Out Takes

This week on Out Takes, we celebrated the return to business of some of our favourite independent local cinemas.

We were joined by CEO of Cinema Nova Kristian Connelly and owner of Lido, Classic and Cameo cinemas, Eddie Tamir. Both Connelly and Tamir are joining us to talk about the ways that our cinemas have been impacted by the current public health crisis, and what we can expect from local cinemas as they reopen over the coming weeks.

In this Out Takes retrospective, we look back at our coverage of how the COVID19 public health crisis has effected our local film and cinema industries. We revisit exclusive Out Takes interviews with Cinema Nova CEO Kristian Connelly, Director of the Sydney Film Festival, Nashen Moodley, ABC Director of Entertainment and Specialist Programming, Michael Carrington and St Kilda Film Festival Director, Richard Sowada.

This week on Out Takes, as protesters take to streets across the globe demanding an end to racism, we looked at the ways in which race relations, rebellion and resistance are addressed in queer cinema.

In particular, we spoke with Herbert Peck about his award winning documentary, I AM NOT YOUR NEGRO, which paints an incendiary portrait of James Baldwin and race relations in 20th century America.

We also revisited interviews with the film makers behind documentaries like CHECK IT and KIKI and Barry Jenkins, the visionary director of IF BEALE STREET COULD TALK and the Academy Award winning MOONLIGHT.

To support local and national anti racism organisations, see this fantastic list of resources courtesy of the Victorian Women’s Trust.

Anti-Racism Resources from Australia and Beyond

This week on Out Takes, we celebrated the St Kilda Film Festival, which returns to screens for a bumper online edition this June.

St Kilda Film Festival features a number of curated sessions and some of Australia’s best short films.

Our guests were Festival Director, Richard Sowada, and film maker Jamieson Pearce, whose new short film STRANGERS features in this year’s “Forbidden Fruits” collection of short, LGBT leaning films.

Hungry for more short films? We also looked at some of the queer short features streaming online as part of this year’s Sydney Film Festival.

This week on Out Takes, we looked at #metoo cinema in the post Harvey Weinstein era.

Our guest was Kitty Green, whose new film, THE ASSISTANT, has been called ‘a significant cultural statement in cinematic form’.

THE ASSISTANT follows Jane, the assistant to a powerful entertainment mogul, who slowly becomes aware of the coercion and abuse that colors every aspect of her industry.

Like BOMBSHELL and Ryan Murphey’s HOLLYWOOD, THE ASSISTANT is part of a spate of new productions that have sought to make sense of power, abuse and the #metoo era.

Two of the best queer films of 2020 have come via Netflix and this week on Out Takes we were extremely honoured to have the directors of both documentaries joining us on the show.

Rachel Mason’s film ‘Circus of Books’ looks at her parents legacy in LGBTIQ history through their legendary gay book stores of the same name and Chris Bolan shares the incredibly moving tale of his Great Aunt Terry, her wife Pat and their 72 year love story in ‘A Secret Love’.

We also explored the representation of LGBTIQ families in cinema including the importance of our chosen families alongside our biological ones.

This week on Out Takes we celebrated the release of HOLLYWOOD, Ryan Murphy’s much anticipated new miniseries on Netflix. HOLLYWOOD follows an aspiring group of actors and filmmakers trying to make their dreams come true in Hollywood’s golden age.

There’s no doubt that Murphy tips his hat to the golden age. But how much of HOLLYWOOD is true? We’re sorting fact from fiction as we celebrate Murphy’s revisionist and optimistic take. We also looked at some of the films that you should watch if you loved the series: think SCOTTY AND THE SECRET HISTORY OF HOLLYWOOD, ALL THAT HEAVEN ALLOWS and FAR FROM HEAVEN.

This week on Out Takes, we continued our look at the ways in which the COVID19 public health crisis has impacted the film and cinema industries in Australia and around the world.

Film productions are in hiatus. Cinemas are closed. And the industry is scrambling to find a way to survive what has already been a bleak few months. But it’s not all bad news. We explored some of the brilliant new initiatives to keep film and cinema industries afloat and to keep you entertained.

Our first guest was Sydney Film Festival Director, Nashen Moodley, who joined us to talk about WE ARE ONE, a new digital global film festival set to hit YouTube later this month. WE ARE ONE brings together 20 of the most preeminent film festivals from across the globe for 10 days of free-to-watch programming, including some of the most anticipated yet-to-be-released independent films.

We also spoke with friend of the program and MQFF Program Director, Spiro Economopoulos, about MQFF COUCH CRITIC, the Festival’s new online competition designed to get you reviewing your favourite queer films.

And finally, we were joined by Michael Carrington, the Director of Entertainment and Specialist Programming at the ABC. We spoke with Michael about the ABC’s groundbreaking FRESH START FUND, which provides urgent and critical support to independent Australian producers. The FRESH START FUN is a new 5 million dollar initiative designed to safeguard local content and support Australian creatives through the unprecedented current public health crisis.

It’s that time of year again! JOY 94.9 is Australia’s premiere LGBTI radio station and it needs your help. So this week on Out Takes, we’re celebrating RADIOTHON – JOY’s annual supporter drive – and the importance of keeping independent programs like OUT TAKES on the air.

This year’s RADIOTHON theme is We Are You, so we’re bringing the Out Takes family together for a very special Out Takes look at why LGBTI representation in film is so important and why seeing ourselves on the big screen matters.

We’re looking back at a number of exclusive Out Takes interviews that have highlighted the importance of queer representation, including chats with Academy Award winning director Barry Jenkins, bi-icon Desiree Akihvan and academic Ruby Rich, who coined the phrase New Queer Cinema some thirty years ago. These are Out Takes exclusives that demonstrate just how important independent voices can be.

This week on Out Takes, as we continue to scramble for online content like we never really have before, we took al ook at some of the best, or most queer and campy web series, available online. And we asked the million dollar question, what makes a good web series?

To help us with this question we were joined by online content creator and producer of IGGY & ACE 5EVA, Hannah Ngo. IGGY & ACE 5EVA is a new, Screen Australia funded web series that explores friendship, addiction and recovery through a queer lens. 

We also revisited our chat with Boaz Stark, the writer director and producer of THE HORIZON. Set in Sydney, THE HORIZON follows country boy Jake as he explores life and love in the big city. It is apparently the most watched web series in the world, grossing over 80,000 views every day.