Screen Canberra has backed seven projects with $355,000, including horror film Sissy, expected to shoot by the end of the year.
The CBR Screen Fund has supported Sissy with production investment, and will also provide development support for Little One, a TV adaptation by Peter Papathanasiou of his memoir of the same title; Paranormal Blacktivity, a TV series conceived by Indigenous comedians, and comedy feature film Swing Set.
CBR Screen Fund manager Sophie Harper said: “The quality, diversity and sheer number of projects we’re seeing as this challenging year comes to a close is heartening. It’s also wonderful to see feature film production up and running again in the ACT with horror film Sissy set to shoot before the end of the year.”
Three projects will also share in development support via Made in CBR, the agency’s COVID support fund. They include two TV series, Cipher from Naomi Telushkin and Girl on the Moon from Georgina Jenkins; and a feature film adaptation by Joshua Koske of The Grief Hole, in collaboration with the novel’s Canberra-based author Kaaron Warren.
Screen Canberra CEO Monica Penders said: “The effects of COVID are still far reaching in our local industry and we are happy that we can continue to offer support. We look forward to 2021 seeing a return to more production in the Territory.”
The CBR Screen Fund projects:
SISSY
Producers: Lisa Shaunessy, John De Margheriti
Writer/Directors: Hannah Barlow, Kane Senes
Production Investment, Feature Film (horror)
Invited away on a hens weekend, Sissy is stuck in a remote cabin with her high school bully… and a taste for revenge. #triggered
LITTLE ONE
Writer: Peter Papathanasiou
Producers: Peter Andrikidis, Shannon Wilson-McClinton
Director: Peter Andrikidis
Development Loan, TV Series (adaptation, biopic)
A family’s unity is challenged when a buried truth about an adoption is revealed, forcing a scholarly son and his devoted mother to struggle through a journey of self-discovery. Studying for his PhD in genetics, the son is stunned to hear that his own genetics are not as he expected, while the mother relives the heartbreaking events that led her to such a decision. Spanning a hundred years and four generations, this true story shows how they reconcile a painful migrant past, uncertain present, and whether they have a future together as a family.
PARANORMAL BLACKTIVITY
Writers: Benny Eggmolesse, Jacob Keed, Nayuka Gorrie, Romina Accurso
Producers: Benny Eggmolesse, Joe Weatherstone, Catherine Nabauer and Scott Wilson
Development Loan, TV Series (horror)
Rival siblings must team up to investigate bloody murders, strange disappearances and super weird stuff they suspect are caused by ancient Aboriginal monsters, woken by an imbalance in the natural world.
SWING SET
Writer: Stephen Davis
Producers: Shannon Wilson-McClinton, Jonathan Page, Stephen Davis
Director: Louise Alston
Development Loan, Feature Film (comedy)
A middle-aged couple go to a swinger’s party to find other people. But in the end they find each other.
Made in CBR projects:
THE GRIEF HOLE
Fiction Feature Film – Development loan
Writers: Joshua Koske, Kaaron Warren
When an embattled social worker with the ability to see how people die discovers her cousin’s suicide was influenced by a seductive and powerful celebrity, she must overcome her own personal tragedies and work with other gifted individuals to put a stop to his reign of terror before they become the next in a long line of willing victims.
CIPHER
Television Series Fiction – Development loan
Writers: Naomi Telushkin, Chris Squadrito
Set in the world of celebrity, the bureaucratic hellscape that is Canberra, and the growing underground of the Australian white supremacy movement, CIPHER is a blackly comic drama about the surprising (and true) quest to unite an acting coach, an ASIO agent and a violent extremist in order to stop a devastating terrorist attack…
GIRL ON THE MOON
Television Series Fiction – Development loan
Writers: Georgina Jenkins, Sue McPherson
In 2069, Aboriginal Australian girl Luna (17), the only child ever born on the Moon, dreams of travelling to Earth to connect with her unknown father and her culture. But she knows her weak Moonling body would never survive. Luna is about to discover she is more powerful than any Earthling.