[archive] september 18, 2006

1. Free tickets to Chauvel for FLICs members
2. DCITA's film funding review
3. Popcorn Taxi screens Suburban Mayhem
4. Report from SAMAG's censorship panel
5. Valhalla DA on display until 21/9/06

1. Free tickets to the Chauvel for FLICs members

The Chauvel is currently hosting an Australian Film Feast - screenings of classic Aussie films including Muriel's Wedding, Newsfront, Head On, Caterpillar Wish, Macbeth, and many others. The Chauvel management has kindly extended invitations to FLICs members to attend the premiere of a new print of Goodbye Paradise with a special Q & A session with Australian film legend Ray Barrett and cast and crew, hosted by Jamie Leonarder.

This special event co-presented by the NFSA takes place on Sat Sept 16 @ 2 pm. If you're on this list you're a FLICs member, and members just need to tell the box office staff that they are from FLICs, and they will receive a free double pass.

In the meantime, you can check out the other offerings in the Australian Film Feast - it's a great chance to see Aussie stories on the big screen.

Goodbye Paradise
Dir Carl Schutlz, 1982, 119 mins, 35! mm, col. (M)
An insanely inventive film with Ray Barrett in a career-best performance as a sacked police commissioner turned shambling Gold Coast PI, trying to stay sober long enough to make sense of doggy off-shore oil deals, a White Shoe Brigade campaign to turn Queensland into an independent state, and a military coup. Director Carl Schultz revels (as anyone would) in writer Bob Ellis and Denny Lawrence’ script, and its Raymond Chandler-like plot, Bjelke-Petersen-era political in-jokes and wicked social satire.

Ray Barrett and other cast and crew members will be in attendance for a Q & A talking about the making of Goodbye Paradise. Barrett will also talk about a long career in Australian and UK film and TV that ranges from Hammer Horror and Thunderbirds to Don's Party and the mini-series After the Deluge.

2. DCITA's film funding review

A number of groups have published their submissions for the Government's major film funding review on their websites. That includes the AFC, the FTO, and FLICs, and you can find their and our submissions by following these links.

We've also been in communication with a group who has been lobbying for the separation of the NFSA from the AFC. We're currently digesting all these documents and ideas and will write to you about them - and about action you can take - in the near future.

In the meantime, if you have thoughts or feedback on these submissions or on any film funding review issues, please let us know!

3. Popcorn Taxi screens Suburban Mayhem

On Wednesday September 27th at 7:30 pm Popcorn Taxi presents an advance preview screening and Q & A for Paul Goldman's supercharged new black comedy Suburban Mayhem. The film centres around Katrina Skinner, a 19-year-old single mum who lives in a world of petty crime, fast cars, manicures and sex. A master manipulator of men, she will stop at nothing to get what she wants, even murder. When her father threatens to contact social services to take away her child, Katrina sets in motion a plan to wreak suburban mayhem that will leave a community in shock. After the screening director Paul Goldman and screenwriter Alice Bell will join guest interviewer Margaret Pomeranz for what promises to be a probing discussion about the film and its themes.

Like the Chauvel screenings above, this is a great chance to engage in dialogue about Aussie films with the film's makers - the sort of dialogue that is vital to a vibrant filmmaking and film-viewing culture.

4. Report from the SAMAG's censorship panel

A FLICs member reports back on the censorship panel, put on by the Sydney Arts Management Advisory Group, which took place a few weeks ago at the Australia Council:

"Stephen Sewell kicked things off with a pre-prepared appeal to consider the dangers of censorship. He went on to describe the type of censorship policies that the arts had experienced under the Howard 'regime' which led to a wider debate on Australian society - the effects of censorship and government control.

"David Marr was entertaining and eloquent, citing examples from his own journalstic experience and was particularly...critical of the narrow, selective information that the media provides Australian. He suggested journos had been so constrained and compromised by conservative media bosses and politicians (on both sides) that they have virtually given up asking anything that is challenging or worthy of investigating....

"These arguments...were put forward with a lot of passion and a few amusing anecdotes about the ins and outs (pun intended!) of examining restricted newsagency material (ie pornography). They all agreed that one of the main dangers with the curently unadventurous funding bodies, is the potential block to funding that more radical artists may find. Only art that supports the current political climate will receive financial backing.

"Again the panel pulled out a number of examples, of performances that had been blocked from government financial support but which got up anyway through fundraising/private sponsorship. Interestingly Stephen Sewell found this to be an oppressive damper on artists and resulted in a lack of quality, challenging work, but Liz Ann McGregor felt the exact opposite - that a poorly financed/supported arts culture operating under conservative forces spurred artists on to challenge the controlling forces of the day."

Thanks for the report - if any of you out there know of or attend events you think our members should hear about, please let us know.

5. Valhalla DA on display for 3 more days

Graham Quint from the National Trust writes that the current development application for the Glebe Valhalla which is on public exhibition till 21st September:

Graham tells us "The development proposal envisages keeping the shops and the facade and foyer and undertaking restoration of these areas but putting offices into the main auditorium and then subdividing and strata titling the offices. While from a strictly construction viewpoint this could be reversed the subdivision and strata titling would make it highly unlikely that the Valhalla could ever be converted back to a cinema at any future time."

If you want to make a comment on this DA, email Philip Jamieson, pjamieson@cityofsydney.nsw.gov.au. Tell them in your own words what the Valhalla means to you, how important historic cinemas are, and why you believe the building should be retained in a form which could one day be a cinema again.