Build It And They Will Come
There are more than a few movie producers out there toting Geelong as a perfect place to shoot local films for all the world to see, but as a prime, picturesque location with plenty to offer, the regional town could be so much more…
So it has often been quoted, and Australia has enjoyed a brief but profitable history of being a favorite place for international production companies to shoot their next big blockbusters. But what happened? How did the interest suddenly slide? The state of Victoria has hosted many an international production, from Ghost Rider to Killer Elite, it seemed, for a while anyway, that the Garden State would build a long standing and favorable repertoire with the filmic capitol of the world, that fabled land of Hollywood. But the moguls across the Pacific have recently turned their eyes elsewhere, and having had the opportunity to work on the set of some of these international productions has given me an invaluable insight as to why.
Around the catering truck or the coffee machine, I overheard a multitude of complaints about filming in Melbourne, either inner city locations or in the vast Melbourne Central Studios in the Docklands. American stunt performers, actors, cinematographers and directors all had their grievances, and they were always the same; not the weather, not the Australian film crews, not the catering and not the distance from home. The source of the filmmaker’s woes orbited around the very issue that many commuters and employees from all walks of industrial life begrudgingly withstand every day in Melbourne: Infrastructure.
As a commuter myself, I understood their every point of contention; Melbourne Central Studios is frustratingly difficult to get to and from. Accessible only by navigating the maze of thin roads and “No Right Turn” signs, one finds oneself then having haul a convoy of film trucks down a long, narrow street, encumbered with monolithic speed bumps to the gates. Then there’s getting to the exterior locations from there; Footscray was a favorite, but you try getting there from the Docklands in less than sixty minutes, on a tight budget and schedule, and when whichever route you choose must also accommodate several large trucks and RV’s full of delicate equipment and actors. The nearest picturesque beach is well over an hour’s drive, while suburbs or city streets which can substitute for Pairs, Bel Air of Morocco are difficult to negotiate and perilously close to heavy traffic and the intrusive hordes of photographers such films tend to attract. Getting anywhere, setting up and keeping these buzzards and their cameras out of the way, delays expensive day’s filming and often causes the cinematographers to miss the most important few hours of shooting; that precious window known as the “golden hour” between six and nine AM. Added to that the cost of booking out Melbourne streets long enough to decorate them, film in them and then clear off, the price of accommodation for key international personnel and their transit from Tullamarine Airport and the inconvenience of filtering the Melbourne populous out of the way, and suddenly it wasn’t worth the trip. Production companies might just as well have forked out the immense bills for shooting in the scripted locations.
One thing strikes me about all these valid issues, and at this junction it may be important to note that at the time, I was not yet a Geelong resident; there is a place that could, potentially, be the solution to their gripes. All that is required is one educated leap of tactical faith, and Geelong could be the perfect accommodation to big budget, international motion picture productions.
There are, of course, a number of notable Australian filmmakers out there who lord Geelong as a wonderfully accommodating location for a movie; ex member for Corio Gavan O’Conner has accurately detailed Geelong’s unique infrastructure and locality being perfect for the job of shooting Australian films and the plethora of job opportunities such an undertaking would create absolutely would provide the much-needed stimulus for both the local economy and outside tourism, while Melbourne based film producer Bobby Gallinsky has also pointed out the excellent variety of geography, readily available and easily accessed.
They’re right! No more than thirty minutes from the Geelong CBD are the location scout’s choice of industrial areas, beautiful golden beaches, desolate outback-style environs, slums, Beverly-Hills style estates and rich, lush forests. Take your pick. I have personally seen Spring Street in Melbourne turned into a bustling street in 1980’s Paris. Spring Street! If they can do that with a small corner in Melbourne, amid the glaring, flashing lights of photographers and much to the chagrin of locals, then they can far more easily do it in Geelong’s cultural precinct, where foot traffic is minimal and a single street being closed off for locals will have a mere and negligible impact on the day-to-day running of the town.
It’s a fantastic idea, and lest we forget that while most see a movie as being made by a director, camera guy and a bunch of actors, there is, in fact, far more to it than that. A single film requires a legion of widely varying capacities; drivers, couriers, accountants, photographers, graphics designers, grips, safety personnel, costume and make-up, catering, extras, AD’s (who’s tasks vary from wrangling the extras to making sure there’s a coffee machine about), assistants, secretaries, security personnel, the list goes on, depending on the budget.
That brings me to the one prickle in turning Geelong away from the brink by way of a fully functioning motion picture industry; only a fraction of any film is shot on location. There lies the one benefit Melbourne has over Geelong: Melbourne Central Studios. It may be hard to get to, it may be difficult to find, it may not, in contrast to Geelong’s wide, welcoming and largely flat roads, be surrounded by the most hospitable of artificial terrains, but it’s there.
As it is, Geelong is indeed a perfect location for local films. But Australian films are world-renowned for how lean their budgets are. That’s a good thing, it’s an excellent way to train the blockbuster directors of tomorrow; see what they can do with a little, before Hollywood gives them a lot. If only Geelong’s council could promote this beautiful city and its neighboring wonderlands, we’d have a lot more local productions being shot here, but for the international productions, the real money-spinners, Geelong quite simply does not have the facilities that would make the expense of the trip worth it.
There is, already in motion, a foundation upon which Geelong could support an excellent, fully functioning local film industry, but it could be more. We could host the major leaguers.
Once you’re through the labyrinth and have gained access to Melbourne Central Studios, there isn’t much you can really say about it; there’s the office buildings, and an assortment of warehouses in whish sound stages are built to become, say, Henry the Eighth’s throne room or the bad guy’s secret futuristic lair. To become an all-purpose, super-profitable production studio, in league with Britain’s Pinewood (notable for Star Wars and Batman), or Hollywood’s Universal, a studio needs a lot more than a few monotone warehouses in which half-pipe subways or the inside of an airplane can be constructed; it also needs a fairly sparse exterior backlot. A place where our gratuitous friends in Hollywood can blow things up, build and destroy miniatures the size of city blocks or build spaceships the size of tankers to drop on them.
Melbourne is built on a wharf, it can’t really do that. But Geelong can.
There’s nothing worse, for a city council, than having abandoned buildings on your map. Geelong has many, and most notable of them is the Ford Factory, soon to be an utterly functionless eyesore. A complex network of large, sparse factory buildings surrounded by vast grassland can’t exactly be converted into something else easily…except a movie studio with a fully functioning backlot.
Sure, it could be another government housing estate, but the ambition of many a local is, sadly, to move away from Geelong, not deeper into it, and being that it occupies an immediately visible area on the main arterial into the town, that might not bode well for those coming down for their summer vacation.
We could have ourselves a studio to rival anything in Hollywood or England, simply by knocking down a few walls and reinforcing a few foundations. Unlike Melbourne’s hidden gem, we could have ours right there, front and center, greeting everyone suddenly compelled to visit our town. Not that’s something I’d like to drive by. Why would people suddenly be compelled? Well, now they can come down to a gorgeous bayside hotel and stay in the suite Jennifer Laurence picked out while filming her next great adventure film at Geelong’s movie studios. They could stay only minutes away from Barwon Heads or Bremlea, featured location in the next Swept Away style love scene. They could explore the fern and pine forests on a day trip, which they last saw in Jurassic Park Fifteen: We Cloned John Hammond.
At the moment, key personnel wanting to shoot in Melbourne have to land at Tullamarine and be ferried, at a not inconsiderable expense, nearly an hour down the freeway to Melbourne, where they stay at Crown Plaza. In Geelong, they could land at Avalon, via Sydney, and be whisked in ten easy minutes to any of the inner city or Torquay based resorts. That, in turn, boosts commercial interest. “Sorry, ma’am, our penthouse suite is currently occupied by Ryan Gosling…” not a bad marketing tool, don’t you agree?
Yes, we must support and do all we can for local filmmakers to use Geelong in as many ways as possible, but a one million dollar Australian film, every five years or so, is one thing; a ten to hundred million dollar American film is quite something else.
The best thing about a studio backlot, however, is that they tend to build themselves, at no cost to the locals. Say, for example, Roland Emmerich needs a lagoon with a green screen background to sink a miniature ocean liner seven or eight times in; the backers in Hollywood front the bill, and employ dozens of local construction workers to make that lagoon happen, and then it’s there, ready accommodate whatever production needs it next. The engine room of the Starship Enterprise, commissioned by the last blockbuster, need only a few key alterations to become Wimberley Stadium in a Led Zeppelin biopic. Those suburbs we built a fraction of, painting in the rest with local special effects wizards, for Tim Burton’s next fairytale suburbia can be repainted before James Cameron carpet bombs them in his next World War Two picture. Facilities, lights, generators and trucks could be sourced on the cheap in the early days, shipped down from Melbourne while they’re not in use there, and given the inconvenience of Melbourne, that’s quite often, until Geelong has turned enough profit to purchase new equipment. A special effects studio, basically a computer lab with room enough to make a few life-size models of a giant shark here and there, would mean that the production never has to leave Geelong until the shoot is completed. A few shots of Highton can sell the image of Mullholland Drive, itself an expensive and inconvenient place to shoot, or Norlane Compton, but the computers which flesh out the picture, turning the Shell Refinery into downtown Detroit, could be situated here as well, and employ our own technicians.
That, in turn, generates not only clientele for local caterers, restaurants, hotels and bars, but the best kind of clientele; the clientele which attracts other clientele. Attractive job opportunities, many of which require little or no academic skills, and an assortment which do, Geelong is ready for this step, and can easily afford it.
In fact it reminds me a great deal of another picturesque, regional town as it was a hundred years ago, an undiscovered gem which perfectly accommodated the motion picture industry, but sadly doesn’t anymore: Hollywood.
So it has often been quoted, and Australia has enjoyed a brief but profitable history of being a favorite place for international production companies to shoot their next big blockbusters. But what happened? How did the interest suddenly slide? The state of Victoria has hosted many an international production, from Ghost Rider to Killer Elite, it seemed, for a while anyway, that the Garden State would build a long standing and favorable repertoire with the filmic capitol of the world, that fabled land of Hollywood. But the moguls across the Pacific have recently turned their eyes elsewhere, and having had the opportunity to work on the set of some of these international productions has given me an invaluable insight as to why.
Around the catering truck or the coffee machine, I overheard a multitude of complaints about filming in Melbourne, either inner city locations or in the vast Melbourne Central Studios in the Docklands. American stunt performers, actors, cinematographers and directors all had their grievances, and they were always the same; not the weather, not the Australian film crews, not the catering and not the distance from home. The source of the filmmaker’s woes orbited around the very issue that many commuters and employees from all walks of industrial life begrudgingly withstand every day in Melbourne: Infrastructure.
As a commuter myself, I understood their every point of contention; Melbourne Central Studios is frustratingly difficult to get to and from. Accessible only by navigating the maze of thin roads and “No Right Turn” signs, one finds oneself then having haul a convoy of film trucks down a long, narrow street, encumbered with monolithic speed bumps to the gates. Then there’s getting to the exterior locations from there; Footscray was a favorite, but you try getting there from the Docklands in less than sixty minutes, on a tight budget and schedule, and when whichever route you choose must also accommodate several large trucks and RV’s full of delicate equipment and actors. The nearest picturesque beach is well over an hour’s drive, while suburbs or city streets which can substitute for Pairs, Bel Air of Morocco are difficult to negotiate and perilously close to heavy traffic and the intrusive hordes of photographers such films tend to attract. Getting anywhere, setting up and keeping these buzzards and their cameras out of the way, delays expensive day’s filming and often causes the cinematographers to miss the most important few hours of shooting; that precious window known as the “golden hour” between six and nine AM. Added to that the cost of booking out Melbourne streets long enough to decorate them, film in them and then clear off, the price of accommodation for key international personnel and their transit from Tullamarine Airport and the inconvenience of filtering the Melbourne populous out of the way, and suddenly it wasn’t worth the trip. Production companies might just as well have forked out the immense bills for shooting in the scripted locations.
One thing strikes me about all these valid issues, and at this junction it may be important to note that at the time, I was not yet a Geelong resident; there is a place that could, potentially, be the solution to their gripes. All that is required is one educated leap of tactical faith, and Geelong could be the perfect accommodation to big budget, international motion picture productions.
There are, of course, a number of notable Australian filmmakers out there who lord Geelong as a wonderfully accommodating location for a movie; ex member for Corio Gavan O’Conner has accurately detailed Geelong’s unique infrastructure and locality being perfect for the job of shooting Australian films and the plethora of job opportunities such an undertaking would create absolutely would provide the much-needed stimulus for both the local economy and outside tourism, while Melbourne based film producer Bobby Gallinsky has also pointed out the excellent variety of geography, readily available and easily accessed.
They’re right! No more than thirty minutes from the Geelong CBD are the location scout’s choice of industrial areas, beautiful golden beaches, desolate outback-style environs, slums, Beverly-Hills style estates and rich, lush forests. Take your pick. I have personally seen Spring Street in Melbourne turned into a bustling street in 1980’s Paris. Spring Street! If they can do that with a small corner in Melbourne, amid the glaring, flashing lights of photographers and much to the chagrin of locals, then they can far more easily do it in Geelong’s cultural precinct, where foot traffic is minimal and a single street being closed off for locals will have a mere and negligible impact on the day-to-day running of the town.
It’s a fantastic idea, and lest we forget that while most see a movie as being made by a director, camera guy and a bunch of actors, there is, in fact, far more to it than that. A single film requires a legion of widely varying capacities; drivers, couriers, accountants, photographers, graphics designers, grips, safety personnel, costume and make-up, catering, extras, AD’s (who’s tasks vary from wrangling the extras to making sure there’s a coffee machine about), assistants, secretaries, security personnel, the list goes on, depending on the budget.
That brings me to the one prickle in turning Geelong away from the brink by way of a fully functioning motion picture industry; only a fraction of any film is shot on location. There lies the one benefit Melbourne has over Geelong: Melbourne Central Studios. It may be hard to get to, it may be difficult to find, it may not, in contrast to Geelong’s wide, welcoming and largely flat roads, be surrounded by the most hospitable of artificial terrains, but it’s there.
As it is, Geelong is indeed a perfect location for local films. But Australian films are world-renowned for how lean their budgets are. That’s a good thing, it’s an excellent way to train the blockbuster directors of tomorrow; see what they can do with a little, before Hollywood gives them a lot. If only Geelong’s council could promote this beautiful city and its neighboring wonderlands, we’d have a lot more local productions being shot here, but for the international productions, the real money-spinners, Geelong quite simply does not have the facilities that would make the expense of the trip worth it.
There is, already in motion, a foundation upon which Geelong could support an excellent, fully functioning local film industry, but it could be more. We could host the major leaguers.
Once you’re through the labyrinth and have gained access to Melbourne Central Studios, there isn’t much you can really say about it; there’s the office buildings, and an assortment of warehouses in whish sound stages are built to become, say, Henry the Eighth’s throne room or the bad guy’s secret futuristic lair. To become an all-purpose, super-profitable production studio, in league with Britain’s Pinewood (notable for Star Wars and Batman), or Hollywood’s Universal, a studio needs a lot more than a few monotone warehouses in which half-pipe subways or the inside of an airplane can be constructed; it also needs a fairly sparse exterior backlot. A place where our gratuitous friends in Hollywood can blow things up, build and destroy miniatures the size of city blocks or build spaceships the size of tankers to drop on them.
Melbourne is built on a wharf, it can’t really do that. But Geelong can.
There’s nothing worse, for a city council, than having abandoned buildings on your map. Geelong has many, and most notable of them is the Ford Factory, soon to be an utterly functionless eyesore. A complex network of large, sparse factory buildings surrounded by vast grassland can’t exactly be converted into something else easily…except a movie studio with a fully functioning backlot.
Sure, it could be another government housing estate, but the ambition of many a local is, sadly, to move away from Geelong, not deeper into it, and being that it occupies an immediately visible area on the main arterial into the town, that might not bode well for those coming down for their summer vacation.
We could have ourselves a studio to rival anything in Hollywood or England, simply by knocking down a few walls and reinforcing a few foundations. Unlike Melbourne’s hidden gem, we could have ours right there, front and center, greeting everyone suddenly compelled to visit our town. Not that’s something I’d like to drive by. Why would people suddenly be compelled? Well, now they can come down to a gorgeous bayside hotel and stay in the suite Jennifer Laurence picked out while filming her next great adventure film at Geelong’s movie studios. They could stay only minutes away from Barwon Heads or Bremlea, featured location in the next Swept Away style love scene. They could explore the fern and pine forests on a day trip, which they last saw in Jurassic Park Fifteen: We Cloned John Hammond.
At the moment, key personnel wanting to shoot in Melbourne have to land at Tullamarine and be ferried, at a not inconsiderable expense, nearly an hour down the freeway to Melbourne, where they stay at Crown Plaza. In Geelong, they could land at Avalon, via Sydney, and be whisked in ten easy minutes to any of the inner city or Torquay based resorts. That, in turn, boosts commercial interest. “Sorry, ma’am, our penthouse suite is currently occupied by Ryan Gosling…” not a bad marketing tool, don’t you agree?
Yes, we must support and do all we can for local filmmakers to use Geelong in as many ways as possible, but a one million dollar Australian film, every five years or so, is one thing; a ten to hundred million dollar American film is quite something else.
The best thing about a studio backlot, however, is that they tend to build themselves, at no cost to the locals. Say, for example, Roland Emmerich needs a lagoon with a green screen background to sink a miniature ocean liner seven or eight times in; the backers in Hollywood front the bill, and employ dozens of local construction workers to make that lagoon happen, and then it’s there, ready accommodate whatever production needs it next. The engine room of the Starship Enterprise, commissioned by the last blockbuster, need only a few key alterations to become Wimberley Stadium in a Led Zeppelin biopic. Those suburbs we built a fraction of, painting in the rest with local special effects wizards, for Tim Burton’s next fairytale suburbia can be repainted before James Cameron carpet bombs them in his next World War Two picture. Facilities, lights, generators and trucks could be sourced on the cheap in the early days, shipped down from Melbourne while they’re not in use there, and given the inconvenience of Melbourne, that’s quite often, until Geelong has turned enough profit to purchase new equipment. A special effects studio, basically a computer lab with room enough to make a few life-size models of a giant shark here and there, would mean that the production never has to leave Geelong until the shoot is completed. A few shots of Highton can sell the image of Mullholland Drive, itself an expensive and inconvenient place to shoot, or Norlane Compton, but the computers which flesh out the picture, turning the Shell Refinery into downtown Detroit, could be situated here as well, and employ our own technicians.
That, in turn, generates not only clientele for local caterers, restaurants, hotels and bars, but the best kind of clientele; the clientele which attracts other clientele. Attractive job opportunities, many of which require little or no academic skills, and an assortment which do, Geelong is ready for this step, and can easily afford it.
In fact it reminds me a great deal of another picturesque, regional town as it was a hundred years ago, an undiscovered gem which perfectly accommodated the motion picture industry, but sadly doesn’t anymore: Hollywood.
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