Southern Film Scene Flourishes
While we reach the end of 2022 with continued uncertainty around the Screen Production Grant review and the new entity Aotearoa New Zealand Public Media legislation decision “to merge or not to merge” we here down south use this time to sharpen our tools and wits. Regionally all we’re aiming for is a sustainable future but with so many unknowns we can only just continue to collate, craft and collaborate good working relationships within our region.
Some highlights for those locals whose collaboration we commemorate – Jacinta Compton & Millie Cossou’s The Girl, The Lamb and The Man was selected for the Sydney Women’s International Film Festival while Rebecca Tansley’s The Finding was selected for the upcoming Canberra short film festival.
Good Company Arts’ film Equilibrists won Best Art Music Video at International Music Video Awards in Budapest. Additionally, Best Independent Experimental Film at Asia’s Best Independent Experimental Film Festival, for their film Voyager / Tal.
The 20th year of 48-hour film competitions saw 500 entries around the country and though our numbers were smaller than other regions we say congrats to St Hilda’s High School team trio, Lily Knox, Kate McEwan & Courtney Lloyd (together make Cinnamon Cinemas) who took home the prize for best school entry. It was a great wee homage to Film Noir, equally funny and absurd.
Workshop wise, we were fortunate to see Miranda Harcourt come to town (thank you Dan Eady for arranging this) to present a Directing Masterclass which was hugely popular bringing in interested parties from all over the Otago region. We are hopeful this is not a one-off. Locals Rose Jameison and Mark John were selected for the latest Share the Knowledge Production Sound Course, with FOS and DCC providing travel grants to attend.
Outside of the happenings generated within the city we saw Ki Studio drop a Bollywood shoot on our beaches at the end of November. Unfortunately, minimal local crewing on this one which was a missed opportunity for them!
We did however welcome the chance to highlight our locations, Production space and crew capacity for the Domestic feature One Winter. While the core team were ex Auckland having begun production there we filled majority of the roles within Dunedin and Otago region. The largest day on set was for a riot scene where we had approximately 120 crew, 50% being Dunedin based, 25% Otago based and a riot crowd of 250 Dunedin extras who brought the look, the sound and the essence of the real deal Springbok protestors.
More talks had on possible future TV Series and Features sitting with blinking green lights for 2023… likely to be waiting for the final decision on where SPG review will sit before they push go. One hopes it will end with an agreed status quo. If it ain’t broke…
I hope you all have a peaceful, Covid free Xmas and a replenishing NY to welcome in 2023.
Rebecca Rowe
