[My First Published Article About Film] Yay!

One of my goals for 2008 was to be writing for some kind of film publication before the year was out. I had this pipe dream of being able to swing myself a press pass for the 2009 Cannes Film Festival... hey, everyone is allowed to dream big right? I looked at a number of actual print magazines and such, of which the lefty global monthly 'New Internationalist' seemed the ideal fit for me. I sent them a couple of emails, but the time obviously wasn't right for me to be contributing for such an esteemed publication. Towards the end of the year, I did a big email-out to a variety of online culture publications. I did not get any replies. On NYE I reflected back on the year and was a bit disappointed that I hadn't achieved this goal. The next morning I woke up to find an email reply from one of the culture websites I had expressed an interest in writing for - "you are a great writer, and we would love you to contribute for us". Needless to say, I was pretty happy, and smiled to myself, 'better late than never'.

The website is www.twoflatwhites.com and they exist to provide up and coming Australian writers and artists a platform from which to express their opinions. As such, the content is specifically focused on Australian culture (film, music, fashion, art, and food).

Whatever I would chose to write about, it had to be something to do with the Australian film industry. This was a bit of a concern to me, as I had previously turned my nose up to the majority of Australian films. I am not sure why this was. But I later discovered that I was certainly not alone in this attitude. Throughout the month of January, I rented about 7 Australian DVDs each week. Much to my surprise (and joy!), I began to realise that the general ethos of Australian films contained everything that I love about cinema - just really good quality social realism movies. I watched about 25 DVDs in January, of which the following just completely blew me away: 'Lantana', 'Romulus, My Father', 'Walking On Water', '2:37', 'Beneath Clouds', and 'Somersault'. All of these were released in the last decade.

I was now starting to get a feel for Australian films. So.. what to write about? I knew that I wanted my first piece to be a bit broader than simply a film review. I remembered a quote from UK comedian Ricky Gervais, writer/star of 'The Office' and 'Extras', where he said that "it's always helpful to write about what you know." Well, I knew that no less than 3 months ago I was of the opinion that Australian cinema couldn't possibly stand up against European films. And I knew that I wasn't alone in this opinion. And I now knew that this was not the case, and that this apathy towards our film industry was a problem that needs to be addressed. Therefore, I decided to write my first article about just that - my perspective of the state of the Australian film industry. I sent it through to 'TwoFlatWhites', and they were really happy with it and are looking forward to further contributions. It feels good to once again have something of a ball rolling, so I'm pretty inspired now to get back to regularly writing about cinema.

Here is my article - I hope it may encourage you to check out some more Australian movies, if you are not already doing so!