BLUE-TONGUE FILMS – making the cut

HE CITES Gene Hackman as his role model and – if all goes according to plan – could become Australia’s most unlikely leading man since Geoffrey Rush and his Oscar-winning turn in SHINE. He is Joel Edgerton: Australia’s man of the moment in Hollywood, star of the new Aussie thriller WISH YOU WERE HERE, and part of the filmmaking collective Blue-Tongue, which was lauded by many as the future of the Australian film industry after producing ANIMAL KINGDOM.

Briefly back in Sydney recently, Edgerton is all-too aware of the need to maximize opportunity while it’s there – he spent a decade breaking into Hollywood, after all – and believes the ‘clubhouse’, (which is how he describes Blue-Tongue), is vital to his creative output, and that of fellow club-member, actor-director Kieran Darcy-Smith. The othes are Joel’s film-maker brother Nash Edgerton, writer-director Spencer Susser, editor Luke Doolan, stuntman/actor Tony Lynch and ANIMAL KINGDOM director David Michod.

Curiously wary of his legacy at age 37, Edgerton insists there’s no better way to foster talent and maintain the momentum kick-started by Michod’s critically acclaimed debut feature, in 2010.

“David’s success with ANIMAL KINGDOM had a residue that rubbed off on all of us,” Edgerton told Unwind at the world premiere of WISH YOU WERE HERE at the Sundance Film Festival in Utah. “Hopefully, it’ll continue. We didn’t really intend it, but we’re happy that [Blue-Tongue] evolved like that. What it is, is a bunch of guys who all like each other’s work. Now, whenever I write something, I’ll hand it to the other guys, and they tell me what’s wrong with it.”

Although he’s busy making back-to-back films this year – he’s currently shooting Kathryn Bigelow’s Osama Bin Laden feature in Jordan – Edgerton remains a prolific writer. He already has one script sold in the US – an ode to the films of John Hughes called ONE-NIGHT STAND – with three others in development: the follow-up to ANIMAL KINGDOM, THE ROVER (co-written with Michod); a follow-up to THE SQUARE (co-written with Nash Edgerton); and a self-penned police thriller, set in the multi-cultural western suburbs of Sydney, where he grew up. All are Blue-Tongue co-productions.

Despite the critical buzz that follows much of their work, not everyone is convinced. Given that last year was Australian cinema’s worst in a decade (less than 4 per cent of the movie-going public watched a local film in 2011), critical applause is not enough.

Gary Hamilton, who heads up global sales-production house Arclight – and whose latest hit, A FEW BEST MEN, is enjoying a world-wide rollout (including Russia, Vietnam and Italy, where it’s taken 2.5 million Euros at the box office) despite receiving mixed reviews at home – believes independent producers and their respective collectives sound nice in theory, but can prove counterproductive in practice.

“I’d be more interested in seeing another STRICTLY BALLROOM, to be honest,” he says, on the phone from Beijing, following A FEW BEST MEN’s premiere there. “We’ve got to make international movies, films that people want to go and see. No one’s interested in film festival films. And having individual producers is not the way to build an industry. As much as I liked ANIMAL KINGDOM very much – it was wonderful – I don’t see it as a model. Australia needs to get away from the mindset that that alone will build a filmmaking community. It won’t.”

Hamilton, whose list of successes include 2005’s WOLF CREEK, and who’s next release, Aussie shark thriller BAIT 3D, precedes his multi-director project with John Polson, SYDNEY UNPLUGGED – is busily capitalizing on the government’s producer offset tax break to encourage more production back to Australia. That, he says, as with making commercial movies, is the only way the industry can grow.

“The best thing would be to have it increased,” he says, of the 40 per cent payback option for investors. “The high dollar puts people off – Canada and Louisiana are as good as Australia [with tax breaks]. We’re trying to help develop a commercial movie business for Australia. To do that, you need to lobby government and business for film.”

WISH YOU WERE HERE may not fit such a mould, but the husband-and-wife team behind it – writer-director Darcy-Smith and writer-cum-star Felicity Price – are adamant that, given its generally positive reception at Sundance, such a universal story that Australians, in particular, can relate to should resonate strongly with the cinema-going public. Even if ANIMAL KINGDOM’s $5 million-plus local box-office haul proves elusive.

“ANIMAL KINGDOM was something of a masterpiece,” Price says, matter-of-factly. “That was quite an out-of-the-box success, it just doesn’t happen that often. I mean, it got Oscar-nominated, when does that happen? You just have to accept it and move on.”

Regardless of how well it plays out in theatres, its creative alumini are determind to continue on their path, pointing to a potentially divided landscape in the years ahead. What, after all, is more important: cultural awareness or commercial enterprise?

Edgerton believes a middle ground of sorts is possible with his teammates. “I want them to carry something more,” he says of the stories he and his Blue-Tongue colleagues are currently developing, and of his choices as an actor. “I mean, it has to be a commercial thing. I’m trying not to get lured by money. The real question is: do they resonate beyond entertainment? If so, we’re doing something right.”

BLUE-TONGUE FILMS: THE PRODUCERS

Despite their all-male lineup, the Blue-Tongue collective has an impressive roll-call of tough-talking female producers to thank for its successes. You could say as the women handle the purse strings, the men go off and create. Edgerton, currently securing financing for three projects, including one in Australia, says it’s hardly surprising the members of Blue-Tongue have surrounded themselves with a likeminded group of savvy women. “Kieran [Darcy-Smith] has aligned himself with Angie Fielder, David [Michod]’s got Liz Watts, Nash [Joel’s brother] is working with Louise Smith,” he says. “And the movie I’m working on here, I’m working with Rebecca Yeldham (an Austalian girl who’s produced stuff like THE MOTORCYCLE DIARIES). We’ve got these people filling in the parts of the industry that we’re not really good at: robust creative financing. We say ANIMAL KINGDOM is a Blue-Tongue film, or a David Michod film, but really it’s a Liz Watts film, a Porchlight film. David is part of Blue-Tongue. But without Liz, ANIMAL KINGDOM would never have made.”

WISH YOU WERE HERE is in cinemas from Wednesday.

ANIMAL KINGDOM and THE SQUARE are both available on DVD/Blu-ray.

ED GIBBS

First published in The Sun-Herald.