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$500,000 up for grabs for feature

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Funding
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Screen Australia’s multi-platform drama program has the scope to invest up to $500,000 in a low budget feature- yet not one feature producer has applied.

The fund, which has $4.2 million to invest this financial year, is willing to support feature-length projects from applicants who have a significant social media audience.

That’s defined as a channel with more than 100,000 subscribers or followers, or a video with more than 1 million views and at least 25,000 subscribers.

The creative team must include a producer and director with at least one credit on a comparable project which has been publicly released.

Screen Australia’s report entitled Issues in Feature Film Distribution unveiled last Thursday noted, “To date, Screen Australia has received no applications for low-budget feature films through this program.”

Investment manager Mike Cowap tells IF he believes he has not been flooded with applications because the guidelines were clarified, specifically to include low-budget features, six weeks ago and word hasn't spread.

Cowap welcomes applications for funding for features that are part of a multi-platform project. “So much talent is emerging from YouTube and other social media we are keen to see how they can apply those skills and knowledge,” he says.

The program’s remit is to invest in the production of narrative projects that take risks and push the envelope of fiction storytelling on traditional and non-traditional platforms. 

They could be comedy or drama projects distributed on any platform (including traditional TV, online web series, tablet, mobile and PC based distribution) or on multiple platforms. An online platform must form a central element of the project’s distribution plan.

The fund has supported The Divorce, a contemporary comedic opera starring Lisa McCune, Marina Prior, Hugh Sheridan, Kate Miller-Heidke, John O’May, Matthew McFarlane, Melissa Madden-Gray and Peter Couse, which is now shooting as a 4-part TV series and feature.

A collaboration between Princess Pictures, ABC TV Arts and Opera Australia, it's written by Joanna Murray-Smith, directed by Dean Murphy and produced by Andrea Denholm.

Universal Home Entertainment has acquired the feature and is planning an event-style theatrical release via Universal Pictures.
 

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3 Comments

  1. So, the assistance is only for people or companies which are alreadu famous and don’t meed help anyway?
    That’s what the preconditions seem to indicate.
    Waste of time even publicising this, umless the intention is to taunt indy film makers with things they can’t have.

    Reply

  2. Good afternoon

    I have a plot in mind that would gurantee a profit and it involves India one of the leading film industries

    all I need is a writer and a crew to put my plan in motion. My well deserved portion can be used to donate to a bloody good cause. You want a challenge I’ll help you put your money where …..

    Regards

    Reply

  3. This so called offer above is typical of the way so many operate in a country where hit and miss is the general record of dramatic film production.

    When forming a sports team, do they ask for anyone who has a social media following or a You tube video?
    if a champion comes along, do we make a decision, or do we ask for a testimonial and a record of success?

    We could send our prospect to Athlete training school and employ the best coach in the world, only to have our kid beaten by a totally unheard of fellow from an African nation we also never heard of.

    Producers, or “wanna be” Producers who think that a star and a top director will guarantee a return at the box office know less about film production than the birds singing in the trees.

    The magnificent classic, Brief Encounter, with Trevor Howard and Celia Johnson (G-d bless her memory) was very nearly scrapped and destroyed by panic ridden producers who thought it was an embarrassment, and sought to kill it before it was released; thankfully they failed.

    Conversely, so many obviously thought that, Strangerland, was a worthwhile production that ticked all the boxes. Any first year drama student could have told the producers to invest elsewhere, but there we have it, under our noses in video shop sale bins for $2.50cents.

    We must stop this quasi corporate, quasi banker mentality. The production of film drama is the production of theatre, and theatre is a stand alone craft and art, that also requires specialist knowledge, fiscal restraint and the hand of a financial manager, but it cannot be constructed by committee, cut off by the meter, and reckoned against a cost and return sheet.

    When we make films, we are creating and story telling. We use a script of imagined conversation and intent, we make a great many still images through a kaleidoscope of lights and colours. We then force them to move past a single frame, and be illuminated and projected at a constant speed, in the hope that the resultant images cast against a screen, and sound through the speakers will draw in an audience, capture their spirits, and lift their hearts for a couple of hours. For this, we expect to pay and to be paid.

    Reply

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