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.

Blokes share the agony of ecstasy

Latest News, Television, , ,

Agony Uncles, ABC1, Wednesday, 9.30pm

Des Dowling, Scott Brennan and Adam Elliot come clean about their experiences of
sex and love in this new series.

With tongue firmly in cheek, writer and actor Adam Zwar (Wilfred, Lowdown)
bravely goes where few people have hitherto dared: inside the psyche of men and the
rituals of love and romance.

On paper, this could have been a stinker. A bunch of self-satisfied blokes sitting
around discussing their experiences of women and the game of love has the vague
stench of locker-room misogyny.

The clip-and-talking-head format of this also bears strong similarities to the tedious
Grumpy Old … franchise, in which washed-up boomer-era comedians nostalgically
kvetch about what’s wrong with the world today.

For starters Zwar, who narrates and can often be heard in the background laughing
at the responses the discussions elicit, has rounded up a diverse bunch of men who
span generations, cultural backgrounds, personalities and sexual preferences.

There are blokes’ blokes like broadcaster Tim Ross and comedian Lawrence Mooney,
SNAGS such as Josh Lawson and Damian Walshe-Howling, Muslim academic
Waleed Aly, out-and-proud gay filmmaker Adam Elliot and the odd-couple pairing of
father-and-son John and Tom Elliott, among others.

As they talk about the first tentative steps that single men take in their quest to meet
Mr or Miss Right, or to paraphrase Robin Williams, Mr and Miss Right Now, what
emerges is a far cry from the stereotype of blokes bragging about their sexual
conquests, an image reinforced by background, Puberty Blues-era footage of leering
surfers standing next to their shining ”shaggin’ wagons”.

Continue reading Blokes share the agony of ecstasy →

Promoting your film online – Hunger Games

Film, Latest News, Online Media, , ,

Selling a movie used to be a snap. You printed a poster,
ran trailers in theaters and carpet-bombed NBC’s Thursday night lineup with ads.

Today, that kind of campaign would get a movie marketer fired. The dark art of
movie promotion increasingly lives on the Web, where studios are playing a wilier
game, using social media and a blizzard of other inexpensive yet effective online
techniques to pull off what may be the marketer’s ultimate trick: persuading fans to
persuade each other.

The art lies in allowing fans to feel as if they are discovering a film, but in truth
Hollywood’s new promotional paradigm involves a digital hard sell in which little is
left to chance — as becomes apparent in a rare step-by-step tour through the
timetable and techniques used by Lionsgate to assure that “The Hunger Games”
becomes a box office phenomenon when it opens on Friday.

Continue reading Promoting your film online – Hunger Games →

Jim Schembri departs The Melbourne Age after 28 years

Film, Latest News, Online Media, Television, , , , , ,

AFTER a number of Twitter indiscretions, The Age’s long-serving entertainment writer Jim Schembri negotiates an exit.

In a memo sent to staff last night, editor-in-chief Paul Ramadge wrote: “After 28 years of dedicated service and hard work bringing a distinctive voice to The Age’s entertainment coverage as a film and TV critic and feature writer, Jim has decided to embrace other challenges.”

Last week, website Crikey erroneously reported Schembri had been “sacked from his position following revelations he had reportedly dobbed on the employers of his Twitter critics and hinted at taking legal action under the auspices of Fairfax Media”.

In fact, management only asked Schembri to take early leave after Crikey broke news of his Twitter transgressions. It is understood Schembri had a substantial amount of time owing and Fairfax Media did not comment on Schembri’s misdemeanours.

Schembri has since negotiated his departure. It is believed he will continue writing  on pop cultural matters elsewhere.

He is the published author of more than 40 books, including the memoir Room For One and eight novels for young children.

Schembri was one of the best-loved and contentious writers at The Age, with his Modern Fable series in the 1990s a particular favourite with readers. He cultivated a strong film blog, Cinetopia, for the newspaper and occasionally attracted the opprobrium of the film industry for his strident views on the industry despite his championing of comedy and certain filmmakers.

While presenting at this year’s AACTA Awards, A Few Best Men’s director Stephan Elliott asked Schembri to “stop the poison pen” and “hate” after the journalist wrote his film was “unreleasable”. It went on to earn $5 million.

At the 2008 AFI Awards, The Black Balloon’s co-writer, Jimmy Jack, responded to Schembri’s criticism of his film by reading the review before saying “Jim Schembri. F*** you.”

And last year, The Chaser’s Hamster Wheel program named its segment on internet discretions ‘The Schembris’ after the journalist revealed a major plot twist in his review of Scream 4 before retracting it and writing it was merely a ruse to fool the “Twittersphere.”

In the memo to staff, Ramadge thanked Schembri for his contribution and wished him well. He added Schembri “has chosen to forego farewell drinks and will arrange an informal gathering soon.”

Michael Bodey – The Australian, 16/3/12

Cameraman kills earless bunny

Directing, Documentary, Film, Latest News, Television, , , ,

An earless baby bunny that was a rising star on Germany’s celebrity animal scene had his 15 minutes of fame brought to an abrupt end when he was accidentally stepped on by a television cameraman.

The fate of 17-day-old Til, a rabbit with a genetic defect, was plastered across German newspapers on Thursday, the same day a small zoo in Saxony was to have presented him to the world at a press conference.

The cameraman told Bild newspaper he had not seen Til, who had buried himself in hay, when he took the fateful step backwards on Wednesday.

Til was reportedly hidden under hay when he was stepped on.Til was reportedly hidden under hay when he was stepped on. Photo: AP

Zoo director Uwe Dempewolf told Spiegel magazine that Til did not suffer.

“We are all shocked. During the filming, the cameraman took a step back and trod on the bunny.

“He was immediately dead, he didn’t suffer. It was a direct hit. No one could have foreseen this. Everyone here is upset. The cameraman was distraught.”

Spiegel Online reported that the rabbit’s body would be frozen while zoo officials decided if it would be stuffed.

Germany has been home to several global animal celebrities in recent years, including polar bear Knut and Paul the prognosticating octopus.

AP and smh.com.au

YouTube poised to upend old film models

Film, Latest News, Online Media, , , ,

Nora the piano-playing cat is no longer the main attraction as other programming comes on YouTube.

Since watching YouTube’s Entertainment Matters keynote at the Consumer
Electronics Show in January, I’ve spent more and more time pondering YouTube.
And YouTube has been giving me more and more to ponder, as the site is moving
away from Nora the Piano Cat and distraught Britney Spears fans to more ambitious
content.

The more I think about it, the more convinced I am that YouTube is getting ready to
burn down the filmed entertainment business as we know it. In fact, the match has
already been struck. We just haven’t felt the heat yet.

There’s been a lot of talk about targeted advertising and how that builds revenue
streams from YouTube, which reassures content producers and owners that there
will be a way to make money off Web video even as audiences splinter to
infinitessimal shards. That’s fine, but I think that talk assumes we’ll be watching the
same things, just watching them through YouTube instead of cable or broadcast.

But how people watch shapes what they watch. As people shift to watching YouTube
and other Web video services, longform video could become a niche product, just as
opera and classical music became niche products in a market dominated by pop
songs.

Continue reading YouTube poised to upend old film models →

Margin Call opens in Australia

Film, Latest News, Screenwriting, ,

The feature film Margin Call is interesting for a number of reasons. It was written over four days by writer-director J.C. Chandor, who before that had made a number of shorts films and documentaries. It was shot in 17 days, and apparently the screenplay immediately began to attract ‘name’ actors as it began circulating LA.

Craig Matheison has the details:

SOMETIMES a young filmmaker only has to look to his family and upbringing for
compelling material. For his outstanding debut feature, Margin Call, American
writer-director J. C. Chandor tellingly explores the Wall Street life that his father
spent 35 years amidst working for the investment bank Merrill Lynch.

”It feels like an honest representation of that world,” says the 37-year-old Chandor,
who has only recently returned with his young family to their home in Rhode Island
after spending the awards season in Los Angeles following his Academy Awards
nomination for best original screenplay.

He wrote the moral thriller in just four days in 2009, but with its allusive dialogue,
twisted institutional allegiance and breached ethics, Margin Call does for Tom
Wolfe’s Masters of the Universe what David Mamet’s Glengarry Glen Ross did for
shady salesmen: it creates a self-contained milieu where the characters are
compelled to reveal their true nature.

Continue reading Margin Call opens in Australia →

John Carter tanks – bad news for Disney?

Film, Latest News, , ,

The failure of the sci-fi movie ‘John Carter’ opens up new questions about the studio’s weak pipeline and overall movie strategy, according to Kim Masters writing in the Hollywood Reporter.

Now that John Carter has landed with a resounding thud <at the US domestic box
office> , Hollywood is trying to decipher whether Disney will conclude that it needs
to change the guard or at least tweak its strategy when it comes to homegrown live-
action films.

Since chairman Rich Ross, 50, arrived in October 2009 and set out to remake the
film studio, competitors and others have been watching to see whether the former
cable television executive could find his legs in the movie business. Some in the
industry — pointing to marketing missteps and a sputtering pipeline — had turned
thumbs down even before Carter failed, bringing an expected write-down of more than $150 million. Others believe that Ross, perceived as a favorite of Disney chief
executive Robert Iger, will escape blame and be judged instead on next year’s slate.

Continue reading John Carter tanks – bad news for Disney? →

Screenwriters being rewritten – the Hollywood model

Film, Latest News, Screenwriting, ,

Why does anyone want to be a screenwriter? It is the most difficult job in the
business. Facing a blinking cursor and a blank screen is much tougher than
interpreting that screenplay. And for this arduous work, the screenwriter is
compensated less than the producers, director, and stars: It is pretty rare for even an
A-list writer to get any kind of big-money profit participation on a film, while it is de
rigueur for those in the aforementioned categories. And, unlike the other artists who
work on films — and in most other art forms — it is common and even pro forma to
replace a screenwriter on a studio project. While book editors probably have given
notes to e.e. cummings and Norman Mailer, I doubt anyone ever rewrote them. I
can’t imagine that after Bruce Springsteen sent Columbia Records the songs for Born
to Run, an executive said to him, “That’s great Boss, or, eh, The Boss, but we think it
best to hand these over to John Fogerty and let him do a pass on them.” Dalí, Rodin,
and Chopin would probably be aghast to learn of how motion picture scripts are
developed. On a big-budget film, it is not uncommon for six or more writers to have
worked on the screenplay, including the director and a friend of the star who is
brought in just to work on his character’s dialogue. After 27 years working in this
industry, I’ve heard many writers complain about unjust situations or how a movie
could have been better had their work made it to the screen, but not about the actual
experience of being rewritten or rewriting someone else. So in search of illumination
on the topic, I decided to ask a group of four top script writers — David Koepp
(Jurassic Park, Spider-Man), Brian Koppelman (Rounders, Ocean’s Thirteen), Jeff
Nathanson (Catch Me If You Can, The Terminal), and Andy Walker (Se7en, Sleepy
Hollow) — for their thoughts on the curiously standard procedure of swapping
writers on movies.

Continue reading Screenwriters being rewritten – the Hollywood model →

Screen Australia loses Producer Offset appeal

Documentary, Latest News, Television, ,

As predicted by Simon Nasht at last week’s 2012 AIDC conference in Adelaide, the Federal Court has rejected Screen Australia’s appeal against the documentary series Lush House being granted the producer offset.

As Geoff Brown says, SPAA urged Screen Australia not to appeal against the ruling that Lush House was eligible for the offset, but they went ahead anyway. This will now add to the uncertainty about the definition of what is a documentary, for the purposes of the Producer Offset.

Here is Brendan Swift of IF Magazine’s take on the issue (Wed 07/03/2012)

The Federal Court of Australia has confirmed that TV documentary series Lush House should qualify for the Producer Offset rebate after Screen Australia challenged last year’s similar decision by the Administrative Appeals Tribunal.

The national screen agency originally rejected Essential Media and Entertainment’s Producer Offset application because it viewed the ten-episode cleaning series as a ‘reality’ program. However, Essential argued that the series, which follows household expert Shannon Lush as she gives cleaning advice to homemakers, was similar to another of its programs, Is Your House Killing You?, which did receive the tax break.

The AAT confirmed Essential’s position although Screen Australia then challenged that judgement in the Federal Court.

Essential said the Federal Court did not find any fault with the process followed by the lower court in determining that Lush House is eligible for the 20 per cent tax rebate available for broadcast documentaries.

Essential Media and Entertainment chief executive Chris Hilton said the company is pleased with the Federal Court decision.

“It represents a win for the Australian production industry as a whole and should provide more certainty to producers who are seeking to invest the Producer’s Offset as part of their project finance,” he said in a statement.

Continue reading Screen Australia loses Producer Offset appeal →

Australian docs – view from the US by Peter Hamilton

Documentary, Latest News, , , ,

Peter Hamilton runs documentary.com, a site about the market for documentaries around the globe. Peter is an Aussie who once taught at Sunshine Tech, would you believe, but is now based in New York.

Here is his summary of what’s going on in Australia, gleaned at the WCSFP congress in Paris late last year.

Australia: Rich in Coal and the Flat White Lifestyle. But What About Factual Commissions?

2012 March 7
by Peter Hamilton

Australia is enjoying its biggest boom since the 1850′s Gold Rush:

  • The GFC wasn’t even a hiccup.
  • Carpenters sip their early morning strong flat whites and then head off to work in their Audi’s.
  • New Coal-for-China billionaires seem to be minted weekly.

Is this wealth trickling down to the Aussie Factual sector?

For the Paris Science Congress, we surveyed the Australian landscape from 20,0000 feet through interviews with local industry participants. We focused on Specials, limited series and docs. Here are our updated findings…

———————-

TAKEAWAYS

  • 90%+ of Australia’s total factual spend is accounted for by ABC and SBS.
  • Both are taxpayer-supported broadcasters.
  • And they are experiencing reorgs.
  • Australia’s economy is booming, and there is a traditionally sympathetic Labor government in power in Canberra
    • But neither pubcaster has benefited from a big step up in the public TV budget that would have flowed through to local unscripted production.

    FUNDING

    • Funding from Screen Australia is steady – this year $16+/- million is budgeted for factual, indicating the  modest scale of the Australian market
    • Screen Australia’s factual spend is directed (+/-):
    • 50% for ABC
    • 40% for SBS
    • And 10% for cable/satellite channels.
  • “Screen Australia has budgeted $3-5 million for 2011/12 in the All Media Fund, a new $3-5 million Fund which encourages interactive or multi-platform innovative, risk-taking storytelling and includes factual -based projects.” Continue reading Australian docs – view from the US by Peter Hamilton →