A mismatched collection of twenty somethings loiter in front of a large old house in Eveleigh, south of Sydney’s CBD. Goths, surfers, hipsters and stoners make up the group. Inside it’s shoulder-to-shoulder with revellers filling hallways and stairwells. The event is not just thrown together either – flashing lights and disco balls suggest the members of this household take their parties seriously. And the amount of drugs and alcohol circulating certainly deem the environment unsuitable for children.

Encore is on the set of Oscar-nominated Peter Templeman’s feature film debut Not Suitable For Children, starring Ryan Kwanten (True Blood, Griff the Invisible) as the lazy playboy, Jonah. Never struggling to find a bed-mate, but never settling for just one, Jonah feels his biological clock speed up when he discovers a lump on one of his testicles.

The film follows his quest to find someone to mother his child while there is still time. Helping Jonah with the cause are his flatmates, Gus and Stevie who acts as his ‘womb agent’, setting him up with girls she thinks will be a suitable ‘host’ for his unborn offspring. Producer Jodi Matterson says, “It’s a traditional romantic comedy, but in reverse as Jonah crashes through his ex-girlfriends. We think he is going to end up with the ex who is the love of his life yet we see this friendship with Stevie simmering into a relationship.”

Writer Michael Lucas began working on the script while studying at the Australian Film Television and Radio School (AFTRS) and the story is based loosely on his personal experience. After discovering a suspicious lump, Lucas made a Friday afternoon visit to the doctor.

“Over the weekend he became incredibly anxious thinking ‘what if I have testicular cancer?’ and ‘what would happen if I couldn’t have a baby?’ and he was flicking through his phone book thinking ‘who of my girlfriends would join this pact with me?’” Matterson explains. “Fortunately he found out on Monday that he was fine but the idea stuck with him.” The concept of a lead male character desperate to have a baby also struck a cord with Matterson who was interested in the role reversal within the romantic comedy formula.

While Australian filmmakers have long demonstrated a solid grasp of dramas, the rom-com is a genre yet to be cracked – with a few notable exceptions. The 90s saw the highly successful Muriel’s Wedding and more recently, Peter Helliar’s I Love You Too showed box office promise in 2010 but few other directors have attempted the format since. Matterson believes that while local filmmakers are often wary of the style, it falls well within their capabilities. “It’s very hard to make a romantic comedy in Australia because we don’t have the $40-50m budget and romantic comedy stable of stars. It comes down to script and requires real passion for the genre.” A passion Matterson says “romantic comedy junkie” Lucas has in spades.

Cast and crew

When Michel Lucas’s agent approached Matterson with the script, the plan was for Darren Ashton to direct as Matterson and Ashton had previously worked together on feature films Razzle Dazzle and Thunderstruck. Upon reading the script, they felt another director would be more suited and Ashton took on the role of executive producer instead. Matterson interviewed numerous directors before selecting up and coming Peter Templeman who cut his teeth on the set of acclaimed children’s series Lockie Leonard. Having won 38 major festival slots with a number of well-received short films and an Oscar nomination for the 2007 short The Saviour, Templeman was ready to tackle his first feature.

“The way Peter looks at the world and the sensibility he brings to it has an edge,” Matterson explains. “Matched with Michael’s script, which is quite a traditional romantic comedy, it makes for an interesting combination.” The creative team locked in, casting was the next major consideration. With established TV actors taking on their first feature roles – Ryan Corrs (Packed to the Rafters) who plays Gus, and Sarah Snook (Spirited) in the part of Stevie – securing Kwanten was a major coup.

“We were very keen to get Ryan purely on a creative level,” Matterson says. “Often the realities of film financing mean thinking about names first and then asking if they are right for the role second. We were incredibly blessed that in this situation we had someone we really wanted that also ticked all the right boxes.”

The original working title of the film was The Twentysomething Survival Guide and in the earliest drafts of the script the main characters Jonah, Gus and Stevie ran a self-help website of the same name.

“A couple of drafts in, we got rid of the website but kept the title,” says Matterson. In the website’s place, layabouts Jonah and Gus turned to throwing parties at the share house charging guests an entry fee to keep them in the lifestyle to which they are accustomed. While the basic premise remained the same, the evolution of the script called for a new name.

“We had been looking for a title for about six months when halfway through pre-production Michael came up with Not Suitable For Children. It was the first title we could all agree on,” Matterson says. With a working list comprising hundreds of titles, she admits they considered some interesting options.

The worst, Matterson says, “probably had something to do with testicles. There was a lot of Get The Ball Rolling and Balls Out”.

Party mode

Similar to the idea behind the film, the plot device of the household parties comes from Lucas’ life. Costume designer Gypsy Taylor, who has previously worked on projects including Australia, is Lucas’ real life flatmate and together they are known for throwing lavish Halloween bashes. Alongside extras dressed as punks, skaters and rockabillies, Taylor’s penchant for fancy dress is evident in the party scenes. “When I called on the extras I gave them a couple of different looks in the genres that I thought they could cover,” Taylor says. “One guy arrived with two outfits, a suit or a Trojan outfit, so we said, alright, go with the Trojan.”

Today we’re on set for one of the infamous parties. During the day the crew shoot indoors, where the colourfully attired extras crowd the hallways and over-spilling stairs. In the evening Templeman’s crew move outside to film in the backyard.

Like the partygoers, the house has plenty of character. From the outside, it could be mistaken for The Addams Family mansion, as peeling paint cracks and sheds from the clapboard exterior. Elizabeth Mary Moore, production designer says the property was perfectly dishevelled when they found it. “It was really important the house worked in every way, interior and exterior,” Moore explains. “I’ve really just had to modify the garage and paint the doors. I haven’t had to do much at all.” She describes the character’s world as more “Thai take away than two-minute noodles” suggesting a step up from university life and as Templeman rushes between rooms, crew watch monitors set amid ragged old bench tops and crockery piles that suggest years of ex-flatmates.

Production specs

With a budget of $4.5m, the film is produced by Matterson’s production company Wild Eddie. Exit Films, home to Matterson’s day job, also take credit as a partner on the film. Screen Australia and Screen NSW have come to the party, while Icon handle local distribution and Arclight the film’s international sales.

Cinematographer Lachlan Milne shot with the Arri Alexa camera and post-production is being handled by Frame Set and Match who have also invested in the project. The shoot was seven weeks long and Matterson estimates the entire production from script to screen will take four years.

Once complete, the film will face rigorous audience testing with four major screenings before several smaller sessions. After being in an edit suite for so long, Matterson says it’s easy to lose perspective on what’s funny and what’s not. “If you’re in an auditorium with an audience, you can feel where the energy dips, where they react and what they laugh at. It’s important to be in that room with people who know nothing about the film.”

The project is currently in the final stages of post and while a release date is yet to be set, the picture is due to be locked off by the end of February. With the wait to see if they have nailed it almost over, Matterson is realistic about the film’s chances.

“You can make a really great film and for whatever reason it doesn’t find an audience or you can make an average film and it’s in the right place in the right time,” she says. “We’ve had a very definite audience in mind the whole time and we’re doing everything we can to give that core demographic a film they would enjoy. We can only hope it reaches that audience, makes its money back, and beyond.”

• This feature first appeared in the relaunched print edition of Encore magazine. To subscribe, click here

FOR: Jess Harris, co-creator, writer and star of ABC2’s comedy series Twentysomething

Josh Schmidt (Twentysomething co-creator) and I wanted to get into the industry but we didn’t really know the gap between having an idea and making it a job. We knew about community station Channel 31 because our friend, Ryan Shelton, had done a show on 31 called Radio Karate. We decided to make a series about being in your twenties, struggling and not really knowing what you’re doing with your life.

It took us about two years to finish the six episodes and we didn’t get in contact with Channel 31 until the very end. We called them up and said, “we’ve got six episodes here of a show we would love to air on your channel”. We had to pay an airing fee so we got RMITV, RMIT University’s media production group, to help us out by sponsoring the show.

Twentysomething aired on Channel 31 and we got quite a bit of feedback in the media and so we thought maybe this is going to be it; someone’s going to see it and they’ll want to do it again but that didn’t happen straight away. Everyone saw it, liked it, congratulated us and then moved on.

It wasn’t until Josh was putting together a documentary for the ABC that Debbie Lee, the executive producer, saw it. At that time, Screen Australia and Film Victoria were running a program called Stitch created to fund new narrative-based comedies. Through Stitch we received development funding and the show was commissioned.

If you’re doing it for the right reasons, to create and for people to see your work, then you should be happy with your program being on Channel 31. It’s a dream to see Twentysomething on ABC2 but we didn’t mind if it didn’t go past Channel 31.

There are some shows that are definitely meant to just be on community television that are not suited to commercial television.

What’s next for us? Hopefully a second season of Twentysomething. We’re just basking in the glory of the finished project at the moment.

AGAINST: Yianni Zinonos, creator and host of Yianni’s City Life showing on TVS and Channel 31

I am one of the most well-known community television producers and personalities in the country. My national program Yianni’s City Life is made in Sydney and broadcast in Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane, Adelaide and Perth. I have generated massive print publicity. I am a B-grade socialite. I go to heaps of events and functions. Everyone seems to know who I am and everyone has watched my show at least once. I have been called the “gay Greek Kerri-Anne” and the “king of community television”. I am a brand.

This year the public could vote for my show to win a Logie in the category of Best Lifestyle Program. Despite months of begging, I couldn’t get an invite to the awards.

The truth is, almost no-one is making the transition from community television to the mainstream, although that’s the dream I was sold.

I have had many meetings with major production houses and television stations. The commissioning editor at SBS told me they have so many programs coming in from overseas; they don’t know where to slot me.

I was approached by Foxtel’s Aurora Channel. They said they would charge me $500 per episode to broadcast and I would have to sell advertising to recoup costs.

I have spoken to as many influential people as possible but the doors seem shut. I cannot even get an agent to promote or manage me.

Community television is never mentioned or acknowledged in broadcast media.

All the majors seem to know that if they take community television personalities on, once they are finished with them, they will reappear on TVS or Channel 31, just as Melbourne’s Vasili’s Garden did after a move to SBS didn’t work out.

Ratings are another issue. They are rarely released, which makes it hard to quantify our audience for sponsorship or promotion.

Since TVS went digital last year, the audience has grown dramatically, and although we are considered a mainstream channel by the public, this is certainly not the case in the industry’s eyes.

• This feature first appeared in the relaunched print edition of Encore magazine. To subscribe, click here

Did you ever expect Tropfest to become as big as it has?

No, I had no idea. I didn’t know it would last to the second year. It started as a short film screening and I ran with the ball. I never expected it to have the scope that it does in Australia or any of the other places.

What’s next for the world’s largest short film festival?

We’re pushing Tropfest Sydney to three days for the 20th birthday with a party on Friday 17 February, an all day seminar on Saturday, musical events and the main event Sunday. The conference will have six to eight successful film professionals including short film and feature directors, financiers and cinematographers. It is an opportunity for filmmakers serious about their career and taking their position to the next level to hear from others that have done well.

Tropfest is no stranger to corporate dollars. What’s your sponsorship strategy?

Every sponsor offers an initiative. We don’t do generic packages. Part of what we sell them is an exclusive opportunity that adds value to both the stakeholders and Tropfest. We have Telstra doing the mobile marketing and if you make your film on a mobile phone, you get included in a whole other competition with a prize of a trip to Sundance and $5000.

The Sydney Morning Herald supports with marketing and they deliver a free DVD with the newspaper.

We say to filmmakers we can offer a platform that makes sure everyone your mum knows will see your film and we ask for content in return for subscription television channel, Movie Extra, our naming sponsor, who broadcasts the finalists.

You’ve just held the first Tropfest Arabia. What were the entries like?

With everything going on around the Arab Spring, there are a lot of films about transition and change. Overall they feel a bit more serious. I have no issue with Tropfest having a different tone in a different region. One other thing I’ve noticed is music plays a big role. I don’t know if that’s a local filmmaking trait but as all the films have been in Arabic, with English subtitles, possibly they realised with the language barrier comes music.

Away from Tropfest, you’re producing a city-based collaborative film, similar to Paris Je T’Aime and New York I Love You. How is it going?

We’ve locked in 12 directors for Sydney I Love You and I must say it’s an impressive who’s who of the Australian industry. The timeline is to have a full draft by the end of the year with the working title ‘Sydney’. We’re putting together financing and our plan is too shoot in 2012.

What would you change about the Australian film and television production industry?

I think the development process could do with work. Right now, there’s pressure to get a film into production quicker than it should, as people don’t get paid until it’s in production.

I don’t think anyone does it with the wrong intention but if I was running the Australian film industry, I would be investing in the people rather than the projects.

Whether it’s state or national government, someone has to put their focus on individual talent and not get so caught up in, ‘what movie are you doing now?’

• This feature first appeared in the relaunched print edition of Encore magazine. To subscribe, click here

It was nine years before Tampa, four years before Hanson, but there it was, ugly, prophetic, violent, Romper Stomper. ‘This is not your country’. A frankly Hitlerist gang of tattooed thugs going after Asians with baseball bats, bricks and knives in Footscray alleys, defending Australia’s racial and cultural purity. ‘Won’t let what happened to the Abos happen to us,’ says Hando, the headshaven pack leader, urging his eager swarm of war-painted dysfunctionals on, despising pasta as ‘wog food’ and smashing up Japanese cars, pushing back the yellow hordes with Howardite gravitas, we will decide who comes here, and tribal pride. He may lose this war against the unceasing invader, but he will give it his best shot. Russell Crowe in the role has the moral force of Brando, with the crisp, succinct charisma common to all great warrior-leaders.

Undertones of the classics

Homer comes to mind, and Clockwork Orange and Mad Max and Pure Shit and even Downfall, for anyone watching this epic unravelling of a big dream. As Bogart and Cagney and Jimmy Blacksmith showed, we always identify with the character who’s front and centre whatever his beliefs or his genocidal deeds. So good is Crowe and his co-stars – and the urban warfare choreography of the auteur, Geoffrey Wright – the story by its end seems almost Arthurian.

The Guinevere in this case is Gabe (Jackie McKenzie), an unstable, epileptic, rich bohemian drop-out lately escaped from years of tender incest with her filmmaker-artist father Martin (Alex Scott) and smitten by Crowe’s Hando (whom she rapidly beds and readily takes from behind) at first unwillingly, and then avidly, joining in the brutal headkicking of impertinent Vietnamese.

The Lancelot figure is Davey (Daniel Pollock), at first meekly worshipful of Hando, his comrade, guru and male-bonded friend, then in love with Gabe and resentful of him; and then, when she breezily comes to his bed, in open heretical mutiny, wanting him dead.

In this role, bruised and simmering, with a James Dean thwarted longing in his eyes, Pollock gives a hint of the great career he never had after falling, drugged, in front of a train and dying at the tender age of 23.

Not that it matters, but the copulation scenes are as raw and fine as the face bashing and besieged factory ones, the burning and pillaging that wordlessly, brutally swarm over the movie. This is sex as it is remembered, straightforward, eager, innocent, deadly, and Jackie McKenzie – giving her all, I suppose – transfigures into great acting what else might seem a mess of gasping, heaving and rolling about.

Hard to find a flaw, at even this distance, in Romper Stomper. Better than Clockwork Orange and all the Mad Maxes, it gives us the narrative spontaneity of how quickly one thing leads to another and tragedy unfolds for those daft enough to embark, in modern times, on a great adventure.

Cast and crew

Crowe’s next role, a mild-mannered teenage homosexual with an understanding dad in The Sum of Us, showed, after this one, in which he felt like the 35-year-old Richard Burton, how great his range was, his ability to inhale a role and make it somehow entirely new. He gave, I told him once, black-and-white performances in colour films, and he said, ‘I think I know what you mean.’ He remains unsurpassed in English-speaking cinema as the male who gave us the greatest variety of emotional impact since the coming of sound.

For Geoffrey Wright, though, sadly, this perfect matching of director to subject was never repeated. His Metal Skin was overwrought, his Macbeth pretentious rubbish. But he gave us this, his lone high summit of cinema, the best Australian film of its kind, and, worldwide, among the greatest.

Bob Ellis is a journalist, writer and director who has worked on numerous film and television projects including the 1978 film Newsfront as well as writing and directing The Nostradamus Kid.

• This feature first appeared in the relaunched print edition of Encore magazine. To subscribe, click here

Celebrity Apprentice is an interesting concept; one that perhaps, on paper, could be deemed a marketing nightmare. For how can you take B-grade Australian celebs and replicate the hugely successful multi-billion dollar Donald Trump-helmed hit?

The crew shoot a challenge episode

For the unfamiliar, the premise is fairly simple: 12 celebrity contestants, each vying for a final prize of $100,000 for their chosen charity. Entrepreneur and founder of wealth management company Yellow Brick Road, Mark Bouris, presides as the ultimate boss. Guided by ACP Magazines’ Deborah Thomas and Bouris’ long time right-hand man Brad Seymour, Bouris puts the contestants through their paces with a series of team challenges before gradually eliminating them in a boardroom showdown.

Initially created in the US by Mark Burnett Productions and billionaire real-estate tycoon Trump, The Apprentice shot to success in 2004 and has since spawned over 20 global imitations.  Down under, FremantleMedia produces the franchise as part of a larger deal with Burnett that gives them the local rights to all of the producing powerhouse’s formats.

In 2009 series one of The Apprentice Australia aired on Channel Nine concluding with Bouris hiring auctioneer Andrew Morello. While the first incarnation never managed to crack the magical million mark in the ratings, the celebrity-driven version is clearly faring better.

On set with the celebs

For the Fremantle production team, the hours are long and the workload demanding. The sun is barely up most mornings of the six-week shoot when the 65-strong crew converges on Sydney’s Fox Studios.

Fremantle’s director of TV content Marion Farrelly says, “some days I sit and look at my friends who have fabulously tall, handsome boyfriends and I don’t because I’m at work all the time. But I don’t mind because I love making television. I really love when shows actually work.”

On set, Farrelly’s primary focus is story. “My concentration is less on everything that happens around us. What goes on to that screen, and what makes people want to watch it, is our driving force.”

This series comprises 21 episodes and largely follows the US format, apart from being stripped across weeknights.  “It has stayed true to, but is not as volatile as, the US version,” director Jo Siddiqui explains. “In terms of the way it is approached technically, it is much the same.”

Months of speculation about the celebrity cast preceded shooting with names including Peter Andre, Shane Crawford, Kristina Keneally and even Brendan Fevola being thrown about. The casting process, a joint effort between Fremantle and A Cast of Thousands, led to the line up including politician Pauline Hanson, comedienne Julia Morris, publicist Max Markson, The Block contestant Polly Porter, songstress Deni Hines and former Miss Universe Australia Jesinta Campbell.

Onscreen dynamics are predictably fiery resulting in captivating viewing. “These people have massive egos,” executive producer Karen Warner says. “They are used to being the biggest personality in the room and then you put 12 of them together and it’s like no, no, look at me. From that point of view it has been really easy to cut. And there have been some incredible fiery boardroom scenes.”

Series producer Amanda Bainbridge says that while very little puppeteering is required to create the desired drama, the producers are more than happy to stoke the fire.

“There are certainly instances where we will put people in conflicting situations,” Bainbridge explains. “For example, in one of the challenges we put Polly and Deni in the same car because we knew there was tension there. Of course the tension exploded and we got this great bit of content.”

Shot on Sony XD800 cameras, each week of production encompasses two main elements – the boardroom and the challenge. A challenge is created over two to three days and filmed on location with four cameras. The all-important one-on-one interviews are conducted later in the day in the contestants’ hotel.

The boardroom shoot requires additional technical knowledge and utilises a custom-built set at Stage 4 of Sydney’s Fox Studios.

In the previous series, dramatic wide and overhead crane shots created with a jib heightened the boardroom drama but the team has opted against this method, instead relying on seven stationary cameras.

“We wanted to really keep the mood and the atmosphere in the space so we didn’t use a jib at all,” Siddiqui explains. “This means a much more intimate setting. We haven’t got cranes flying overhead. It’s like they are actually just in a boardroom.”

Close to the set is an innocuous de-mountable building that houses the control room. Inside is a frenetic hub of activity. At one end of the room, a huge screen displays live feeds from all seven cameras and glued to the monitors, a hierarchy of production crew. Seated at the front are Warner, Siddiqui and Bainbridge, followed by a team of supervising and assistant producers.

The crew shoot a challenge episode

For the contestants, lack of sleep coupled with the pressure to perform inevitably boils over in a complete boardroom bitch-fest much to the amusement of the production team.

A common excuse from contestants causing a collective eye-roll is “the girls in production never told me that”. This means Bainbridge has to be one step ahead.

“I’m out on the set all of the time, so I know all of the stories,” Bainbridge says. “I have a document which details a list of everything that happened, and what the consequences of that are. If anything is challenged by the celebrities, then I’m there to say well actually, this is how it happened.”

Despite precision planning, the nature of reality TV means the crew must be prepared for the unexpected at all times.

“It’s like a race where you all start on the start line, people can run in every direction and you have absolutely no idea which way they will go,” Farrelly says. “You know there is a finish line but getting to it is very difficult.”

“There are certain things you just can’t plan for,” Director Jo Siddiqui agrees. “Disasters in reality TV are sometimes a joy. You have to think on your feet a lot. You hope for the best and prepare for the worst.”

Unexpected outcomes are especially the case when it comes to crunch time in the boardroom. “It is Mark’s decision who he fires,” Farrelly says. “We obviously have a way we want to hit a storyline from what happened in the challenge but we do leave it to him. Often this is different from what we anticipate.”

The final piece of the puzzle, and perhaps the most crucial, is the post-production schedule. With close to 30 hours of footage shot each day on multiple cameras, the editing team has a mammoth task to accomplish.

Running Avid Media Composer in 16 edit suites, it takes three weeks to cut a challenge episode and two to cut the boardroom. The turnaround time is tight and only half of the episodes were in the can when the first aired.

“We have a team of six editors who are working on the challenge and a team of four working on the boardroom,” supervising post-production producer Phil Dickenson says. “We then have a further two people solely cutting the two parts of the boardroom that go into the challenge episode.”

Once the raw footage is divided, the storyline is built during the offline edit. “When the story is locked off we go into the online edit and start the grading of the picture and application of any graphical elements and music,” Dickenson adds. The episodes are then delivered to Nine on DigiBeta tape where they are digitally ingested for broadcast.

“We are really lucky to have, every step of the way, people who are passionate about television,” executive producer Warner says. “We have created a great framework both on location and in the edits for the story to be told.”

Hit or miss?

Inside the boardroom shoot at Sydney’s Fox Studios

Within today’s cut-throat television landscape, both Nine and Fremantle have much riding on the success of the series. Nine’s decision to ‘strip’ the show and air it five nights a week was a major risk. “This is the first Apprentice anywhere in the world that has been stripped,” Farrelly says.

In the first week of the show’s debut in the 7-8pm timeslot, the series attracted more than one million viewers on three out of five nights, a tremendous result given the inability for stripped shows such as The Renovators on Ten to do the same. The Fremantle team have no illusions about the likelihood of success but believe they have the right mix for a hit.

“You never know whether shows will work. There is no secret formula,” Farrelly says. “My rules for television are fairly simple – make me laugh, make me cry and surprise me. Then there are the four Cs: conflict, comedy, consequence and characters. Ideally, if you have all seven of those in your show, and you pay attention to them, then you have a fighting chance of winning. I think Celebrity Apprentice has all the elements to make a great story.”

• This feature first appeared in the relaunched print edition of Encore magazine. To subscribe, click here

Within our society there is a common underlying thread. That unspoken C word, only ever briefly discussed or tentatively skirted during dinner party conversation. Despite a growing abundance of people living with or affected by cancer, it still remains the elephant in the room. Jonathan Teplitzky’s, Burning Man does no such tiptoeing.

Trailing the wake of one man’s grief, it provides a harrowing snapshot of the devastation such a disease can cause. Based in-part on Teplitzky’s personal experience, viewers are plunged headfirst into the fragmented world of Tom (Matthew Goode), a British chef living in Bondi whose wife is dying of breast cancer. Unconventionally raw, Burning Man showcases the often ignored emotional fallibility of 
the male.

Already an accomplished writer/director (Better than Sex, Gettin Square), Burning Man is Teplitzky’s third feature film – and is perhaps his strongest cinematic offering yet. Wearing all three hats – writer, director and co-producer, Teplitzky’s involvement was obviously very hands on. However, he explained that even though his own experience initially got the ball rolling, he didn’t want to make a film based entirely on himself. “It’s no secret that I was writing from my own experiences, but I only wanted them to be a starting point for a fictional story which could really use what cinema has to offer.”

Teplitzky added that it was eighteen months before the story really came together solidly. “For about a year or so I toyed with the idea, because the energy of what you go through at a time like that really interested me – what it was to be a male, in your thirties, and suddenly your life completely changes. That really fascinated me, but I was just sort of searching around for more, for that little bit extra. I was also writing a film about a chef and one day I just thought – my God, these two go together so well – and that’s really where it took off as a concrete idea.”

For Teplitzky, it was important to collaborate with someone who possessed not only the technical experience, but had a mutual understanding for, and expectation of the end result. Co-producer Andy Patterson was one such person. “Andy was a friend so I showed him the script and he really liked it. It may sound obvious, but a lack of parallel thinking is actually the bane of the writer/director’s life – to go through all the blood, sweat and tears of writing the script and then find you’re at odds with the producer. He understood what I was trying to do and really responded strongly to it. I sensed very early on that if we were to work together we were both going to be on the same page.”

Setting the scene
From there the conversation turned to location. Teplitzky told Encore the decision to film in Australia was not automatic. “From the beginning I was trying to make a universal film so we looked very seriously at setting it in Los Angeles because the landscape is really interesting.” However, with the economic climate unsteady, coupled with the huge amount of support offered in Australia through the producer offset, it seemed logical to shoot locally. “The offset is such a great thing and it became really important, because it’s tough at the moment to make independent drama in and around the world – so the it just allows you that bit of breathing space and enables you to get to a point where you just have so much more chance of financing a movie.”

With a reported budget of $7.8m, backed by private investment with funding from Screen Australia and Screen NSW, Burning Man was shot in and around Sydney over eight weeks, and portrays a somewhat alternative view of the city.

Bypassing the classic Bondi/harbour views, Teplitzky used non-descript Sydney locations bringing an international feel to the story. It was always an intention to highlight another aspect of the city. “It was really a conscious decision to not use the classic picture postcard view of Sydney. We really wanted it to be much more organic, and much more textural. We shot quite a bit in Bondi and in Clovelly and funnily enough you don’t see many of those places in Australian films. I like that we are not trying to sell the iconic tourist view of Sydney, it’s sort of a lived in view of the city. I didn’t want it to feel parochial and that’s sort of the view of people around the world.

A staccato of scenes
Visually, Burning Man is chaos. Unusual camera angles, courtesy of DOP Garry Phillips, give complexity and depth, while a staccato of non-linear scenes thrown together in apparent random order adds a unique element that captures the exact emotional strain Tom is experiencing. And at second glance we start see the chaos is cleverly structured and cinematically tight – producing a haunting tale that begins to emerge from the noise.

“What I wanted from Burning Man was for it to be a visceral experience for the audience,” said Teplitzky. “I wanted it to be emotional and I wanted them to experience the film rather than just watch it as a story. The structure as a fractured narrative I felt is partly from my own experience and really strongly reflected the emotional headspace of the character and what he was going through. But having a structure like that allows you to highlight the most intense moments and make them coherent in telling the accumulative story, which is Tom’s experience. It was very much about having a structure that was part of the storytelling. Not just allowing the story to unfold.”

The challenge of translating such gritty content is simpler than it looks. In fact, Teplitzky said that the more compelling the storyline the more powerful the end result will be. “I think cinema is a fantastic vehicle and a fantastic outlet for the rawest and the most emotional content of exploring people’s lives. So I think it comes quite naturally to dramatise all of that. I think the power of film allows you to explore it in a really cathartic and visceral way. The more raw the content the more cinematic it is.” And it is this raw emotion that Teplitzky hopes will resonate with audiences globally. “I hope it challenges and confronts viewers, I hope that it makes them reflect something about their own lives, and what’s going on with them and their relationships. I hope that they find it an experience that is powerful, entertaining and engages them emotionally.”

International appeal
The need to appeal to an international audience is paramount, and Teplitzky told Encore that delivering a film that could stand on a global stage was at the forefront from the start. “From the very beginning we talked about casting a non-Australian in the lead to help position it internationally. I’m very conscious of making films that can play to universal audiences and I think having a universal cast helps that.” As such, Goode is supported by local faces with international resumes; Rachel Griffiths, Kerry Fox and Bojana Novakovic.

Garnering international attention is crucial. Burning Man screened on the first Friday night at the Toronto International Film Festival. Before the festival, Teplitzky explained that the importance of gaining such a slot was huge. “It gives it a chance in a very worldly environment to be embraced by audiences, to be talked about by people and the press. It gives it that chance of doing what all films are made for – to find a niche for them and an audience for them. The high profile of the festival will hopefully draw people in so that the film has that chance of playing to audiences not just in Australia but all round the world. And I think that’s essential.” Building on the film’s success and helping its promotion, Teplitzky has secured Colin Firth for new film, The Railway Man.

Ultimately, Teplitzky has not only successfully delivered a deeply confronting and compelling film but highlighted an incredibly sensitive issue – which just may, perhaps, help dispel the elephant in the room.

Burning Man is released in cinemas 17 November through Transmission.

In order to compete with such universal giants, Australia’s studios must offer that little bit extra – a uniqueness not found anywhere else. While perhaps considerably smaller in comparison to the backlots of Hollywood, Australia’s absolute landscape versatility has proved to be a substantial draw-card.

Jon Cassar executive producer for Stephen Spielberg’s Terra Nova (which shot on location in the Gold Coast Hinterland as well as the Gold Coast’s Village Roadshow Studios) told Encore when searching for the right studio you have to weigh up several factors. “You look at two things. You look at infrastructure and studio space. We started with two studios and we’re already up to three. Having the volume of studios to pick from is good. And they came here because there is as much varying jungle in a close parameter.”

Adelaide
Albeit the smallest of the four, Adelaide Studios is an entirely new complex and perhaps compliments rather than competes with Australia’s existing studios. Richard Harris, CEO of Adelaide, told Encore the concept was to create not just a production studio
but a community of industry professionals. “We are connected to an industry hub and the SAFC (South Australian Film Corporation). We actually deliberately developed the whole idea of the site to create a hub of filmmaking production and practitioners.” Open for just over two months, it offers state-of-the equipment, including two sound stages, production offices, wardrobe facilities, recording and editing suites and a 96 seater theaterette. Harris explained that it aims to target mainly domestic productions. “Where we differ from the rest is we are not huge, I mean our largest soundstage is 1000m2 and that is probably one of the smaller ones on the Fox lot. We are primarily targeted towards the domestic Australian production market. So it was a very deliberate decision to target domestic productions, rather than try to replicate what they had on the East Coast.

Harris added that technology was also another unique aspect to Adelaide’s lot. “What is also different is that we have sound stages and mixing facilities and production offices all on the one complex so in a way we are probably more integrated across all levels of production and post-production in a way that others aren’t.” Harris believes that as there is no intention to expand towards bigger productions, Adelaide Studios aren’t competing as much with the rest. “I think that in some ways we are, but we are not competing in the sense that their main aim is to drive towards bigger productions. And we are not. There are of course other stages and mixing facilities in the country that we will be competitive with but we are specifically not competitive with Fox or Docklands in the same way.”

Adelaide’s main focus will be television, Harris 
said. “We made a very conscious decision to focus on TV because we realised that TV was very well suited
to using these studios. And scale cost effectiveness meant that they’d also be well suited.” Harris said it
was unlikely feature films would be shot in the studios. “We were looking at feature films but, features films are very difficult and unpredictable, whereas television actually brings in the critical mass of production and
it also brings in longevity of production.” In November, Adelaide will start pre-production of its first ever series Resistance, a $14m sci-fi kids show executive produced by Star Wars producer, Gary Kurtz.

Sydney
As Australia’s largest production facility, Sydney’s Fox Studios is spread over a 32-acre site with 155,000m2 of sound stages (eight) supported by 35,000m2 of offices and133,000m2 of workshops, construction space and art departments. Nancy Romano, chief executive of Fox Studios told Encore that for Fox, it’s all about bringing in the big productions. “We have three of the largest sound stages in the southern hemisphere and hence, we really lend ourselves to features that have large sets. For instance currently we are shooting The Great Gatsby and in the past have shot features such as The Matrix Trilogy, Mission Impossible II, Moulin Rouge, Australia and Wolverine.” However, where the studio really shines is in its wider cinematic scope – Housing over 50 television and film related businesses, the studio is also neighbouring (AFTRS), the Australian Film, Television and Radio School and the Brent Street Dance School – which Romano sees as a point of difference – positioning Fox as a truly creative campus.

Romano also told Encore that its lighting department is one of a kind. “We are the only studio that offers our industry a “one stop shop” – particularly since we recently launched “Fox Lighting” which, in itself, gives us a competitive advantage as we are now Australia’s largest studio and leading supplier of lighting equipment.”

Alongside the big budget films, Fox has been home to massive domestic TV productions such as Australian Idol and the X Factor, and is presently filming
 Good News World, Celebrity Apprentice and Kitchen Whiz. When touting for new productions Romano said it is important to use incentives that will benefit the local industry. “We use everything at our disposal as we understand the benefits to NSW and the local industry – this includes both federal incentives and state incentives.” With such a huge complex to fill, it would seem that Fox must sit empty for half the year in between big shoots. Romano explains that the while recent dollar strength has found international productions slightly lacking, the complex is almost always buzzing. “There are many factors which determine when and if productions come to Australia. Currently the lack of international productions is predominantly due to our rising dollar coupled with a Location Offset that is not competitive enough with other countries and certain US states, which makes life a real challenge to keep the studio busy all of the time. And Fox Studios Australia is never really completely empty. Whether it’s a feature, a television production, commercials, music videos, a fashion show or a launch, there is always something happening.”

Melbourne
Trailing just behind the major production complexes – but by no means lacking – is Docklands Studios Melbourne. Rod Allan CEO of Docklands explained that currently a full range of shows is in the making. “At the present time Channel Nine is occupying one of our stages and is using that stage to make audience-based shows like Millionaire Hot Seat, The Footy Show, Million Dollar Drop and those sorts of shows. We also have Channel Seven’s second series of Winners and Losers. We’ve had Australia’s Got Talent and Talking ‘Bout Your Generation.

Spanning 60,000m2 with five sound stages, Docklands is set to start renovations next year – including adding bigger support areas and three more sounds stages. Allan described the changes: “We have had some funding approved to do some improvements to the studio which include, in the case of our smaller stage, stage 5, some changes and extensions.” The aim is to make it more suitable and flexible for audience-based television. “The second part of the improvements is to make alterations to the interior of our warehouse building, so it is better suited to accommodate multiple clients at the same time.” Despite its largely television-based portfolio, Allan maintains the studio does not exclusively chase TV productions. “We are quite agnostic. We will look at all types of production; I think it is good for the productions environment if we have a mix of different production types.” Allan echo’s the sentiment of other studios, saying a strong Aussie dollar is tough when attracting international productions. 
“We recognise that under the current situation, with the strength of the Australian dollar, it’s increasingly difficult to secure international productions. So although we still work hard at that, we have been concentrating a lot on domestic production. And we need to be able to continue to service our national film industry.” The close proximity to both Melbourne’s CBD and major highways makes Docklands sought after as a shooting destination. Allan told Encore you could be out of town and in a remote location very quickly. He added that the film culture of Melbourne is also what makes this studio unique. “I think Melbourne is a very film-friendly destination for all types of productions and we see ourselves as being part of that package that you get from shooting in Melbourne. There is a variety of locations on offer here and Melbourne is very well set up to support both small and large scale productions.”

Queensland
With its tropical climate and ready access to a vast range of non-descript scenery including sand dunes, jungle and rugged mountain terrain – the Village Roadshow Studios in Queensland attracts many international productions. Previously home to big budget flicks such as The Chronicles of Narnia: The Voyage of the Dawn treader, Fools Gold, Nim’s Island and James Cameron’s Sanctum, the lot offers eight sound stages, ten production offices, several workshops and a host of editing suites, wardrobe, and make-up departments. Each sound stage is equipped with modern, industry standard facilities including air conditioning, extraction fans, steel grids, catwalks – and vary in size with an overall floor area of 10,844m2 – making it one of the largest production lots in the Southern Hemisphere. Lynne Benzie, president of VRS explained that the studio is used for many different types of productions. “We’re available for anybody that wants to approach us to use the facility. We’ve done commercials, product launches, DVDs and film clips”. She added that no single type of production is targeted; however, it is the international films that keep the financial wheel turning “We target every kind of production. I travel overseas twice a year and got to Los Angeles as well as the UK. But, the international productions sustain the industry; they are the ones that are able to outlay capital to grow things like the tanks or the stages”. But again, with the strong Australian dollar, there has been a decrease in offshore productions, and more local films are stepping up to make use of the 40 per cent producer offset, Benzie said. “We are getting a lot more international productions looking at becoming co-productions, so as to access the producer offset that way”. She added that the main point of difference for VRS is its custom-built water tanks. “We have three; one in stage five, we have an above ground round tank and we have the big one we built originally for Fools Gold”. With the principal tank measuring 30 by 40m2 it is the largest custom built water tank in the country.

Benzie concluded that VRS is in an exceptional position due to its complete landscape ambiguity. “I think each state is unique in what they have to offer, but with Queensland because we are so diverse in the locations, we can double for so many areas like the Pacific and Bahamas, and Kansas. And it’s just all so accessible to the studio. It makes it a lot easier to attract productions here.”

Canon 1D

Michael Rymer opted to shoot Face to Face on the Canon 1D. Encore managing editor Brooke Hemphill took both the 1D and 7D on a shoot out, where did her vote land? Read on.

Readers of past product reviews will recall my love for the Canon 5D which has only somewhat diminished in recent months after a three-day shoot in the snow singlehandedly playing camera and sound girl with the aforementioned camera. The whole process of lugging separate audio equipment tends to become tiresome especially with all those battery changes and memory cards to keep track of. But there are many other Canon DSLR cameras out there and I’ve now had the pleasure of playing with both the 7D and the 1D. Since everyone on the interwebs is doing it, I thought I’d do a little comparison review for you.

Obviously they are both digital SLR cameras and, as Canon continues to stress, were never specifically designed for video. I think that means us video types aren’t entitled to complain about features like sound and stuff so I’ll bypass all that jazz and talk about what the cameras can do.

Canon 7D

Picture-wise, it’s all much of a muchness with the Canons. With that shallow depth of field and white balance settings, I’m of the opinion that you’re in good hands with any of the cameras provided you know what you’re doing and that may take a little practice and manual reading. Countless video boffins have created comparison videos of the 1D, 7D and 5D which you can watch on YouTube. Despite feisty comment threads, the general consensus is that it’s six of one, half a dozen of the other.

The thing that drives me crazy about the different Canon models is the change of buttons and menu structures. While on one machine you can change the ISO here, it’s slightly different over there and to record video on the 1D you firstly have to set up the live view mode in the settings menu. Then obscurely, to shoot you record via the FEL button, which when in photography mode stands for “flash exposure lock”. You learn something new everyday, which is frustrating when you have a different camera in your hand every other week.

Now that I have taken the first shot at the 1D, let’s find some redeeming features. For starters, the 1D takes a compact flash card and an SD card. So storage space is at a maximum. The 7D, well it’s just one compact flash card at a time. Battery life is the same for both cameras so nothing to fault there.

But as far as I’m concerned, none of this makes up for the bulky and frankly uncomfortable body of the 1D unit. As someone who is largely afraid of fandangled DSLR rigs, I like to hold my camera with both hands. With the 5D and 7D, this is no problem but the 1D isn’t as ergonomically friendly.

So which camera would I go with given the choice? The 7D is a clear winner for me. The shape and size are ideal for the videographer on the go while the 1D is just too darn clunky and coming in about a grand cheaper than the 5D, the 7D is an excellent choice.

COST: Canon 1D Mark IV Digital SLR Body – only $6599 – Canon 7D Digital SLR Camera $2399

SCORE OUT OF 10: I give the 7D an 8 while the 1D a 5. Both are great for picture quality but for ease of use, the 7D wins hands down.

WHO’S IT RIGHT FOR: Let’s be honest. The 1D was designed and made for a photographer, not a videographer. The 7D, on the other hand, is an ideal choice for the shooter on beer budget wanting to produce a champagne product.

It’s the 21 Century filmmaker’s worst nightmare. Online piracy is costing the global industry billions of dollars. According to a recent report the Australian screen industry is worth $6.1B and supports 48,667 jobs. While this number is up by 5.1% since 2006-07, a study on behalf of the Australian Federation Against Copyright Theft (AFACT) showed that $1.37B in revenue was lost across the entire Australian economy due to movie and TV piracy while 6,100 jobs were forgone in 2010.

Filmmakers these days are well aware of the importance of protecting themselves against piracy before their film’s life has run its course but it only takes one pair of unscrupulous hands and a screener is online.

So what life does a film have if it’s been uploaded to the internet before its release? And how can a filmmaker best monetise their pirated film and utilise the data it generates?

Adam Blaiklock, director of new film Caught Inside says, “We’ve been unbelievably careful with our screeners, and what’s written over them. You hear horror stories of films being seen by the audience they have, before the films get released and they get dropped like a hot potato.”

Between finishing the film to the time of its release, Blaiklock and partner Paul Friedmann produced an anti-piracy campaign for the Intellectual Property Awareness Foundation (IPAF). “We made that while we were in the throes of negotiating distributors and sales agents for our film,” says Friedmann.

Around the same time, says Friedmann “we logged on and did a search for the film’s name on a torrent site and they’d linked all their sites to ours and to our trailers. We served them legal notice to remove any references to our film, but it just popped up on another one, and it looked like the same company with multiple sites.”

Fortunately for Friedmann and Blaiklock however, their film hadn’t been leaked. The motive from the bit torrent sites, says Friedmann, is to create interest in the film. “We were terrified for a moment but what they’d done was gone on and stolen parts of the trailer.”

Neil Peplow, Director of Screen Content at AFTRS and producer of Waking Ned and Bright Young Things wasn’t so lucky, when he discovered his film FAQ About Time Travel online. Due to studio movements beyond Peplow’s control, the film failed to see a release in the US after HBO Films and subsequent other specialised distribution arms of Warner collapsed. In the UK the film was released through Lionsgate but was pulled after two weeks to make room for the next big blockbuster. After the release of the DVD, the numbers of votes on IMDB were greater than the ticket sales at the box office or DVD sales. That’s when Peplow did some investigating.

“We notice that Torrent Freak (a torrent news blog) had a chart and we appeared three weeks in a row. That piqued my interest,” says Peplow. Further investigation found FAQ About Time Travel was across 65 sites. On one site, a comment was written “if you’re going to upload it, upload it properly, the last ten minutes are out of sync.” “So I wrote to the Torrent Freak blogger,” says Peplow, “and I said ‘I’m an independent producer. I’d like to know how many times my film was downloaded and if there were any legs in a sequel.’ He said ‘It has been downloaded 1.2 million times. If you want more information you have to pay for it!’”

Ahmed Salama, with partner Val Petrenko of the multidisciplinary digital agency DLSHS were executive producers on The Tunnel. They turned the traditional distribution model on its head, initially releasing the film on BitTorrent. “Word of mouth is always going to improve the chances of a film’s success,” says Salama. While he acknowledges it’s an illegal act, he says “It’s no surprise the top ten downloaded films are the top ten earning films. [Pirates] are the audience that is talking. For every one of those downloads, twenty of their friends will hear about it. Word of mouth is so important for any film.” Through word of mouth The Tunnel was the number one Australian film on IMDB and the film’s website is number one on a Google search for the word ‘tunnel’ and to date, has had 2 million downloads.

Thomas Mai host of Youtube TV show Audience Republic, has 15 years experience in international film sales, having worked at Lars Von Trier’s Zentropa Entertainment and sold hundreds of films. He now specialises in what he’s calling film distribution strategies 2.0 and argues that a film’s financial life isn’t lost after it’s been uploaded. “Peer-to-peer is a way to advertise and piracy is sometimes sampling the film. The old method of cutting the best parts together for a trailer and saying ‘here’s a minute – it’s great, go see it…’ No one cares.” He cites Star Wreck, the first film by the team behind Finnish/German/Australian co-production Iron Sky. Since being uploaded to a peer-to-peer site for free, Star Wreck has had 3.5-4million downloads and yet still sold 60,000 DVDs. On the back of this many eyeballs, crowdfunding for Iron Sky, is half way to their target of 1m euros.

“Once I calmed down,” says Peplow after his communication with the hypocritical TorrentFreak, “I engaged in the message board and was having conversations with people who had downloaded my film. They were asking questions about where they could buy a DVD version [in the States]. There wasn’t any DVD interest by HBO, so the pirates suggested I go to Amazon for a bespoke DVD service. It was the first time I had the audience suggesting a way to distribute it and it opened my eyes on how to engage with the audience. If I managed to persuade half of the illegal downloaders to buy a $2 DVD that was well synced, I’d have made $1.2m – a substantial chunk of change would have come back. Lionsgate had bigger films to promote, this model was not any interest to them. As a producer though, that is your business. You’re wanting to get the money back any way you can.”

“The way forward for the ‘filmmaker2.0’ to survive in modern landscape,” says Mai, “is to maintain exclusive rights and make non-exclusive rights with others. Apple, Netflix, Amazon all can be done non-exclusively and now the person who made the film ends up owning the film and it’s a more fair way, and democratic way.”

Mai says filmmakers (and distributors) must use the download numbers as leverage for distribution. If Caught Inside, while having no distributor, had ended up online, its download numbers could prove its popularity. “Why not take them to the theatres and say ‘look at that’. They’d have a campaign to show a theatre or distributor.”

On the same day that The Tunnel began its online campaign, the film was released on DVD by Paramount and premiered on the Showtime channel. On the back of the film’s success, The Tunnel then approached a theatrical campaign – It has screened in Australia, Canada and soon the United States. Owning exclusive rights to the film they’ve also placed it on ABC’s iView and Sydney Morning Herald’s video platform. Salama assures the film has made its money back.

A social media campaign is a must for the filmmaker2.0 and Mai explains the concept of being an ‘independent’ filmmaker is over. “You are ‘fan-dependent’. Now with social media you have a two-way conversation with your fans. [And] You can build on that database from film to film.” Iron Sky currently has 71,500 fans on Facebook and its trailers have been viewed over 7 million times on Youtube.

As Peplow says, “You can build an audience but you still need to earn a fee. Using the Iron Sky audience, the producers asked ‘where do you want us to screen it?’ and they would use a map of the concentration of their fanbase to show to traditional distributors. It’s about gathering that data and mining it to potential financiers for that creditable funding.

“In the future,” says Salama, who used crowdfunding as partial finance for The Tunnel, “you will see legislation change where people can opt to pay for a film after the fact of downloading it. If you download a film and you get a guilt trip you can pay a dollar. It’s about leveraging that audience. Many people were paying more than they’d pay for a DVD on The Tunnel website. If you made payment optional, people would feel compelled to pay their dues.”

“My overall thing is it’s not over,” says Mai. “It’s just a new beginning. It’s exciting and the cost of distribution is so cheap to reach a million people – look I have a TV show now! I couldn’t have that before.”

Caught Inside is out October 6 through Umbrella Entertainment

Entering the site, it’s pitch black and damp. Small white spotlights illuminate the darkness but only so far. Moving closer to the source it’s clear – the lights are headlamps on the workers, also dressed in day-glo vests. It’s ‘safety first’ down here and just as a mine should feel, but Encore is on a film set.

This is the Beaconsfield mineshaft – ‘the 925’ (925 metres below ground) where Todd Russell, Brant Webb and Larry Knight became trapped on ANZAC Day 2006.

Lachy Hulme (Offspring) plays Todd Russell. “My first question to Glendyn Ivin (director – Offspring, Last Ride) was why are we telling this story, because it’s otherwise just ‘the boy stuck down the well’? [But] the way that the script has been put together, and Glendyn understands narrative so well, it’s a fucking horror story. It gets so dark and scary.”

Says Ivin, “What we are trying to do is show some elements that no one has had access to and show it from a perspective different from the media’s.”

“While the public know the story,” says producer, Jane Liscombe, “they really only got the information the mine manager was feeding them and then they made a lot up.”

“If you remember the reports, the boys were in good spirits,” says Hulme. “There was a computer graphic of the cage with stick figures walking around. [However] from Todd and Brant’s point of view it’s like having a serial killer aiming a shotgun at your head all the time. You have a 150 tons aimed at your head. After all other avenues were exhausted, rescuers had to blow explosives one metre from their heads. Todd made the decision that he would be the one who counts down each blast – it’s Russian roulette. If we’ve done our job right, people will be astounded because it is horrific.”

“So what we’re trying say is, you think you know how it all unfolded and the outcome but this is what really happened,” says Liscombe. “The behind the scenes you never got to see.”

Nevertheless, the media’s role is not ignored. Network Nine’s association with the story is integral, from Tracy Grimshaw’s exclusive interviews with the boys, to the death of Richard Carleton (played by Steve Vizard in his first serious role) after a Beaconsfield press conference. It made sense the program will air on Nine. The telemovie will also use original Nine footage in places.

The Odd Couple
The show will be produced by Southern Star John Edwards who optioned the rights of Russell and Webb’s book Bad Ground three years-ago. Screenwriter Judi McCrossin (Secret Life of Us, Tangle) used this as a starting point.

It’s a very personal story. Beyond the disaster, McCrossin “was able to ascertain that it was about the love story of an odd couple,” says Liscombe. “They’re as chalk and cheese as Lachy and Shane. Todd is very stoic and introverted and is the alpha-male and everything is internalised. Where as for Brant, it’s all externalised, from telling stories to laughter. These two guys didn’t really know each other and the yin and yang of them kept each other alive.”

As well as the large 925 tunnel that’s been built, a set piece by production designer Jon Rohde, just to the right of the 925, is a replica of the small crushed cage where Todd and Brant were trapped. It’s claustrophobic hell.

The team have shot on location, at a mine in Victoria and Beaconsfield itself. “We’ve just come off shooting in a mine for a week,” explains Ivin. “It gave us this incredible production design with kilometres of tunnel and everything a working mine gives you. I love it. I could spend the whole time with the boys but it’s pretty claustrophobic and brutal at times with what’s going on down there. Even though it is compelling, the above-ground story is to give the audience a breather of what’s going on in this extremely claustrophobic world. You’re telling a story in which you’re either underground or there’s giant machinery or special effects – there’s always extra elements. We’re doing this on a TV budget on a TV schedule but there is always a new element. TV works when there is two or three people talking in rooms and then they go to another room. But this is people talking in rooms surrounded by giant equipment or a thousand metres underground or there’s dust in the air. There’s always something slowing you down.”

Event Television
Being billed as ‘event TV’, Liscombe says, “Glen and I are delivering it in the highest quality we can and therefore we treat it like a film with all the structure of a film.” However, acknowledging the success of mini-series Cloud Street and Southern Star’s Paper Giants Liscombe says there is argument to stretch it beyond the one night. “That is the big debate, do we do one big epic night or split them up and create the two natural parts. We had a discussion early on when John Edwards suggested the two parts and it was definitely a question mark about where you leave the audience. It has to be a considered thing, what does part one represent – we don’t know if they’re alive or dead and what is the trauma that is resulting in’ and how were they surviving. There’s a school of thought for both but it comes down to Nine’s decision and ratings. I’ve found they’ve come with fanfare and an element of cheese but I think if what you’re trying to do is create something too short for a series and too long for a film then a two-parter works well.” Likewise, says Liscombe, “the commercial breaks have been very thought out – They are very punctuated, where Judi has put them and Channel Nine have assisted because they are very aware of it, that’s their world.”

“It is a commercial approach to the retelling of a well-known story but there are some surprises in there,” says Ivin. “We’ve tried to introduce a subconscious response to what it’s like to have someone taken away from you. For want of a better word, there is something surreal or dream-like, of memory and perception, of what it’s really like to be separated from someone you love.”

“Todd was on day one and two of the set,” explains Liscombe. “There’s a scene with one of the shift bosses telling Todd’s wife, Caroline, to expect the worst and she won’t believe it, and Todd’s sitting back watching the scene as the tough guy and he broke down and walked out because he’d never seen it from her perspective. [Likewise] when Caroline saw the cage she broke down as she’d never seen it from that perspective before. It makes your heart break because while everyone has moved on, they’re wearing the death of Larry Knight.”

Image by director Glendyn Ivin