So we covered how successive Federal Government policy has been indecisive and downright contradictory, while having unrealistic expectations, I think it should be noted that the industry was also guided by the hands of its participants who have let it down.
While every time one of our directors or directors of Photography went to Hollywood for fame and glory, what they did was deprive the Australian Industry of a marketing position. Yes, that's right. For every Peter Weir or Gillian Armstrong who *made it* to Hollywood, it was also the case that there was one fewer director to invest in, back in Australia. It should also be noted that Australians, who speak English together with Canadians are the ideal fodder for Hollywood. It is much harder for a director from a non-English-speaking country to go to America. And yet it was this ease with which our creative talents went to America that drew the attention of Hollywood to us.
Was this good? It was a mixed blessing. If American money heads down to Australia and funds its pictures to be shot here, then there is a level of technical crew who stand to profit from this; and more power to them; and so they should because that money certainly wasn't going to be generated inside Australia. So films such as Star Wars episodes 2 and 3, Matrix 1 through to 3, which were all shot in Australia employed many crew personnel. However it should be noted that none of these films featured Australian creative control. No writers, no directors, and just one Australian producer. In essence, the boom of production thanks to the American industry was very deceptive in that it really didn't have anything to do with our industry in any cultural sense. Even a work such as Moulin Rouge, which was hailed as an Australian film, was in fact American product using American money for the American market. Let's face it, Nicole Kidman isn't exactly strutting her 'strine' in that film with Ewan McGregor's North Country brogue. Its international success disiguised the current malaise which has seemingly exploded, but was in fact in the making even then.
Hence my 'I told you so' tone here.
The rest of the industry was hoodwinked. The money the Americans spent here was for their own product. Our crew worked, and worked well, to make their product, which is better than not working, but it's not as good as making our product. It's not about jobs, it's also about the product. So what happened to our industry in the meantime? Our industry was still reliant on the FFC and AFC formulae, which in turn enforced a weird bureacrtic form of censorship over what gets made and more significantly, what doesn't get made; which ultimately would send our creatives to the wall. However this struggle for expression was veiled behind the apparaent blossoming of our film industry, thanks to american money.
Let me be blunt. There were 54 students who graduated with me from the Australian Film Television Radio School in 1993. Of whom I believe less than 5 have actually directed a Feature Film. Some have produced or written, others have languished in the hell of waiting to hear about hoiw our submissions are assessed by the FFC or the AFC. Each year there have been 100 or so film-makers graduating from courses all over New South Wales. Where the hell are their films? Where is their industry? It don't exist because for some warped reason, the money ear-marked for film productions simply vanished into the air through these bureaucracies - These people are driving expensive foreign cars, and all we want to do is practice our goddam crafts. I swear, we're fucking angry out here. Furious! I kid you not, and suddenly this year, Steven Smith says we're 'stuffed'. Well, Steve, let me just enlighten you that we've been stuffed for a good many years. Our 'stuffed' status didn't exactly come down in the last showers, mate.
Let's ask our selves some questions.
- Why is Australian Product so unattractive to the market?
- Why is Australian Product perceived to be so weak in the market place by international distributors?
- How is it that 280million dollars a year can be spent on our screen product and our industry is still in some kind of limbo?
And yet we felt it was important to make movies about indigenous concerns or quirky suburban romantic comedies or films that look so unattractive, you wouldn't watch it even if they paid you to watch it. My friend produced one of those, and it even opened at a famous Film Festival in the United States. It flopped; partly because he actually produced a worthy film that not one of his friends wanted to see; and he wonders where his career is headed. Go figure!
Now, he's been going to the SPAA conference for years and if anybody, he should have seen the writing on the wall, but he lived in denial through all of it because well, he was producing *something* even if your average Australian punter just didn't want to know about that film.
Another way to put all this is as follows:
Hong Kong has a thriving Cinema where it exports its product in spite of the language barrier. How does that work? The hallmark of Hong Kong's totally private (i.e. minimally supported by the government) film industry comes down to its dogged pursuit of genre pictures and quantity of productions. The Hong Kong producer would look at how many genre pictures they can produce for a certain amount of money while the Australian producer is pondering how to get government funding for this important story. In other words, Hong Kong cinema plays the numbers. After you produce 100 Kung Fu films one of them is bound to be both good as well as successful. This way, the risk is spread and increases the productivity of the industry as a whole.
A small model of this was carried out in the last place where I worked, Classroom Video, where come hell or high water, the company would produce 40-45 short videos a year. Some were good, many were not so good. Some were successful, some were less so. However, over all numbers of sales figures told us that the entire slate gave rise to a sustainable business; not one video or one project. So this model is in fact feasible even at the bottom end of the market, and that was under the condition where they were not necessarily competing for the entertainment dollar. Think about that for a moment. A sustainable audio-visual production house not aimed at the entertainment dollar.
Yet we have seen a good 15 years where Australian producers dare not challenge making genre pictures on the grounds that they are no more successful than the worthy pictures they make. Sorry to burst your bubble guys, but if you made 100 genre pictures and 10 *worthy pictures* at 10 times the budget and therefore *quality*, the chances are the 100 genre pictures will make a buck and allow you to make another 100 genre pics at a profit. That's called business. The 10 *worthy* pictures is called a stab in the dark. However, that's Australian producers on the whole; and every time the so-called industry is in crisis, they get together at SPAA and complain about the state of the industry ("it's Stuffed!"), then line up at the door of the government for more hand outs. No wonder our industry gets no respect from the Australian market place.
- Art Neuro
6 comments:
A better simile for this is that it is like New Coke and Classic Coke. When they introduced New Coke, they were confident on the basis of consumer tests that people liked it better. But the public campaigned to bring back Classic Coke. Those very people would always pick New Coke in blind taste tests as being preferable, but they thought they liked Classic Coke better.
The Australian Film Industry is just like that. Your average Australian wants there to be an Australian Film Industry, even if they never go to watch an Australian Film. It reassures them that America doesn't dominate the Australian cultural landscape. If it should disapear off the shelf, they would complain mightily, but in reality they're spending their entertainment bucks on Non-Australian Films. The numbers clearly say so.
It's Pathetic, really. I don't think the Industry is worth saving in its current shape. It's got too much fat. It's got to be pared back once again and get more focused on producing volume and market returns.
As my statistic lecturer never said, when dealing with people, '8 out of 10' is not significant. '16 out of 20' is significant.
IMHO, people turning up at droves at the cinemasweek after week, year after year, NOT to watch Australian product but foreign product, is *SIGNIFICANT*.
I think you have something there. I don't think it is the whole story. I think the vultures that have captured the culture industry have missed aspects of Australian culture.
One might think that school life was boring. It is not. It is dramatic and interesting. There are an infinite number of variations that would be worthy in portraying Australian school life on a cinema screen. But it won't happen. Unless the following takes place.
1) exposition of adult exploitation of adolescent sexuality (sort of worldwide experience)
2) exposition of legal aspects of sexual discovery by adolescents.
3) exposition of same sex coupling in adolescents.
4) exploration of how poor adolescent choice leads to poor career choice.
But the simple drama of school life, hung on a framework of simple experience is considered to be generic, not cultural, wheras the generic stuff above is promoted with Australian anacronisms.
I can see your story and I know you have talent. I believe that there are vultures that pprevent you having your expression of your talent for largely political reasons. In the world you live in, it scores points that 350 million dollars not be spent so that some anti government activist can make a point.
Remember (Weasel here) that the Matrix deals and Lucas projects were with NSW government through Fox studios, not the Australian Government through film projects. Seems political to me, no matter how it is dressed up.
I think I covered the political angle/problem in Part one. Both the major parties want a film industry AS cultural industry, and they both want it to be a profitable industry not in need of government funding. The Coalition believed in inentives and that got cut back by labor. Labor believed in direct funding through selections by *expert* committees; they never found those experts and eventually the Coalition cut back the funding. So, it's been +6 to the right, -6 to the Left, +6 to the Left -6 to the Right. Neither of them are making it work because they've not conceived of a film industry with coherent realistic goals.
If politics followed such simple divisions, then sensible people would fix the problems. You once correctly wrote that politics is not logic, but emotion. Australian film industry is a product and parcel with and of the emotion.
People don't want to be persuaded of things. People want to be endorsed. They want to back winners. People will go to extraordinary lengths to look good when their heroes do something stupid.
This is the heart of the problem that faces the conservative voice that wishes to act responsibly when placed in charge. If a conservative government takes control it is fascist. If it pays up and leaves alone its irresponsible. If it attempts to place checks and balances it is meddling.
But it is ok for non conservatives to not be conservative. So the ''Its Time' jingle is said to be snappy. Beazley can make a pie bald lie about an FTA agreement only being possible under ALP and it will be reported without a twitch or smile. Actors and producers will baldly state they despise Conservatives. Compare the treatment of Linda Rondstadt and Arnold Schwarzenegger. Or Ronald Reagan and Mary Tyler Moore.
The US movie industry created an animmal that produced the lies recounted in "Billy Jack." The Australian film industry came back with 'Barry McKenzie' and 'Alvin Purple' In all of these dramas, the point often made is that it is ok to not be conservative. The iconic nature of these films is the image that places the conservative as being corrupt and out of place. A control freak. Whereas the non conservative is 'chill,' can let his hair down, relax and do 'what has to be done.' These iconic films are still produced in Oz. They still promote a lifestyle that the audience know to be false.
Compare the conservative in Muriel's Wedding with the ones of 'The Castle' with the ones of 'Alvin' and 'Bbarry" and you see no change.
Notice these cultural expositions are 'comedies.' However, such works as 'The Piano' and "Picnic at Hanging Rock.' Award winning films. Portrayal of culture is neither accurate nor likely. In the 1900's, if a turd cut off the fingers of his wife he would be hung under English Law. Headmistresses of important schools were, if they were evil, were evil because they were too close to their charges, not coldly distant. An accurate portrayal of either situation would be better dramatically as it would allow the audience more access. The success of these films is due to other reasons than their cultural exposition, which is neither daring nor challenging of the status quo.
The fact is, that the request of the Fed Government to correct bias in ABC reporting is responsible government. The response of the ABC and its supporters is indicative of why the malaise in the industry won't end.
The sad result is good people miss out on work for the same reason that the GST and the FTA was corrupted at implementation. Sheer bloody mindedness by those emotional beings that champion their heroes no matter what.
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