The 67th Festival de Cannes has announced that two Australian feature films have been invited in Official Selection at the prestigious film festival next month. David Michôd’s highly anticipated second feature, The Rover, will have its world premiere Out of Competition, and Charlie’s Country, from revered Australian filmmaker Rolf de Heer, has been selected for Un Certain Regard.

Screen Australia CEO Graeme Mason said, “This is an honour for two remarkable Australian filmmakers – a veteran and a tremendous next generation storyteller. It is wonderful to see both being celebrated by one of the leading film festivals of the world, Cannes, and well-deserved recognition to both.”

This is David Michôd’s first invitation to the prominent film festival, for his thriller The Rover. David’s well-received debut feature, Animal Kingdom, received 36 awards including the Grand Jury Prize, World Cinema: Dramatic at Sundance Film Festival, a first for an Australian film, and received a prestigious Academy Award® nomination for Best Performance by an Actress in a Supporting Role (Jacki Weaver).

The Rover producer Liz Watts said, “David and everyone involved with The Rover are thrilled by its world premiere at the highly prestigious Cannes Film Festival – it’s truly an honour to screen there, and a wonderful start to the movie’s journey to audiences all over the world.”

The Rover is set ten years after the downfall of the western economic system, when society is in decline, the rule of law has disintegrated and life is cheap. Eric is a cold and angry drifter who has left everything and everyone behind. When his car is stolen by a gang of desperate desert hustlers, Eric embarks on a ruthless mission to track them down. Along the way he is forced into an unlikely relationship with Rey, a naïve and injured gang member.

Writer, producer, and director David Michôd will be joined by The Rover lead cast including Guy Pearce and Robert Pattinson, along with producers Liz Watts and David Linde.

The Rover was made with financial support from Screen Australia, the South Australian Film Corporation and Screen NSW, and was produced by Porchlight Films in association with Lava Bear Films.

Returning to Cannes for the fourth time, Rolf de Heer has previously received two Palme d’Or nominations, for The Quiet Room and Dance Me to My Song, and won the Special Jury Prize, Un Certain Regard for Ten Canoes. Charlie’s Country is the long-awaited third film in Rolf’s unofficial trilogy and longstanding collaboration with Aboriginal Australian screen icon David Gulpilil, beginning with The Tracker in 2002 and followed by Ten Canoes in 2006.

Rolf said of his return to the festival, “As a great celebration of cinema, the Cannes Film Festival has historically been a wonderful launching pad into the world market for films I’ve directed. I’m consequently very pleased that Charlie’s Country has been selected, because it means the film will be seen.”

Charlie’s Country was developed, written, produced and directed by Rolf, who will attend the film’s international premiere in Cannes accompanied by co-developer/lead actor David Gulpilil, actor/producer Peter Djigirr and executive producer Sue Murray.

The story centres on the character of Charlie, played by David Gulpilil, who decides to make a stand following the new invasion of his Aboriginal community… and finds he still has a long way to fall.

Charlie’s Country is a co-production between Vertigo Productions and Bula’bula Arts Aboriginal Corporation, produced by Nils Erik Nielsen, Peter Djigirr and Rolf de Heer. The film is presented by Screen Australia and Domenico Procacci and produced in association with the South Australian Film Corporation, Larrakia Nation Aboriginal Corporation and Adelaide Film Festival.

David and Rolf will join eminent Sydney-based filmmaker Jane Campion, who will preside over the jury of the 67th Festival de Cannes, and is the only female filmmaker to have ever received Cannes’ top award, the Palme d’Or, which she won for The Piano in 1993. The Australian presence will be further emphasised with attendance by Nicole Kidman for her film Grace of Monaco, which is scheduled to open the festival, and Sam Holst, who has been selected for the Cannes Cinéfondation Résidence in Paris.

CHARLIE’S COUNTRY

Production Companies: Vertigo Productions, Bula’bula Arts Aboriginal Corporation

Devised by: David Gulpilil, Rolf de Heer

Writer/Director: Rolf de Heer

Producers: Nils Erik Nielsen, Rolf de Heer, Peter Djigirr

Executive Producers: Domenico Procacci, Bryce Menzies, Sue Murray, Troy Lum,

Peter McMahon

Australian Distributor: Entertainment One Films Australiahttp://au.eonefilms.com

Cast: David Gulpilil, Peter Djigirr, Luke Ford, Jennifer Budukpuduk, Peter

Minygululu, Bojana Novakovic

Synopsis: With the new invasion of his Aboriginal community in full swing, Charlie

decides to make a stand… and finds he still has a long way to fall.

THE ROVER

Production Companies Porchlight Films Pty Ltd in association with Lava Bear Films

LLC

Writer/Director: David Michôd

Producers: Liz Watts, David Linde, David Michôd

Executive Producers: Tory Metzger, Adam Rymer, Vincent Sheehan, Anita Sheehan,

Nina Stevenson, Glen Basner, Allison Cohen

Cast: Guy Pearce, Robert Pattinson, Scoot McNairy, David Field, Anthony Hayes,

Gillian Jones, Susan Prior

International Sales: FilmNation Entertainment

Australian Distributor: Village Roadshow

Synopsis: Ten years after a collapse of the western economic system, Australia’s

mineral resources have drawn the desperate and dangerous to its shores. With

society in decline, the rule of law has disintegrated and life is cheap. Eric (Guy

Pearce) is a cold and angry drifter who has left everything and everyone behind.

When his car – his last possession – is stolen by a gang of desperate desert hustlers,

Eric embarks on a ruthless mission to track them down. Along the way he is forced

into an unlikely relationship with Rey (Robert Pattinson), a naïve and injured

younger brother of gang member Henry (Scoot McNairy), who has left Rey behind in

the bloody aftermath of the gang’s most recent robbery. From the acclaimed director

of Animal Kingdom.

Twitter: https://twitter.com/TheRoverMovie

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/TheRoverMovie

Screen Australia – Thursday 17 April 2014

THE slashing of more than 10 per cent of the National Film and Sound Archive’s
staff has passed with relatively little comment outside Canberra.

Last week, Michael Loebenstein, chief executive of the National Film and Sound Archive of Australia, announced “a new business model and structure for the organisation” following a six-month review and consultation process.

Twenty-eight of the archive’s staff of 206 are expected to go. Loebenstein later told ABC666 Canberra that the NFSA “is not being dismantled, it’s moving forward”. He tells Reel Time: “The two key messages are we need to be able to live sustainably within our means and be able to build skills and capacities to engage in the digital environment. Existing programs such as screenings at Canberra’s Arc Cinema, exhibitions and the touring film festivals will be gradually replaced by new programs, with an increased focus on online delivery.”

He adds: “We’re not going to abolish the idea of a screening in front of a live audience” but there will be fewer screenings in Canberra as the NFSA aims to “see how we can serve the whole national footprint”.

Friends of NFSA president Ray Edmondson tell Reel Time: “It’s not a very responsible way to deal with the national memory.” He thought Loebenstein had previously “done a good job under difficult circumstances” but “the reality is all the cultural organisations have been cut year after year by the efficiency dividends. There’s no fat in them.”

Loebenstein’s statement to staff said the institution needed “to adapt the way we do business to take better advantage of technology and of our relationships with partners in industry and the community”. Essentially, the focus will be a push into the online environment and away from physical screenings and programs.

Michael Bodey – The Australian – April 16, 2014

Any list of must-watch films is likely to be so arbitrary and subjective that it buys plenty of arguments, and so it proves with the Taste of Cinema website’s selection of 20 Essential Australian Films You Need To Watch. Writer Liam Clark, a film/literature/music student in Sydney, omits everything produced before 1971 and there are many questionable choices.

His Essential 20: Strictly Ballroom (1992), Sweetie (1989), Mad Max (1979), Gallipoli (1981), Muriel’s Wedding (1994), Lantana (2001), Snowtown (2011), The Dish (2000), Candy (2006), Dogs in Space (1986), Somersault (2004), Shine (1986), The Adventures of Priscilla, Queen of the Desert (1994), Wake in Fright (1971), Samson & Delilah (2009), The Hunter (2011), Animal Kingdom (2010), Walkabout (1971), Last Ride (2009), Picnic at Hanging Rock (1975).

As the runners up he nominates: Breaker Morant, The Tree, My Brilliant Career, Sleeping Beauty, Mystery Road, Balibo, Wolf Creek, The Proposition, The Last Wave, Ten Canoes, The Loved Ones, Chopper, Bad Boy Bubby, Blessed, Beautiful Kate, The Castle, Noise, Romper Stomper and Two Hands.

So, no room for Newsfront, Rabbit-Proof Fence, Sunday, Too Far Away, Caddie, Careful, He Might Hear You, Crocodile Dundee, The Devil’s Playground, The F.J. Holden, The Getting of Wisdom, Storm Boy and numerous other fine films and documentaries.

Perhaps the most apt comment is from Michael Favelle of Odin’s Eye Entertainment: “I think most of these lists deliberately throw in a few stupid choices just to get people talking about them.”

By Don Groves INSIDEFILM [Fri 11/04/2014]

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Kelly Dolen’s John Doe: Vigilante premiered in US cinemas last Friday and was met with largely negative reviews which branded it as shrill, gory and pseudo-intellectual.

Main Street Films launched the thriller starring Battlestar Galactica’s Jamie Bamber as John Doe, a self-styled vigilante who is on trial for 33 murders, on 20 screens in California, Colorado and Arizona.

The screenplay by Stephen M. Coates follows a vigilante group called Speak for the Dead which supports Doe’s cause while he’s in prison, igniting a debate about justice versus vengeance. Lachy Hulme (Offspring, Power Games: The Packer-Murdoch Story, The Matrix Revolutions) plays a reporter who is trying to uncover the true story about Doe.

Produced by Screen Corp’s James M. Vernon and Kristy Vernon, Keith Sweitzer and David Lightfoot, the film will debut in Australia on May 1 via Monster Pictures.

“When TV’s Dexter, the serial killer who targets other killers, left the airwaves last fall, he left plenty of room for copycats,” said the Los Angeles Times critic Inkoo Kang. “Into that void strides John Doe: Vigilante, a pseudo-intellectual exercise in bombast and glorified violence. “The fatal flaw of John Doe is its focus on ideas, rather than people. The protagonist’s victims are so cartoonishly evil they might as well be twirling their moustaches before being shot in the head. John Doe’s sanctimonious speeches are equally weightless; only his self-righteous fury registers. In this case, anger speaks louder than words.”

By Don Groves INSIDEFILM [Mon 24/03/2014

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Hollywood-backed U.K. films repped 10% of world’s box office

LONDON — Pics produced in the U.K. took an 11.4% share of the global box office last year, the lowest since 2009, according to figures just released by the British Film Institute.

B.O. revenue for British films in 2013 totaled $4.1 billion compared with $5.3 billion in 2012, which repped a 15.3% share.

As in past years, the vast majority of the B.O. revenue was generated by U.K. films that were wholly or partly financed by U.S. studios, but featured U.K. cast, crew, locations, facilities, post-production and often U.K. source material. These U.S. studio-backed U.K. films repped 9.8% of the global box office, which compared with 13.4% in 2012. Nevertheless, the 2013 tally is still an impressive figure, and testament to the allure of U.K. facilities, crews and tax credit for Hollywood producers.

Independent British films took a 1.6% share of global B.O. in 2013 compared with 1.8% in 2012.

The highest earning pic at the global B.O. to qualify as British was “Fast & Furious 6” with $789 million, followed by “Gravity” with $708 million, and “Thor: The Dark World” with $641 million.

The highest grossing independent U.K. film was “Red 2” with $148 million, followed by “Rush” with $90 million, and “Philomena” with $89 million.

U.K. films had an 11.9% share of the market in U.S./Canada, 5.7% in Japan, 11% in Korea, 9.9% in France, 9.6% in Germany, and 14.6% in Australia.

Leo Barraclough – Variety – MARCH 21, 2014

The rise of the digital economy threatens the very bedrock of both the publishing and the movie industries – the blockbuster.

Forty years after Jaws set box-office records, high-grossing, event-style blockbusters have cemented their place as the essential success strategy for movie studios. In today’s crowded entertainment market, film producers must rise above the noise to win. Pursuing safer movie bets is a recipe for lifting sagging profits.

These are the conclusions of Harvard academic Anita Elberse’s book, Blockbusters: Hit-making, Risk-taking, and the Big Business of Entertainment. The dynamics of blockbusters hold true not just for movies, she writes, but for publishing, recording labels, sports franchises and television networks.

Yet the ever-growing sea of entertainment choices – much of it distributed online, much of it cheaper, if not free – raises the question of ”whether digital technology will spell the end of blockbusters” and with it the dominance of the strategy. So far, the biggest victims of the new technology have been the middle rungs of the entertainment business, leaving a ”winner-take-all” market littered with thousands of ”also-rans” in film, acting, books and music.

Tom Cruise reportedly earned $US70 ($77.5 million) from the first Mission: Impossible, while two-thirds of American actors make less than $US1000 a year. Of the 8 million unique tracks sold on Apple’s iTunes in 2011, 102 tracks sold more than 1 million units each, but 94 per cent sold fewer than 100 units. Nearly one-third sold only one unit each.

Now, tech-fuelled change threatens the industry’s very structure. Promotions for Lady Gaga’s 2011 Born This Way album, for example, employed a complex web of deals among companies as diverse as Amazon, Belvedere Vodka and Starbucks. The demise of retail music-store chains has made reaching a wide audience of potential fans more difficult.

Online retailers such as Amazon and Book Depository offer a millions-strong catalogue of books at prices few corner bookshops can compete with. As those outlets collapse, many of the practices of promotion and marketing in the book business have struggled too. ”The blockbuster strategy is becoming more necessary than ever, but also harder to pull off,” Elberse writes.

Films require bigger launches to break ”through the clutter” of entertainment and attract people to theatres, as attendance continues to fall.

While studios and publishers struggle, the big names can also enjoy new powers: British band Radiohead offered its album In Rainbows directly to fans at whatever price they thought fair, without a record company’s help. Comedian Louis C. K. has done a similar direct-to-fan sale of a performance.

Less well-known bands routinely give away music online to build audiences who will pay for concerts – the opposite of the old model, when bands toured to sell more albums. That would seem to be a significant change in the business, and it matches the broader shift from a manufacturing-based economy to a service-based economy in places such as the US and Australia. It is a shame Elberse does not note credible studies showing revenue from concerts rising, even as recording sales sink.

Elberse does acknowledge the cultural downside of the blockbuster strategy. ”Nine of the top-selling movies in 2011 were sequels to major franchises, and the 10th, Thor, was based on a comic-book character.”

In publishing, the focus on bestsellers has spelt the ”death of the mid-list”, the market for books selling moderately well, which once provided a living for many authors, she says.

Elberse quotes a music label manager saying: ”The great artists and the bad artists are easy – it is the good artists that can kill you,” because with good artists, it is not clear when to stop backing them.

Before the emergence of the blockbuster strategy in the 1970s, audiences had grown bored with movie offerings and distracted by TV. Hollywood was looking for a new success model and the video cassette recorder further dampened movie attendance.

Blockbusters such as Jaws and Star Wars gave the movie industry a new life, as studios sold stories as a special event to draw audiences back to the cinema.

Today, technology is changing viewers’ tastes and, once again, reshaping the expectations of the public. This book offers a snapshot of a four-decade-old strategy that may be in its twilight. What emerges next, no one can say.

Chris Zappone – SMH – March 22, 2014