harley, Screen Australia’s Chief Executive.

The four successful Enterprise Program companies include those working in television, with two companies focusing on youth and children’s television content, documentary, sales and multi-platform digital content. Their business plans incorporate strategies for growth including slate, talent and company development, marketing and expansion into international markets, new partnerships and alliances, as well as strategies for mentoring.

Carbon Media is a strong, full service media production company with a track record of producing children’s content for television and across media platforms, including Indigenous children’s content. Enterprise funding will enable Carbon Media to focus on developing high quality, aspirational and entertaining content for children and will further its international alliances.

Eye Spy Productions has extensive experience in large-scale factual television producing, mainly wildlife and social documentaries for the domestic and international marketplace. Eye Spy plans to establish an international sales company and create production capability in Beijing, where it will launch its brand in Asia. It will also scope the viability of a Pan-Asia Television Academy to facilitate the increased development of quality Australian talent and projects on the global stage.

The Feds develops and produces a range of content across all media platforms. The company will use Enterprise funding to increase development of content and build on the scope and scale of projects to pitch to networks. It will build on its internal resources and international presence to enable this.

Porchlight Films is an award-winning film and television company with over 15 years’ experience. Enterprise funding will enable the company to embrace a more ambitious feature film slate and increase television production output. Porchlight will also implement a writers’ room project to enable writers and writer/directors to hothouse ideas and fast-track early stage development of projects.

“Since 2009, through Screen Australia’s Enterprise Program, we have supported 29 companies, enabling them to develop and expand their screen businesses and enhance their sustainability,” said Dr Harley. “We have further supported another four companies through our Feature Enterprise program and 19 companies through our Enterprise Asia program.

The Enterprise Program selection panel included international screen business development consultants Jonathan Olsberg and Christina Willoughby as well as CEO Ruth Harley and Screen Australia’s Senior Manager, State and Industry Partnerships Chris Oliver. Further details on the 2013 Enterprise recipients are available on their website, along with details of previous years’ recipients.

WGA Members See Darker Days For Feature Film Work

Film, Latest News, Screenwriting, Television

Far brighter outlook seen for TV writing

While TV offers growing opportunities for scribes, members of the Writers Guild of America East are forecasting a bleak future for themselves in writing screenplays for feature films .

According to a survey released Wednesday by the guild, half of the members who responded said that the declining number of movies being made is the biggest challenge WGA East will face in the next five years. “Many also decried the lack of development deals in feature film and limited revenues from digital/online reuse,” the WGA East said.

The WGA East represents about 4,000 members while the WGA West has about double that number. About 20% of the WGA East’s members participated in the survey.

“Members view television as a more writer-driven medium than feature film, and a growing slate of compelling, creatively satisfying shows is being produced for the small screen,” the WGA East also said. “Although more than half of the respondents said they wrote feature films in the last five years, nearly 90% said they intend to seek Guild-covered work in television in the next year. In other words, screenwriters plan to explore opportunities in TV.”

The finding comes with Hollywood’s major studios opting to continue allocating a growing portion of their resources on a few mega-budget franchise tentpoles. In a report released in July, the WGA West said that Hollywood writer earnings rose 4% last year to $1.02 billion as a 10.1% surge in TV writing overcame a 6.1% decline in feature film work.

TV earnings for the WGA West amounted to $667.2 million while feature film employment slid 6.7% to 1,537 writers earning $343.4 million — the third straight year of declines as the six major studios made fewer mid-budget features. Feature film earnings in the WGA West have plunged 35% since 2007 when pre-strike stockpiling generated $526.6 million in writer earnings.

The WGA East survey also found that about 45% of its respondents said they have also produced; nearly 30% have directed; and about 18% have acted. Nearly 20% of the survey respondents are also playwrights; 20% write novels and short stories; 16% write nonfiction books and articles; 10% write in nonfiction television; and 17% of the respondents indicated they have been paid to write for digital media.

The WGA noted that it first won jurisdiction over writing for digital media as part of the settlement in the 2007-2008 strike.

One of the anonymous respondents said, “What I’ve learned the last few years is that I have to be open to more kinds of work – feature, TV, cable, etc. – and then work much harder to get the job.” Another reiterated a longstanding complaint: “There is far too much ‘free’ work expected from producers and studios. This needs to change ASAP.”

The two Writers Guilds negotiate jointly with the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers and the current master contract runs out on May 1. No negotiations have been set.

Dave McNary – VARIETY – September 25, 2013

2014: A banner year for Oz cinema?

Film, Latest News

By Don Groves INSIDEFILM – [Thu 19/09/2013 03:38:42]

This may turn out to be a premature and fanciful call but 2014 is shaping as potentially one of the strongest years for Australian films, commercially and critically, in recent memory.

The 2014 release schedule has a broad mix of genres although crime thriller seems the most popular genre. “It’s a good slate,” says Mike Baard, MD of Universal Pictures International, while lamenting the dearth of comedies, with the notable exception of Wayne Hope’s Now Add Honey. Universal will release Jocelyn Moorhouse’s comic drama The Dressmaker, which toplines Kate Winslet and Judy Davis and will shoot in early 2014.

The Weinstein Co’s acquisition of US rights to Jonathan Teplitzky’s The Railway Man and John Curran’s Tracks virtually guarantees both will get a hefty marketing push and choice screens in the US.

Matt Saville’s thriller Felony got rave reviews at the Toronto International Film Festival, particularly for the performances by Joel Edgerton, Tom Wilkinson and Jai Courtney. Writer-director Aaron Wilson’s debut feature Canopy, set during the Japanese invasion of Singapore in WW11, got positive reactions in Toronto. Greg Mclean’s Wolf Creek 2 had its world premiere in Venice after being pre-sold to every major territory except the US, where a deal is pending. Robert Pattinson, Guy Pearce and Scoot McNairy star in Animal Kingdom director David Michôd’s crime thriller The Rover. Roadshow will release Wolf Creek 2, Felony, The Rover, Now Add Honey and These Final Hours.

EOne Hopscotch will distribute Son of a Gun; Rolf de Heer’s Charlie’s Country; Tony Ayres’ crime thriller Cut Snake, which stars Sullivan Stapleton, Alex Russell and Jessica de Gouw; and I, Frankenstein, Stuart Beattie’s Melbourne-shot contemporary fantasy thriller which sees Frankenstein’s monster protecting the human race against an uprising of supernatural creatures, featuring Aaron Eckhart, Bill Nighy, Yvonne Strahovski, Miranda Otto, Socratis Otto, Jai Courtney and Caitlin Stasey.

Transmission is handling The Railway Man (which opens on Boxing Day), Tracks, Stephen Lance’s My Mistress and, co-distributed with Footprint Films, Fell, a drama starring Matt Nable and Daniel Henshall from first-time writer-director Kasimir Burgess.

Pinnacle will release Peter and Michael Spierig’s Predestination, a time-travel thriller starring Noah Taylor, Ethan Hawke and Sarah Snook.

Among other titles due for release next year are Craig Monahan’s drama Healing, John V. Soto’s crime thriller The Reckoning, starring Luke Hemsworth, Jonathan LaPaglia and Viva Bianca, Nadia Tass’ comedy The Menkoff Method, Michael Petroni’s supernatural thriller Backtrack and, from first-time directors, Jennifer Kent’s psychological thriller The Babadook, Josh Lawson’s sexy comedy The Little Death and Geoff Davis’ WW1 drama The Stolen.

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Too many good Aussie dramas?

Latest News, Television

MICHAEL BODEY – The Australian  – September 21, 2013 12:00AM

I BELIEVE we’re “drama-ed out”. Too many good Australian drama series haven’t
attracted the audiences they deserve this year.

One of them, Power Games: The Packer Murdoch Story (M, Roadshow, 250min, $39.95), is released on DVD this week. Another local series, Upper Middle Bogan (M, ABC, 237min, $29.95), perhaps shows where television programmers and producers should head.

This year reminds me of 2005-06, when we saw a generational distaste for Australian drama. The industry got ahead of itself, launching dramas of differing style and budget, including The Cooks, Young Lions and Canal Road. There were too many and we turned off until new funding led to splashier fare such as Sea Patrol, City Homicide and the Underbelly franchise. There has been a run of success since.

We over-egged it this year. Every week, there has been a new Australian drama, “an important story” that “Australia’s talking about”. There is not space for them all.

The accessible, middle-Australia space previously inhabited by Packed to the Rafters is now taken by House Husbands and Winners & Losers. Offspring managed to recover from its mid-season madness to take the quirky space while the jury’s out, just, on Wonderland.

Nine’s reliance on men behaving badly through the Underbelly and the Packerfocused Howzat and Power Games series is telling. Underbelly: Squizzy was competent but began timidly. Power Games is splendid but niche, particularly when Seven’s A Place to Call Home took the period space not taken by ABC1.

The ABC has had winning telemovies such as Cliffy and Mabo, and played to a formulaic strength with Miss Fisher’s Murder Mysteries. But scheduling The Time of Our Lives against Underbelly and House Husbands was the kind of hubris that saw audiences shun local drama.

Which brings me to Upper Middle Bogan. DVD Letterbox enjoys the work of Robyn Butler and Wayne Hope, which includes The Librarians and Very Small Business. They’re not laugh-a-minute comedies but keenly observed and performed beautifully. Anyone who casts Glenn Robbins, Michala Banas and Robyn Nevin, as they did here, knows what they’re doing.

Upper Middle Bogan is a ripper, the kind of narrative comedy we don’t see enough of. It’s a little bigger than most ABC1 comedies without overreaching. And it hits a socio-political moment, the comfort of middle Australia, without being meanspirited. I doubt it would have worked on the commercial networks but it should raise the question: why aren’t Seven, Nine and Ten doing narrative comedy or sitcoms?

They’re happy to air imports, and fill panel and reality shows with comedians. So why not risk the Australian sitcom? It’s not solely the job of the ABC. Is anyone even looking at setting a sitcom around, say, Anh Do? I’d bank on that before another local drama series.

How China’s Homegrown Biz Is Threatening Hollywood’s Payday

Film, Latest News

China’s evolving movie biz shows an increasing sophistication and diversity that
challenges U.S. studios to rethink their approach

In the past few years, Westerners have exulted in the country’s box office boom, which included hefty grosses for major-studio films such as “Iron Man 3,” “Pacific Rim” and “The Croods.” With the liberalization of access to the market and a greater share of distribution money, Hollywood began to see China as the land of opportunity after decades of feeling thwarted by tight quotas for imported movies.

Yes, the China box ofice is growing, but not for everyone. In the current year, ticket sales for local films increased 144% to $1.12 billion, while imported films saw a 21% slump to $670 million — despite the relaxing of quotas.

Is Hollywood doing something wrong, or are Chinese filmmakers doing something right? Both, which is why American studios need to quickly rethink their roles and goals. Continue reading How China’s Homegrown Biz Is Threatening Hollywood’s Payday →