The duo behind Melbourne's Cinema Nova, Barry Peak and Natalie Miller, are set to open a new cinema in December.
Natalie Miller has so often been the only woman on boards, she has a t-shirt that says "Gentlemen and Natalie". So she's pleased to see the fellowship that was started in her name continue to bolster female leaders in the screen industry.
Since being awarded the 2022 Natalie Miller Fellowship grant, Melbourne Women in Film Festival director Sian Mitchell has travelled to France and Canada to gather knowledge on events similar to her own and establish international ties.
Head of programming for both the Gold Coast Film Festival and Brisbane International Film Festival, Sasha Close, has been appointed president of the Natalie Miller Fellowship.
You won't see Marvel films or 'Star Wars' playing at Melbourne's Cinema Nova, something co-founder Natalie Miller jokes is "either clever or stupid, I'm not sure which". For 30 years, the Carlton cinema has carved a niche by sticking to its brand of arthouse cinema programming, and is today the largest independent cinema in the Southern Hemisphere.
Cinemas in metro-Melbourne are able to reopen to fully vaccinated patrons tonight from 6pm, at 75 per cent capacity or up to 1,000 people. With Melbourne the most locked-down city in the world, IF talks to Village Cinemas executive general manager Nic Robin and Cinema Nova joint executive director Natalie Miller about how they have fared and how they see the theatrical landscape.
Storyteller and producer Pauline Clague is the recipient of this year's $20,000 Natalie Miller Fellowship.
Most independent Australian distributors are doing it tough, forced to postpone releases while the exhibition business languishes with Victorian cinemas closed and seating capacity restricted in the rest of the country.