Schuyler Weiss accepts the AACTA Award for Best Film during the 2022 AACTA Awards. (Photo by James Gourley/Getty Images for AFI)
A five-day festival will accompany next February’s AACTA Awards on the Gold Coast, with the dates for the 2024 ceremonies now confirmed.
Spanning February 7-11, the “celebration of film, TV, streaming, music, and digital content” will include a day devoted exclusively to First Nations content and creatives, networking hubs, and a Screen Careers Expo for those curious about pursuing a career in film or television.
The events will coincide with the AACTA Industry Awards on February 8 and the main ceremony on February 10, both of which will take place at the Home of the Arts (HOTA).
AACTA CEO Damian Trewhella said the academy looked forward to bringing the industry on the Gold Coast to celebrate the achievements of filmmakers, storytellers, and screen practitioners.
“It’s been an exciting year for the Australian screen industry with an abundance of original and innovative productions growing loyal fanbases here and increasingly engaging massive audiences overseas,” he said.
“As we approach the next AACTA Awards, the excitement is palpable.”
Screen Queensland CEO, Jacqui Feeney said the accompanying festival was an opportunity for local practitioners to connect with their peers and become closer to a “dynamic and creative industry that employs so many local people”.
“Screen Queensland looks forward to welcoming the wider screen sector to the Gold Coast in February — to the state’s most vibrant screen production location and the ideal place to celebrate excellence in our industry,” she said.
Tickets for the awards and festival events will go on sale in November to coincide with the announcement of the full program of activity.
The nominees will be announced in early December. Find out more information about the 2024 awards here.
L to R, T to B: Dylan River, Bonnie Moir, Nicholas Verso, Lucy Coleman.
Stan has followed Netflix in announcing an expansion of its drama slate, with the Nine-owned streamer to work with Ludo Studios, Feisty Dame Productions, and Thirdborn on a trio of new series.
Ludo Studio will make eight-part road series Thou Shalt Not Steal, to be directed by Dylan River, while Thirdborn is producing coastal mystery thriller Exposure, and Feisty Dame Productions is preparing to shoot Invisible Boys in Western Australia.
Adapted from WA author Holden Sheppard’s book of the same name, Invisible Boys is a ten-part drama that explores the challenges faced by a group of gay teens in Geraldton, after one of them is outed on social media following an encounter with a married man. As they form a tight-knit friendship, the boys find solace and support in one another, exploring their desires and identities in a world that often renders them invisible.
The novel was awarded the 2019 WA Premier’s Prize for an Emerging Writer, the 2019 Kathleen Mitchell Award, and the 2018 City of Fremantle TAG Hungerford Award.
It was optioned by Crazy Fun Park creator Nicholas Verso and Feisty Dame Productions’ Tania Chambers in 2020, with the project going to receive support from Screen Australia’s Generate fund the following year.
Stan commissioned the series as part of a joint initiative with Screenwest designed to foster local talent and spark the development of new series in WA by providing funding of up to $20,000. The production is being supported through Screenwest, Lotterywest, and the WA Regional Screen Fund, with Banijay Rights to handle international distribution.
Verso penned the episodes alongside Sheppard, Enoch Mailangi, Allan Clarke, and Declan Greene, and will also produce with Chambers.
Tania Chambers (left) and Nicholas Verso.
He said it had been a “dream” creating the series for Stan, who had “shown such a strong commitment to quality Australian and LGBTQIA+ storytelling”.
We’ve had a blast in the writers’ room, diving deeply into this world and expanding upon the characters and themes of the book with all its love, heartbreak, confusion, messiness, and joy,” he said.
“I can’t wait to be back on set in Western Australia, bringing the story to life with the wonderful creative team.”
Chambers also paid tribute to the streamer, as well as the other financing partners, for supporting the series, which she and Verso “to resonate strongly with audiences in Australia and across the world”.
Stan will head to South Australia and the Northern Territory for Thou Shalt Not Steal, a 1980s-set story that follows young Aboriginal delinquent Robyn, who escapes detention and reluctantly teams up with awkward teenager Gidge as she searches for the truth behind a mysterious family secret.
The pair begin a perilous journey across the Australian Outback, pursued by Maxine, a sex trafficker whose taxi Robyn stole, and Gidge’s domineering father, a fraudulent preacher called Robert.
The series is executive produced by Ludo’s Charlie Aspinwall and Daley Pearson, alongside producer Sam Moor, and received production investment from Screen Australia with support from the South Australian Film Corporation, Screen Territory, and Screen Queensland’s Post, Digital and Visual Effects (PDV) Incentive.
Like Thou Shalt Not Steal, Exposure also has its share of mystery, with the story centred on Jaco Gould, a photographer who, following the death of her best friend, returns to her hometown to discover the hidden secrets of their relationship and the truth behind the tragedy.
Lucy Coleman is the writer and creator, with Bonnie Moir directing and Thirdborn’s Nicole O’Donohue producing with Justin Kurzel and Shaun Grant. The six-part NSW-set series, which All3Media will distribute, has received significant investment from Screen Australia, with support from Screen NSW.
Speaking about the slate announcement, Stan chief content officer Cailah Scobie said the programs are representative of the streamer’s entire slate.
“These unique dramas have attracted prestigious international partners – DCD Rights, All3Media International and Banijay Rights – signifying the global reach and relevance of Stan Original content,” she said.
“We are thankful to the Australian writers, directors, producers and filmmakers involved in the projects, and the ongoing support of Screen Australia, alongside our other key partners Screen NSW, Screenwest, Lotterywest, the WA Regional Screen Fund, Screen Territory and the South Australian Film Corporation.”
With the writers strike in the US now entering its third week, writer and script producer Blake Ayshford reflects on the parallel and different issues facing writers working in Australia, arguing our system means small rooms, short weeks for plotting and narrow career paths for newer writers are already the norm.
What the writers strike in the US really boils down to is an attempt to bring the ‘gig’ economy to one of the few areas of writing that still had something of a career structure built into it. Australian TV is already the gig economy let rip, and you really wouldn’t wish that on anyone else.
A newer writer I know, who is going back to uni to retrain, recently told me that a generation of Australian writers are walking away from the industry as they see no path for them here. How depressing. It was always a tricky, uncertain path, and no one guaranteed you a career, but to feel like you have no future…
Before the early 2010s, TV in Australia was mainly produced ‘in house’ by a staff of writers. As far as I know – I only started in around 2006 – we never had the big staff of US shows and relied on a patchwork of ‘staff writers’ (an in-house script producer and four-six script editors) who were augmented by freelancers that came in every week to write the episodes. The staff writers were a core of (generally younger) writers who worked exclusively on the show, understood it, and went through the creation of an episode from story meeting, to scene breakdown, to first and second drafts, then read throughs and directors meeting. These in-house script editors were also ‘on set’ for their episodes, to watch some of the filming and respond to crew and director questions. This is still the model on Home and Away, for instance.
I was one of those script editors on Home and Away and later, All Saints. We were never in the edit, or grade, or sound (as they are in US) but we participated in most of the other aspects of making a drama. After I’d been in almost 50 story conferences I had the confidence that I understood how a ‘room’ worked and how to make the most useful contribution to it as a freelancer, and had the skills I needed when I had to run a story conference myself.
Once the length of series dropped from 44, 22 or even 13, to eight and six, there was no need to employ a staff. There weren’t enough episodes to justify the cost of keeping a staff. Instead, freelance episode writers joined together for short weeks, plotted together, and then went away and wrote episodes. Sort of resembling what the ‘mini-room’ situation that is happening now in the US is like, and is part of what the strike is about.
There was still a script producer, who generally maintained story continuity and tone, and was a backstop in case an episode didn’t meet expectations for whatever reason. The first ‘room’ I was in was for Foxtel’s Love My Way, and it was a thrilling, if still unusual way of doing things back then. Now it is the standard here and is becoming the case in UK.
So what have we ‘lost’ that the US still has? Surely shorter episode run shows means more shows, which means more chances for new writers?
Well, not exactly. One of the unexpected situations that arose from changing from the staff model to the ‘band of freelancers’ model, was previously a writer on All Saints, for instance – generally a more experienced one – would have their time ‘bought’ by a show. There was enough work promised to them over the course of a year that they didn’t have to go out and do a lot of other work. It wasn’t forbidden, but the regularity of paycheck and deadlines meant the All Saints writers weren’t around as much in the wider writing world.
But now, with small episode runs, experienced writers must pitch to be involved in as many projects as they can handle to make ends meet. These experienced writers are directly competing with mid-tier and beginning writers in a way they weren’t so much before. Producers naturally want to secure the best talent they can and so welcome more experienced writers. It’s a bigger risk taking on someone new; as much as most of the producers I know want to welcome new and diverse talent, with more shows in development than actually go into production, it’s natural you would try to minimise risk if you can. This is not only for production companies but networks and broadcasters.
So newer writers have a very narrow path in the current system. But worse than that, because the ’staff writer’ role doesn’t exist, when newer writers are given one of the rare opportunities, they often don’t have the craft skills of the more experienced, which come from having years of experience. And while many succeed out of talent, hard work and luck, many don’t, and find their careers stalled. Or ending as soon as they have begun.
A lot of recent commentary on the US writers strike focusses on this ‘threat to training’ aspect, something I’d argue has already taken place in Australia. With smaller rooms, and shorter weeks plotting, and involvement only in the early ‘writing’ part of the process, newer writers don’t get the training to become the kind of informed showrunners that series need to compete in a super competitive market. Or they are paired with experienced writers in collaborations that are mostly great, but sometimes aren’t – and not what a newer writer needs at that stage of her career.
I feel this is why many younger writers speak about it being a ‘broken system’. Michael Schur recently commented that if staff jobs go, we’ll soon see a ‘very high and very low’ tier of screenwriting career, exacerbating what can already feel like ‘have and have nots’ industry.
What’s the answer? As producer John Edwards said, the previous system is not coming back. Broadcasters say audiences have no appetite for long-running shows.
Perhaps some kind of more formalised ‘mentorship’ between more experienced and less could be one answer – not a forced marriage, but something with clear expectations from both parties. For instance, a script producer being given a right to employ one new writer, without a veto from production company or network to ensure there is always a middle-tier writer at every script conference. A cultural shift that boosted the profile of writing as a key part of drama creation, so more resources are available to this part of the process. Or, just to contradict myself, a shift away from auteur creation – the cult of the genius showrunner – and back to all writers on a series feeling like they have credits on a show, not just on ‘their episode’. The idea that the show was bigger than any individual writer created a sense of collegiality between writers, and ability to make mistakes. But maybe I’m being nostalgic. None of these solutions, even if they worked, feel like enough.
And it’s not as if the model was perfect. The long-running series of the past were often conservative in genre, unreflective of diversity and the kind of writing they required demanded a writer submerge her writing personality within a ‘house style’, which certainly didn’t suit everyone.
But with the enormous revenues of some companies involved in the US writers strike, an investment in industry ‘R and D’ by giving staffing opportunities to the next generation, and ensuring there are new writers around to create the next generation of shows, will hopefully be seen as beneficial for all parties.
As for size of rooms. That’s changed in the last 15 years too. Writers rooms of 6-8 were not uncommon eight years ago. Now the norm is three or four. We have gone from ‘mini-rooms’ to ‘micro-rooms’!
I’ve gone on too long, but, it’s a real issue and the writers strike has provided us the chance to think more deeply about it.
Four of the six writers nominated at the recent AACTAs for best screenplay in TV had a background as a staff writer. I really don’t think this is an accident.
Pay the people what they’re worth, and protect our creatives at all costs.
Hollywood’s labor wants a fair wage. As the WGA walks the picket lines outside the major studios, demanding the studio executives meet some kind of labor agreement that protects the livelihood of all writers in Hollywood, the Directors Guild of America and SAG-AFTRA are entering negotiations on new contracts with the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers.
Similar to the WGA demands, the DGA and SAG-AFTRA are looking to strike a deal on streaming residuals. If you are curious about how much actors are currently making from streaming, check out our coverage on streaming residuals. With both contracts expiring on June 30th, there is a lot that creatives are going to fight for as the entire industry adjusts to the new landscape.
While the actors’ fight is important to the industry, it is the DGA that could help resolve the writers’ strike.
Let me explain.
When the WGA went on strike 15 years ago, the DGA went into contract negotiations, leveraging the pressure on the industry-wide lockout that was in its third month. The DGA was able to find agreements that the WGA and AMPTP couldn’t agree on. The jurisdiction over the internet and a residual formula that was then known as “new media” helped end the exploitation of movies and TV shows for directors.
The WGA used many of the same terms the DGA used in its 2008 contract, uniting and creating equality among the WGA, DGA, and SAG-AFTRA.
However, this year’s strike is different.
‘The Hudsucker Proxy’CREDIT: Warner Bros.
Could a Deal with the DGA End the Writers’ Strike?
According to Variety, WGA members met on May 6th, 2023, and were told by union leaders that they should not expect a repeat of 2008 even if the DGA reaches an agreement.
The reason why is simple: the WGA and DGA have very different agendas. Many of the issues the DGA is facing do not address the concerns of the WGA. This year, the DGA is focused on getting a better deal on international streaming residuals.
“The bigger the SVOD platform domestically, the higher the residual,” the guild stated. “However, under our current formula, no matter how many millions of global subscribers a service might have, the Studios only pay you a fraction of the domestic residual to compensate you for all of the global audiences that enjoy your work. This effectively cuts you out of your fair share of the worldwide distribution and success of your work abroad.”
Variety reports that AMPTP president Carol Lombardini has already made an offer to writers on that issue, which could be a launching point for the DGA’s negotiations.
“If I were in Carol’s shoes, I’d say ‘Let’s do DGA,’” said John McLean, former CBS labor relations executive, and a former WGA executive director. “If we can give them something in international, you go to the actors and then make a deal with them. That does put the Writers Guild in a tough spot.”
However, the DGA and SAG-AFTRA have gone out of their way to express solidarity with the writers, with the DGA’s Jon Avnet appearing on stage with WGA leaders at a unity rally on May 3rd.
You might be wondering what would happen if the DGA went on strike, which is something we’ve been thinking a lot about, too. A DGA strike could shutter all scripted productions immediately – including film and TV – which could give writers more leverage. The likelihood of this strike happening is unlikely, with the DGA striking only once in 1987 for three hours and five minutes on the East Coast and just twelve minutes on the West Coast.
With the DGA’s unity and solidarity with the WGA, I hope that the DGA uses its leverage in the industry to push for fair rights across the board for all creatives. The DGA should always put their guild-specific issues first, like on-set safety, diversity, and protecting directors’ creative control, but aiding other creatives who are essential pieces to creating entertainment and media should be supported at all times.
“I think they understand that all of labor has to stand up and fight against these companies that really do want to minimize us as much as possible,” Ellen Stutzman, the WGA’s chief negotiator, told Variety while picketing outside Netflix in Hollywood on May 8. “And the fact is, they can’t make the content without any of us or all of us.”
This is the summer of strikes. Whether the DGA or SAG-AFTRA strike is up to the people who control the wealth of the industry. We creatives just want a fair slice of the pie so we can live and create work that inspires and protects the next generation of filmmakers like you.
New documentary uses hundreds of clips to show how even the most acclaimed classics of cinema have encouraged a culture of sexual harassment of women
Anna Smith The Guardian Fri 21 Apr 2023 19.00 AEST
“I get letters every day from people around the world, saying, ‘Oh my God, thank you for making this’,” says Nina Menkes. “But one woman told me, ‘You’ve ruined all my favourite films’.”
Menkes is the director of Brainwashed: Sex-Camera-Power, a documentary arguing that even the most acclaimed classics of cinema have encouraged a culture of sexual harassment of women. Using hundreds of clips, Menkes shows how female characters are consistently framed as the object by the male subject.
We see sex scenes full of fragmented female bodies, shown part by part. Women’s behinds being ogled by the leading man. Endless passive, even unconscious objectified women. At the movies, sexualisation doesn’t always stop once you’ve breathed your last.
‘I’m dead in bed, and the camera goes slowly down my body’ … Rosanna Arquette with Griffin Dunne in After Hours. Photograph: United Archives GmbH/Alamy
“I’m dead in bed,” says Rosanna Arquette of her role in Martin Scorsese’s After Hours, “and the camera goes slowly down my body. I look back on that now and go wow, what was I [thinking]? … It was just part of what you did.”
I host a feminist film podcast, and I’m also a fan of Blade Runner – which can be hard to reconcile. There’s a scene in which Harrison Ford aggressively refuses to accept Rachael turning down his advances. She eventually relents, soundtracked by Vangelis’ seductive Love Theme. This is just one of the myriad examples Menkes came across of a lack of consent being brushed off, or even glamourised. Their cumulative influence on “rape culture” is less easy to dismiss.
“Everybody knows that women tend to be objectified in advertisements and music videos,” says Menkes. Less well known is its ubiquity in the canon. “The great directors that everyone reveres. These films that many people consider to be their favourites reinforce a way of seeing women that’s detrimental to our lives.”
‘Power structures can be corrupt’ … Nina Menkes. Photograph: Ann Johansson
Talking heads analyse the effects of such imagery, from academics such as Laura Mulvey to directors including Julie Dash and Catherine Hardwicke. The absence of white, male, heterosexual speakers was accidental, says Menkes. “We were kind of shocked because it was not our plan.”
Menkes does include discussions with a mixed group of film students, one a young man who says he now realises how much movies have trained him to treat women. “It makes us think we can just have whichever one we want.” Major male directors are absent. “We reached out to a lot of the big directors whose clips we included, including Scorsese and Spike Lee,” says Menkes. “Denis Villeneuve, because we use his clips quite a few times. And we got the brush off.‘Busy, sorry’. Without trying, we ended up with a group of people who were very powerfully reinforcing the message.”
Yet Menkes also uses incriminating examples of objectification from films by female directors – from Sofia Coppola’s Lost in Translation to Julia Ducournau’s Titane. “Patriarchy has no gender,” says Menkes. “We’re not saying, if you have a male body, you make this kind of movie. It doesn’t break down like that.”
Menkes took suggestions for films to include from her students. One felt Magic Mike – with audiences encouraged to ogle an oiled-up Channing Tatum et al – was a good reverse example. “So I went back to check it and it supports my thesis. When men are sexualised, they are sexualised completely differently, as subjects.”
Menkes was raised in California, by Jewish parents who had fled Europe as children. “It’s in my family, this idea that power structures can be corrupt,” she says. “You don’t have to bow down to existing laws, as those laws might be corrupt.”
Her mother encouraged Nina to examine her own relationship with gender. “I remember when I was 15 or something, I came home and I was like: ‘Oh, Mom, guess what? David told me that I’m the most wonderful woman in the world and he really likes me!’ And I was all excited. And she said, ‘OK, but do you think he’s the most wonderful man in the world?’ I never forgot that. It was such a shock. It was like: ‘Oh, what do I think?’”
Brainwashed: Sex-Camera-Power is in UK and Irish cinemas on 12 May. Nina Menkes is in conversation at BFI Southbank on 10 May as part of the film season Cinematic Sorceress: The Films of Nina Menkes running 6-31 May.
(Top L to R): Jane Allen, Judi McCrossin, Kodie Bedford (Bottom L to R): Sam Meikle, Suzie Miller, Tommy Murphy
Screen Australia and the Australian Writers’ Guild have today announced the six participants selected for The Creators, a dynamic career acceleration program for high-calibre Australian screenwriters to hone their skills and further develop a slate of premium Australian television.
Established to support the creative and professional growth of Australian writers in an increasingly global screen market, The Creators will see the group travel to Los Angeles in May 2023 to attend Content LA and to participate in tailored project and pitching development and networking opportunities to sell their stories in domestic and international markets.
The cohort of experienced writers and creators will receive high-level training from international industry leader Jeff Melvoin (Killing Eve, Northern Exposure, Remington Steele), founder and Chair of the highly-competitive Writers Guild of America’s Showrunner Training Program, and pitching training from writer, director and executive producer Jeff Greenstein (Will and Grace, Friends, Desperate Housewives).
Screen Australia’s Head of Content Grainne Brunsdon said, “These writers are at the top of their game and we’re pleased to support them in the creation of their own projects with the opportunity to hone their craft, learn from the US industry and bring their skills back to Australia. We know Australian stories travel well and this program will make sure these creatives are best placed to take their distinct homegrown projects to audiences here and around the world.”
AWG President Shane Brennan said, “The Australian Writers’ Guild is delighted to support these six outstanding writers in the next stage of their careers – developing their industry expertise and networks to create a slate of premium Australian stories for local and global audiences. We see this as a game-changer in the Australian industry, and with local content quotas on streamers coming soon, this program will ensure Australia has talented creators and showrunners ready to meet demand.”
Sam Meikle, co-showrunner on Wakefield and co-creator of MaveriX, said, “The Creators is next-level training for the next frontier in Australian television storytelling – showrunning. We’re just beginning to truly embrace the model here and I’m thrilled to have the chance to learn, expand my skills, and bring that knowledge home to share with other writers and creators. This program is opening the door to a massive leap forward for all of us.”
Suzie Miller, whose Olivier-nominated play Prima Facie opens on Broadway next month, said, “The AWG and Screen Australia have thoughtfully put together a thoroughly exciting program that allows writers to truly ‘go global’ and to have the opportunity to work alongside professionals who invented and refined showrunning as a writer model. The hope is that we can all bring in more of the incredible writing, directing and acting talent of the film and TV community in Australia to work on such projects.”
Kodie Bedford, award winning-playwright of Cursed! and series including Mystery Road, Firebite and All My Friends Are Racist, said, “I remember when I was 15 and told my mum that I was going to be a showrunner after being inspired by Buffy, so to be selected for this specialised program where I get to learn showrunning and pitching skills from Hollywood’s best is absolutely a dream come true. But also, to bring back and share the skills I learn to the Australian industry, where more writers are wanting to take ownership of their own ideas, is something I’m quite excited about.”
Judi McCrossin, co-creator of The Time of Our Lives, creator for television of The Wrong Girl and writer on TheSecret Life of Us, said, “Showrunners aren’t just storytellers. They have both financial and creative authority over all departments. They keep the show running. Empowering Australian writers with showrunning skills gives them the ability to tell their stories the way they want them to be told. And Australian TV will be better for it.”
Tommy Murphy, creator of Significant Others and Holding the Man, said “I am humbled to be among the six chosen TV Creators who will learn from international industry leaders and from each other. We will be challenged to create ideas for television that are bold and new. For me, that means seeking out stories about queer characters in a rapidly changing world. I am fascinated to connect with collaborators and mentors who are answering that task abroad.”
Jane Allen, lead writer on Janet King and writer on Troppo and Cleverman, said, “It’s a unique opportunity to learn from such experienced American practitioners alongside this ridiculously talented group of fellow writers. I look forward to returning with pencils and skills sharpened, ready to put into practice all I’ve learned. What a word nerd fest this will be.”
The Creators is supported by industry partners Australians in Film and Scripted Ink.
If you can tell a story in the pub, you can write a film script: You just need to know the techniques.
So says Master and Commander, Happy Feet, Tanna and Hotel Mumbai scribe John Collee, who is emphatic that there is no “dark magic” to screenwriting. It’s a craft that can be learned like cinematography or directing. He even compares it to furniture making or architecture.
“I don’t think there’s any such thing as a born storyteller. Everyone tells stories. It’s in our DNA,” he tells IF.
Collee argues that for too long, Australia has undervalued culturally the role of the writer, particularly compared to the US and UK industries.
“It’s become a real gap in the Australian film and TV making picture,” Collee says, arguing screenwriting is not taught properly in this country.
“Traditionally Australian writing has just been, ‘Write a short film, then write a long film and see how you go by trial and error’. Even Peter Weir, the first director who I started working with, said he had no education in film writing. He went back to study film of his own volition after he’d made his first couple of movies, just to work out how it was done.
“I don’t think it’s been examined much in Australia, and obviously needs to be when you have a pipeline like Netflix and you want to start making a lot of local content. In the Writers’ Guild we’re lobbying Netflix quite hard to have an Australian content mandate in Australia, for Australian stories. But then you need to define what an Australian story is, and then you also need to teach people how to write.”
The Scottish-born screenwriter, novelist, journalist and former doctor tutored emerging writers via Netflix’s Grow Creative program late last year. Working with younger writers is something he is passionate about; he gives a lecture on writing for Hollywood at AFTRS annually and 20-minute version of much of his advice is up on Screen Australia’s YouTube channel.
Collee finds it inspiring to hear feedback from emerging writers, as it helps to examine the practice of writing and remind him why he does what he does.
“If you do a job all the time, then you, despite yourself, start to take shortcuts. You need to actually keep going back and reminding yourself why this is ‘this’.”
He also continues to work with directors at all stages of their careers. He recently penned short film The Story of Lee Ping, directed by Jasmin Tarasin, intended as a proof-of-concept for a larger feature. Following on from Hotel Mumbai, he wrote with Dev Patel and Tilda Cobham-Hervey short Roborovski, which the pair directed.
Of younger directors, Collee said: “I love their enthusiasm. They’re out there making stuff. The barriers to entry are very small now.
“You can actually now, with your iPhone, go off to some exotic place and shoot something that interests you. I love the freedom of that. In fact, a lot of big shot directors I know love it as well; they long to break free from all the hardware and money stuff. You actually don’t need that anymore. I’m longing for there to be a punk revolution where everyone gets that; people learn how to do filmic storytelling and just go off and do it.”
The Grow Creative workshops are an extension of Collee’s relationship with Netflix, having written upcoming Australian drama, Boy Swallows Universe, based on Trent Dalton’s semi-autobiographical bestseller.
He readily admits his review was his pitch to Dalton to adapt the book into a screenplay.
It seems to have worked: Collee has written all eight episodes of the series. His partners from the Hopscotch Features days, producers Troy Lum and Andrew Mason of Brouhaha Entertainment, produce.
The Boy Swallows Universe cast carries a hefty list of names: Travis Fimmel, Simon Baker, Phoebe Tonkin, Bryan Brown and Anthony LaPaglia, with Felix Cameron in the lead as Eli Bell.
Travis Fimmel (second from right) on the ‘Boy Swallows Universe’ set.
At the heart of its story, Collee says, is “parents fucking up”.
“You don’t definitely have to write about what you know. You have to write about what you feel.
“If you’ve raised kids, as I have – my wife and I, our children are all grown up, they’re in their 20s, but you always feel, ‘Oh my God, I’m not equipped for this. I’m doing it really badly, I’m making all these mistakes’. And there’s something so touching about all of the adults in Trent’s book; he writes with such affection about his parents who are complete dropkicks as human beings.The first father is a heroin addict, the second father is an alcoholic, and the mother, there’s all kinds of anxiety issues. They’re all over the place. And somehow they create this loving family just by virtue of the fact they adore their children. That’s really what sucked me into it.
“But also I’d become so tired of Aussie crime drama, which a) glorifies crime and b) sees a virtue in grunginess. When I was working in development at Hopscotch, I kept saying to Troy and Andrew, ‘Anything but grungy Aussie crime drama’. It seems to me that Australians equate being nasty to each other with drama. That’s the simplest way to create drama, dramatic scenes, to have to have people being horrible. Actually, being nice to each other is really dramatic as well. It’s actually dramatic in a better way.
“So a book that actually took that trope of grungy Aussie crime drama about alcoholics and drug addicts and people living on the edge, and then turned it around so that it was magical and heartwarming and inspiring –I thought was just a really new kind of Australian literature, I really did.”
Like most screenwriters, Collee has a back catalogue of films that haven’t quite gotten across the line. However, in proof that not all that goes in the bottom drawer is lost, a film Collee wrote 25 years ago, The Return, has just gotten up with Ralph Fiennes and Juliette Binoche to star. Directed by Uberto Pasolini and co-written with Edward Bond, it is a retelling of Odysseus’ return home from war.
Collee has several other projects on the go, including the tentatively titled The Light Fantastic, based on Mani Bhaumik’s autobiography, Code Name God. Bhuamik, an Indian billionaire, grew up in poverty and went on to become a quantum physicist in America; his book deals with the link between science and spirituality.
Working with Collee on that project is director Jon Amiel, whom he previously worked on 2009’s Creation, and producer Jomon Thomas, whom he worked with on Hotel Mumbai.
After Hotel Mumbai, Collee was also hired by Middle East and North African media conglomerate MBC Group to write a project about a riot in Mecca, which he is currently researching, and still boiling away in the background is Phillip Noyce’s Rats of Tobruk, inspired by the director’s father and the Allied forces that held the Libyan port of Tobruk against the Afrika Corps in 1941.
What excites Collee at this stage of his career?
“The kind of thing that brings you into a world you didn’t know about,” he says.
“I see every film as a philosophical enquiry. The theme of it has to be personal to you, but what I’ve discovered is that in any story, you can insert a theme that is personal into it, and then that’s what gets you going.”
Writer-director Noora Niasari’s Shayda has been hailed by reviewers at the Sundance Film Festival as a powerful, gripping and affecting debut.
Shayda premiered over the weekend in Sundance’s World Cinema Dramatic Competition, with critics making special mention of the performances of lead actress Zar Amir-Ebrahimi, who won best actress at last year’s Cannes for Holy Spider, Osamah Sami, and young newcomer Selina Zahednia.
Inspired by Niasari’s own childhood, Shayda is set in 1995 and follows a young Iranian mother (Amir-Ebrahimi in the titular role) who finds refuge with her six-year-old daughter Mona (Zahednia) in an Australian women’s shelter during the two weeks of Iranian New Year (Nowrooz).
Aided by the strong community of women at the refuge, they seek their freedom in this new world of possibilities, only to find themselves facing the violence they tried so hard to escape – namely Hossein, Shayda’s domineering and abusive husband (Sami), who seeks to be reunited with his daughter.
Vincent Sheehan produced Shayda through his new production venture Origma 45, with Dirty Films’ Cate Blanchett, Andrew Upton and Coco Francini the execuitve producers.
Writing for Screen Daily, Tim Grierson said that strong reviews, Blanchett as an EP, and the growing global awareness of the women’s rights movement in Iran “should help spark interest” in the Australian drama.
He noted a “palpable sense of dread hangs heavy over the film”, as the audience waits for the inevitable moment that Shayda’s husband will seek to separate her from her child.
“A story like this could lend itself to manipulative melodrama, but Niasari gives the material a pared-down simplicity, resisting big emotional twists or forced dramatic stakes. The muted approach only adds to the taut mood: Shayda is such a vivid presence that we keep fearing the moment when her resilient buoyancy may be destroyed by Hossein,” he wrote.
“Shayda is a tale of a woman who chooses hope over fear, which is all the more inspiring because the film shows us the many reasons why she should be afraid.”
In Variety, Tomris Laffly praised Ebrahimi’s “deceptively simple, even regal” performance, as she conveys her character’s “internalized battles through understated moments with nothing more than a delicate look or a pregnant silence.”
“Equally impressive are Zahednia as the wordlessly traumatized Mona — Niasari clearly has a special way with child actors — and Sami, a villain both blood-curdling and disturbingly familiar. The greatest asset of Shayda, however, is its unmistakably feminine spirit of perseverance, one that runs wild and free in this promising debut,” she wrote.
While conceding the film may skew towards the predictable at times, Laffly counters that this is as “the male abuser’s playbook is often predictable too”. She described Niasari’s filmmaking style as carrying “traces of a documentarian’s off-the-cuff alertness, braiding it with qualities akin to a thriller”.
“Through DP Sherwin Akbarzadeh’s fluid and immersive camera movements, the film’s opening is a perfect example of this verité-style intensity,” she wrote.
In The Hollywood Reporter, Shari Linden similarly commended the “quiet ferocity” of Amir-Ebrahimi’s performance and her chemistry with Zahednia.
“Amir Ebrahimi…. [is] quietly riveting, embodying a refusal to retreat into prescribed roles. And Sami, in what might have been a merely thankless, one-note part, makes the sanctimonious Hossein both monstrous and pathetic, overwhelmed by the threat he perceives in Shayda’s strength,” she wrote.
Linden also praised Niasari and Akbarzadeh’s collaboration, and the editing of Elika Rezaee.
“Throughout the film, Niasari and cinematographer Sherwin Akbarzadeh move the action between a realm of the secretive and fraught and one of brightness and play,” she wrote.
Shayda received major production investment from Screen Australia in association with The 51 Fund and was financed with support from VicScreen and the Melbourne International Film Festival Premiere Fund.
Executive producers from the 51 Fund, which provides financing to feature films of any genre that are directed by women, include Caitlin Gold, Lindsay Lanzillotta, Naomi McDougall Jones, Lois Scott, and Nivedita Kulkarni.
In Australia, an Iranian immigrant fights for her life and her daughter in Noora Niasari’s powerful, semi-autobiographical debut
SOURCE: SUNDANCE FILM FESTIVAL
‘SHAYDA’
Dir/scr: Noora Niasari. Australia. 2023. 117mins
Making her feature debut, writer-director Noora Niasari has crafted a gripping drama about one Iranian woman’s struggle to extricate herself from her husband — an ordeal that could also mean losing her daughter. Named for its weary but resilient protagonist, Shayda is inspired by Niasari’s own childhood and stars Zar Amir Ebrahimi as a mother hiding out in a women’s shelter in Australia as she attempts to remake her life and process the abuse she endured in her marriage. A palpable sense of dread hangs heavy over the film, the audience bracing for the inevitable moment that her domineering husband tries to separate her from her child.
Amir Ebrahimi gives a remarkable performance that’s a smart mixture of fiery and openhearted
Shayda premieres in Sundance’s World Cinema Dramatic Competition, its theatrical prospects bolstered by the presence of Amir Ebrahimi, who won Best Actress at last year’s Cannes for Holy Spider. Cate Blanchett serves as an executive producer, and strong reviews — not to mention the growing global awareness of the women’s rights movement in Iran — should help spark interest.
The story takes place in 1995, when Shayda (Amir Ebrahimi) is raising six-year-old Mona (Selina Zahednia), her loving, ebullient parenting style belying the anxiety underneath her warm smile. She has moved to Australia with her husband Hossein (Osamah Sami), but his abuse— including rape — has driven her to seek refuge in an undisclosed women’s shelter as she seeks to divorce him. But Hossein has been permitted visitation rights with Mona, and he fully intends to bring their daughter back with him to Iran.
Home movies of a young Niasari during the end credits signal the semi-autobiographical nature of the material: like Mona, the writer-director grew up in Australia after being born in Tehran. (Shayda is dedicated to “my mother and the brave women of Iran”.) And while the film isn’t quite a thriller, viewers will feel the lingering unease surrounding Shayda, who must contend with a nearly impossible set of circumstances. Refusing to let her husband know where she now lives, she grapples with the constant uncertainty of what might happen if the location of the women’s shelter is compromised. (The appearance of a mysterious car stationed outside the house is enough to make Shayda and the other residents nervous.) But there’s also Shayda’s thorny legal situation: as the bullying Hossein puts it, “You can’t stay here, get your divorce and keep the child.” Will Shayda have to choose between her freedom and Mona?
Amir Ebrahimi gives a remarkable performance that’s a smart mixture of fiery and openhearted. The film never lets us forget that although Shayda is mindful of the danger she faces from her violent husband, she isn’t willing to cower from life. After all, by rejecting customs like wearing a hijab, Shayda has already separated herself from an old existence she no longer desires. Shayda nicely balances the character’s understandable worry with a thirst to live — which includes the possibility of a new romantic relationship with sensitive, handsome Farhad (Mojean Aria), who is not aware that she is still married.
Occasionally, Shayda meets Hossein at a mall so he can pick up Mona, and Sami is convincing as this conniving husband, who schemes to turn his daughter against Shayda while trying to determine if his wife is dating anyone. But it’s not just Hossein applying pressure on Shayda: her own mother, still living in Iran, calls to tell Shayda to forgive him, insisting that’s he a good man. In the Iranian community in which she finds herself in Australia, Shayda encounters plenty of patriarchal attitudes about marriage – a tension that will come to a head near the film’s end when Hossein confronts her in public.
A story like this could lend itself to manipulative melodrama, but Niasari gives the material a pared-down simplicity, resisting big emotional twists or forced dramatic stakes. The muted approach only adds to the taut mood: Shayda is such a vivid presence that we keep fearing the moment when her resilient buoyancy may be destroyed by Hossein. But Shayda also takes time to focus on the offhand, happy moments between her and Mona, and newcomer Zahednia is endearing without being cutesy. (The child actor is especially effective once Mona starts to grasp her father’s cruelty.) Shayda is a tale of a woman who chooses hope over fear, which is all the more inspiring because the film shows us the many reasons why she should be afraid.
Five years ago, Noora Niasari asked her mother to write a memoir in order to fill in the gaps of some fuzzy childhood memories. The Iranian Australian director had been just five years old when her mother fled an abusive relationship and left her entire community to raise Niasari on her own in a foreign country.
An early draft of “Shayda,” which opens the World Cinema Dramatic Competition at Sundance on Friday, was based on that memoir and tracks Niasari’s mother’s life from her arranged marriage in Iran as a teenager to finding independence in Australia with her child. The resulting film stars “Holy Spider” breakout Zar Amir-Ebrahimi as Shayda, and Selina Zahednia as her daughter, Mona.
“There are a lot of fictional elements within the current version of the film, but it’s very much grounded in the emotional truth of our experience,” the Melbourne-based Niasari tells Variety.
Backed by Screen Australia and produced by Cate Blanchett’s Dirty Films, “Shayda” is the helmer’s first feature film and follows a number of acclaimed shorts, including “Tâm,” “17 Years and a Day” and “Simorgh.” The director says she had to work up to “Shayda,” both technically as an artist, and emotionally as a daughter who’s still processing her past trauma.
That pain, however, would only deepen in the fall when, as “Shayda” was being edited, 22-year-old Mahsa Amini died in police custody in Iran, after having been arrested by Tehran’s morality police for wearing a hijab “improperly.”
Noora Niasari (Photo courtesy of Sundance Institute)Keiran Watson-Bonnice
Amini’s death sparked a revolution in Iran, now coined the “Woman, Life, Freedom” movement, which has seen women forgoing their hijabs in public, and even destroying them in protest, only to be faced with violent and sometime deadly rebukes from the regime. More than 500 people have so far died as part of the street protests, according to the Human Rights Activists News Agency.
Niasari hopes that “Shayda” — one of three films from directors of Iranian descent that are playing at Sundance (the others are “The Persian Version” and “Joonam”) — will be a “drop in an ocean of change.” While any sort of demonstration hasn’t yet been planned for Park City, the director says industry panels will address the situation and its impact on human rights as well as filmmaking.
“I don’t see it as something that’s going to be creating a monumental shift — I’m really realistic about the situation — I just hope that it’s a way to amplify and support what’s happening in Iran.”
Read on for Niasari’s full interview.
You’ve made a number of shorts ahead of this feature. Why was this the right moment to make this film?
I didn’t feel ready. I felt we were making the shorts, documentaries, traveling, working, being in writers rooms, doing directors attachments. All of these things were stepping stones to make my feature. And at the same time, I needed to process some things in my personal life in order to be ready to make this film, because it was very challenging, emotionally and psychologically. I don’t know if I would have had the ability to do it any sooner.
When exactly did you shoot?
In July and August of 2022.
Oh, wow. So you had seen Zar in “Holy Spider” then?
Well, actually, I hadn’t. I saw the film before filming, but when I cast Zar, it was before Cannes. It was in February 2022. I was introduced to her as a potential candidate for Shayda. We searched far and wide, and I’m very grateful that I met Zar because, as soon as I saw her first audition, I just knew she epitomized the character. The duality of her vulnerability and strength really blew me away and I knew that she was Shayda.
When did Cate Blanchett and her production company come on board?
They became involved toward the end of this development stage, just before we went to market with the script. One of the producers sent the script to [Blanchett] because he’d worked on a film called “Little Fish” with her some years ago. They read the script and loved it, and then we had a Zoom meeting. They were champions of the project from then on. It’s wonderful to have her in my corner.
This is such a personal story. What did you find the most challenging in terms of the shoot?
Anything that involves the father character, Hossein, was particularly challenging. At the same time, the actor that I cast [Osamah Sami] has been a good friend for 10 years. We both live in Melbourne, and I have a lot of respect for him. He’s also very funny guy who does a lot of stand-up comedy. He has a charisma, presence, humor and lightness that I loved, and it just allowed his character to have this other side that the audience could access. He’s not just a black and white character. As an actor, he made me laugh every time I was on set, which really helped with what I was going through.
There must have been some crossover, too, between your edit on the film and the revolution in Iran, right?
The first couple of weeks of the edit is around the time when Mahsa Amini was detained and murdered by the regime. It was very difficult for my editor [who is Iranian American] and me to concentrate because we were following the news every night, not sleeping, stressed out, trying to call family and not getting through. But at the same time, we found a new motivation to finish it, to make it the best we could because Shayda’s fight is also a fight for freedom and independence, and breaking away from these cultural norms and laws that restrict her from living a life on her own terms. It gave me a renewed motivation to finish the film, because I had a depressive episode after finishing the shoot where I found it very difficult to be productive due to the emotional toll of the filming process. I needed one or two weeks off. I’d cry a lot and process, but my editor was so beautiful in creating a safe space and creating a light energy. When the revolution started in Iran, we were very unified by this situation, and we felt helpless. But in finishing the film, we found a renewed purpose.
When it’s so easy for people to turn off the news and block out what’s going on, how do you think films like yours can change perceptions of these world events? Could there be a change in the collective consciousness and how we discuss what’s happening in Iran?
In the instance of what’s happening in Iran, and the kinds of films that we’re making, it’s important to highlight a subjective, intimate experience — a personal one. One that takes you into the journey of a character, what they’re going through on a day to day basis. Because obviously with headlines and in Instagram posts, you only get a glimpse of something. My main hope for “Shayda” is that it’s a drop in this ocean of change. I don’t see it as something that’s going to be creating a monumental shift. I’m really realistic about the situation. I just hope that it’s a way to amplify and support what’s happening in Iran. I don’t think it can be more than that, but at the same time, I think that’s valuable and I’m very grateful to be able to contribute in that way.
How do you feel about the film likely being prohibited from screening in Iran?
I’ve never thought that that was very realistic. The film is not political, per se. It’s about social issues and women’s rights and women seeking freedom in the West, so I’ve never really had a hope that it would screen in Iran. One of my actors, when the revolution was happening, said, “How amazing would it be if we were able to go back one day and actually screen the film?” And that was really the first time that I had a little vision about it. It was very beautiful. But no, I’ve never had a hope that I would screen there, just because I know about all the censorship in Iran. If I was to go back today, I think I’d be in prison. I don’t think I would be allowed to leave the country because of the film and the people that I made the film with.
“Shayda” has its world premiere in Park City on Jan. 20, with additional screenings from Jan. 21-27.
