News

Stephen Curry.

Port Shorts Film Festival ambassadors Stephen Curry (The Castle, The Cup), Wolf Creek Ep Matt Hearn and.screenwriter Kier Shorey (Blurred), will deliver a free workshop in Port Douglas later this month.

They will be joined by Screen Queensland production incentive and attractions Manager Gina Black and New York Film Academy Australia.s Brian Vining and Dean Mayer.

.Do you guys even bother watching the weather report up there with your balmy winter sunsets? It.s bloody freezing here in Melbourne,. Curry said.

.Coincidently, Matt, Kier and I are very excited to be involved in these workshops helping young and emerging filmmakers develop their skills and build confidence in their craft.

.To be honest I.m probably not going to be much help, but the rest of the panel really know their stuff so it should be a great opportunity for anyone interested in filmmaking to come along and pick their collective brains.

Distributors in the Us, the UK and Turkey have bought The Fear of Darkness, a supernatural thriller from writer-director Chris Fitchett.

Producer Mark Overett is planning to stage Q&A screenings attended by Fitchett and key cast around Australia following the April 11 world premiere at the Gold Coast Film Festival.

He.s just done a deal with Transmission to release the film on DVD and Blu-ray, VOD and pay-per-view.

The saga of a brilliant young psychiatrist who is forced to confront the dark creature that dwells deep within her own unconscious when she investigates the disappearance of a university student, the film stars Penelope Mitchell, Maeve Dermody, Aaron Pedersen, Mark Leonard Winter, Damien Garvey and Christopher Sommers.

Alchemy (formerly Millennium Entertainment ) bought. the Us rights and Signature got the UK rights from the worldwide sales agent Arclight.

.We.re on the road to breaking even,. Overett tells If. He and...

Maeve Dermody, Penelope Mitchell and Damien Garvey have been cast in The Fear of Darkness, a supernatural thriller from writer-director Chris Fitchett which starts shooting March 6 on the Gold Coast.

Dermody (Serangoon Road, Griff the Invisible) will play a brilliant young psychiatrist who is forced to confront the dark creature that dwells deep within her when she investigates the disappearance of a female university student.

Mitchell, who was a regular in the Us TV series Hemlock Grove and appears in The Vampire Diaries, plays a patient in a psychiatric clinic who is accused of a gruesome crime.

Damien Garvey (Rake, Network Ten.s upcoming Secrets & Lies) will portray a cop who investigates the disappearance. Casting of two other key roles is due to be confirmed shortly.

The project was developed through Screen Queensland.s low budget feature film initiative. The producer is Mark Overett (Iron Sky, Separation City,. Unfinished Sky...

Family adventure film Nim's Island 2, starring Bindi Irwin, has begun shooting on the Gold Coast.

The film also stars Us actor Matthew Lillard (The Descendants, Scooby Doo), who plays marine scientist Jack, the father of Nim (Bindi Irwin), as well as local actors John Waters (Looking Through the Glass Onion, Offspring), Toby Wallace (Surviving Georgia, Neighbours), Nathan Derrick (Rush, Bed of Roses), Sebastian Gregory (Neighbours, Accidents Happen) and Jack Pearson (Winners & Losers).

The original Nim's Island grossed $US48 million in North America and almost $6.2 million at the Australian box office. While it was shot in Queensland, it did not qualify as an Australian production, unlike the sequel which is now underway.

Nim's Island was a far bigger production, starring Jodi Foster, and was distributed by Universal. The sequel will be distributed in Australia by Pinnacle Films, which has specialised in limited theatrical releases, while international distribution is being handled by Walden Entertainment.

From Nirvana (and Isabel Lucas) fans to seventy-year-olds, Gale Edwards’ debut feature A Heartbeat Away targets an unusually wide demographic. Miguel Gonzalez reports.

Originally titled Montague Municipal, the script was submitted by a Queensland Investment Corporation equities dealer, Julia Kincade, to an initiative set up by the Pftc and Pictures in Paradise to find new writers.

“New writers come up with fantastic ideas and they’re very open to changes, which I’m not sure more experienced writers are. The downside is that it can sometimes take a long time, because they’re not full-time writers and they’ve got other jobs,” said producer Chris Fitchett.

Two scripts from that scheme were soon made into films, Blurred in 2002 and Under the Radar in 2004, but the process for this one would be much slower. Chris Fitchett was working on the film as script editor with Brown producing, but both got distracted by other projects.