Five Australian film and television projects have received a collective $5.6 million in production funding from Screen Australia, including new seasons for Stan’s Bump and Network 10’s The Secrets She Keeps. Alongside the two renewed television dramas, funding also went to feature films Memoir of a Snail, Kid Snow, and Petrol.
Bump is returning to streaming platform Stan with a 10-episode second season, following what Stan’s Chief Content Officer Nick Forward referred to as ‘record-breaking streaming numbers’. Produced by and starring Claudia Karvan and financed with support from Screen NSW, Bump is about teenager Oly who deals with a surprise pregnancy. Writers Kelsey Munro, Jessica Tuckwell, Tim Lee, Mithila Gupta and Steven Arriagada return along with producers John Edwards and Dan Edwards. In a four-star ScreenHub review, Mel Campbell praised Bump for being ‘a sweetly satisfying watch for its melodramatic focus on emotions’.’
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Also coming back for a second series is Network 10’s thriller The Secrets She Keeps, set two years after the first season’s dramatic events with six episodes on the way. Also financed with support from Screen NSW, The Secrets She Keeps’ director Jennifer Leacey returns alongside writers Sarah Walker and Michael Robotham, producer Helen Bowden, and executive producer Jason Stephens. Sarah Bassiuoni (The Heights) will join the writing team for season two.
The first of the funded feature films is drama Kid Snow, set in 1970s Western Australia about an eponymous washed-up Irish boxer who is offered a chance at redemption. Kid Snow is directed by Paul Goldman (Suburban Mayhem) and written by John Brumpton (Life), Phillip Gwynne (Australian Rules), Shane Danielsen (The Guests) and Stephen Cleary (script editor on Sweet Country). Lizzette Atkins (Looking For Grace), Megan Wynn (The Childhood of A Leader) and Bruno Charlesworth (Ladies In Black) serve as the film’s producers, with funding from Screenwest, Lotterywest, Western Australian Screen Fund, and support from Soundfirm and Film Victoria.
Next up is the stop-motion animated feature Memoir of a Snail from Academy Award-winning writer and director Adam Elliot (Mary and Max). Memoir of a Snail tells the bittersweet story of Grace Puddle, a lonely hoarder of ornamental snails in Canberra, who learns how to let go from a friendship with the eccentric elderly woman Pinky. Produced by Liz Kearney (Paper Planes) and Elliot, and executive produced by Robert Connolly (The Dry), Memoir of a Snail is financed with support from Film Victoria, North South East West, Soundfirm and the Melbourne International Film Festival Premiere Fund.
The final project to receive Screen Australia’s latest round of funding is Petrol, the second feature film from writer/director Alena Lodkina, whose debut feature Strange Colours premiered at the 2017 Venice Film Festival. Petrol follows Aurora, a naïve and idealistic film student who befriends a charismatic performance artist named Mia, leading a surreal journey of awakening, haunted by dreams, fantasies and ghosts. Strange Colours producer Kate Laurie joins Lodkina again, with executive producers Robert Connolly and Liz Kearney of Arenamedia (Acute Misfortune). Finance support for Petrol comes from Film Victoria, the Melbourne International Film Festival Premiere Fund and SBS.
