latest news
A Film to Tweet About
Director makes a unique debut feature film inspired by social networking sites
Another Win For Carmilla Hyde
A revenge thriller takes out Best Feature at the 2010 South Australian Screen Awards
Calling All Screenwriters
A new social networking site claims to help aspiring screenwriters showcase their work to industry professionals
Lurking Beneath
An Australian sci-fi/horror flick is set to hit local cinemas in the next few months, but not as you know it
search the site
newsletter
Enter your email address below to receive the weekly Filmink newsletter
Ex-Pats Daddo And Milliken’s New Film
Passengers, a drama about Aussie ex-pats by Aussie ex-pats to have local premiere at Adelaide Fringe.
Adelaide will be the first to view Michael Bond's Passengers, an independent feature film, shot in LA and post-produced in Australia.
Starring Cameron Daddo, who has been jobbing in LA as an actor since the mid-‘90s, Passengers will showcase at The Adelaide Fringe Film Festival in two screenings scheduled for February 24 and 26.
Made by a small team of ex-pat Aussie filmmakers who met in Los Angeles, Passengers stars Cameron Daddo as Tom, an aspiring screenwriter, finally getting a foothold in Hollywood with his writing partner, the comparatively affluent Roger (Hollywood character actor stalwart Bruce Davison from X-Men and Short Cuts amongst many many others). Meanwhile, Tom's wife, Melony (Angie Milliken, who after conquering local stage and screen has also moved to LA where she's recently popped up in an episode CSI: Miami), a struggling actress in her mid-30s is not so subtly losing her sanity.
The majority of the film takes place in the confines of a car. Tom and Melony set out from their home in Santa Monica to meet friends for dinner in Hollywood. It's Friday night - they hit traffic. By the time they arrive, their marriage is over. Their fragile marriage and Melony's tortured psyche unravel during a laborious conversation in which they battle congested traffic and each other on their way to a Hollywood restaurant.
"The idea genuinely came from the feeling of being stuck in your car and being unable to move," says writer director Michael Bond, also an Aussie ex-pat trying to give it a go in LA. "At the same time I was trying to figure out a script that was concerned with love and relationships and really reflect love in the modern world and the pressures that the modern world puts on a relationship. It also came from the idea of ex- pats because I'd just come over from Australia to LA to start my new life which brings all sorts of pressures. So it was really an amalgamation of those things in my head."
According to the press release, Passengers is brutally honest, thought provoking and confronting. "Passengers was a great opportunity to show a range of emotions, and you don't get offered that opportunity many times in your career to handle such complex material," says leading man Cameron Daddo, who first broke into our consciousness as the host of Perfect Match, and is also the eldest of the famous Daddo media clan.
"It was just a beautifully worded script and a challenge at the same time," he continues. "Because there's just me and one other actress, in a continuous mid- shot I really like to convey a depth and arch of emotion about a character. Passengers gave me a huge opportunity in that way."
Inspired by the likes of Polanski and Cassavetes, th film premiered at the Mill Valley Film Festival in the US in October 2009, and has found fans in director Joe Carnahan (Narc, Smokin' Aces) who described it as "compulsive viewing" and revered actress Gena Rowlands (wife of the late John Cassavetes) who said that it was "very well acted, very well written and eloquently directed...about the complexities of love."
Decide for yourself when the Australian premiere happens in Adelaide later this month.
"I hope that people take away from this film that love comes in many shapes and sizes," says Daddo. "Passengers isn't tied up in a neat bow, and you can draw your own conclusions. I think that Michael has written a really beautiful piece and I really encourage viewers to sit down with that view."
For more on Passengers head to the official website, or the Adelaide Fringe Festival.