The Cost of Living: Bill Mousoulis’ Lovesick (2002) Jake Wilson May 2023 CTEQ Annotations on Film “If a viewer understands the story and characters fully, then I have failed.” – Bill Mousoulis on Lovesick Those were the days, when you could have no income to speak of and still live in Collingwood. I m...
The Two Johns: The Films of John Hughes: A History of Independent Screen Production in Australia, by John Cumming Jake Wilson July 2016 Book Reviews Aspiring filmmakers in Australia and elsewhere stand to learn a lot from John Cumming’s The Films of John Hughes, not least about how to deal with funding bodies. An innovator in documentary and adjoining field...
What Happened To Billy?: David Gulpilil on Mad Dog Morgan Jake Wilson July 2015 Special Dossier: Focus on David Gulpilil at MIFF 2015 It’s December 2014, and I’m researching a book on the 1976 bushranger film Mad Dog Morgan – one of the best Australian films of the 1970s, a far-out antipodean Western directed by the much underrated pop surrea...
A Touch of Flaus: Encounters and Impressions Jake Wilson October 2014 John Flaus Dossier When I think of John Flaus, my mind goes back to an evening ten or 15 years ago, when Fitzroy’s Erwin Rado Theatre hosted a rare revival of Salt of the Earth – an independent, communist-backed drama about a str...
Days of Future Past: Albie Thoms’ Polemics Jake Wilson March 2013 Albie Thoms Dossier I met Albie Thoms only once, in 2009, when the Australian Centre for the Moving Image revived his 1969 feature Marinetti – an avant-garde extravaganza described in Thoms’ 1978 essay collection Polemics For a Ne...
The Squares of the City: John Dunkley-Smith’s Flinders Street Jake Wilson June 2011 Melbourne on Film Dossier The time is 1980; the place, a crucial node on the grid of inner Melbourne, where Swanston Street, running north to south, crosses Flinders Street, running east to west. Four corners, four landmarks. Southwest...
In The Submarine: The 2010 Melbourne International Film Festival Jake Wilson October 2010 Festival Reports Another Opening, Another Show In Joe Dante’s satirical Small Soldiers (1998), a range of high-tech action figures is marketed under the slogan “Everything Else Is Just a Toy.” Perhaps this year’s Melbourne I...
Voice of the Grain: Films by Arthur and Corinne Cantrill Jake Wilson October 2010 Arthur and Corinne Cantrill Dossier This essay originally appeared on the website of the Australian Centre for the Moving Image, and was written to accompany the retrospective “Grain Of The Voice: 50 Years Of Sound and Image” which I curated. ...
How to Change the World: An Interview with Leo Berkeley Jake Wilson October 2010 Feature Articles Once, and appropriately, Melbourne based filmmaker Leo Berkeley went under the moniker of “last of the independents”. Having shaped a decades-long body of work on the fringes of the industry, he talks at length about the filmmaking principles that inform his work.
Aliens Among Us: Sally Marshall is Not an Alien (Mario Andreacchio, 1999) Jake Wilson July 2010 Key Moments in Australian Cinema Where’s she from anyway? The outback? The moon? Worse. L. A. - friends of Rhonnie (Thea Gumbert) in Sally Marshall is Not an Alien At the end of the twentieth century, there was more than one reason for Aus...
Heer No Evil: Dutch Tilt, Aussie Auteur: The Films of Rolf de Heer by D. Bruno Starrs Jake Wilson April 2010 Book Reviews Over the past two decades, Rolf de Heer has arguably emerged as Australia’s leading active narrative filmmaker: excepting one or two figures working mostly outside this country, none of his contemporaries can m...
The Boy From Oz: Blood and Tinsel: A Memoir by Jim Sharman Jake Wilson April 2009 Book Reviews The fabulous was Jim Sharman’s birthright. Grandson and son of successive managers of the legendary Jimmy Sharman’s Boxing Troupe, he fills the opening pages of this remarkable memoir with vivid recollections o...
A Critic Unbuttons: I Peed On Fellini: Recollections of a Life in Film by David Stratton Jake Wilson May 2008 Book Reviews Every film lover in Australia owes David Stratton an enormous debt of gratitude. He was largely responsible for the growth and success of the Sydney Film Festival, which he directed for 17 years; he did alm...
Unpopular Populism, or The Decline and Fall of the Little Aussie Battler: Notes on Australian Film Comedy in 2003 Jake Wilson December 2003 Australian Contemporary Cinema This short essay argues that most recent Australian comedy films have been all too "ordinary" – but nominates one or two new directors as talents to watch.
Carlton + Godard = Cinema: An Interview with Nigel Buesst Jake Wilson July 2003 Australian Film Culture Reflections on Melbourne’s own ‘new wave’ from a participant and observer.
The Lady Vanishes: Alexandra’s Project and Rolf de Heer Jake Wilson May 2003 Australian Contemporary Cinema De Heer continues in his latest, minutely controlled film a 'naïve' sensibility that resonates with contemporary trends in international cinema.
The Young Desire It: A Review of The Devil’s Playground by Christos Tsiolkas Jake Wilson March 2003 Book Reviews The first in the Australian Screen Classics series by Melbourne novelist, playwright, commentator and filmmaker, Christos Tsiolkas, is here reviewed.
Looking Both Ways: The Tracker Jake Wilson January 2003 Australian Cinema An analysis of this 2002 Australian release, in particular its cinematic exploration of race relations.
A Certain Familiar Woundedness – A Review of Third Take: Australian Filmmakers Talk edited by Raffaele Caputo and Geoff Burton Jake Wilson January 2003 Book Reviews Wilson unearths the undercurrents and biases of this recent Australian book.
Trash And Treasure: The Gleaners And I Jake Wilson December 2002 Feature Articles Wilson's insightful analysis highlights the beauty and complexity of Varda's contemporary masterpiece.
Baby Steps: Samples From the 2002 St Kilda Film Festival Jake Wilson July 2002 Festival Reports The most obvious lesson from the 2002 St Kilda Film Festival is that the definition of a film is more elastic than ever. Over half the inclusions in the main competition program were made on digital video; ...
Far from Woomera: Reading Sylvia Lawson in Australia: A Response to How Simone de Beauvoir Died in Australia – Stories and Essays by Sylvia Lawson Jake Wilson May 2002 Book Reviews A revealing, sensitive response to Lawson's latest work of stories and essays.
Distrusting Desire – A Review of The Money Shot: Sex, Cinema And Censorship by Jane Mills (Annandale: Pluto Press, 2001) Jake Wilson November 2001 Book Reviews A review of the recent book, The Money Shot, and a wider and thought-provoking discussion of art and criticism.
Watching from a Distance: September 11 as Spectacle Jake Wilson November 2001 Terror, Disaster, Cinema and Reality - A Symposium I switched on the TV soon after the planes hit, and there were the twin towers smouldering like giant cigarettes. As I watched this 'live' spectacle unfold from the safe distance of my lounge room in Melbourne,...
Sharing, Not Caring: He Died With A Felafel In His Hand Jake Wilson September 2001 Contemporary Australian Film Untransformed by brief encounters in a share house: Wilson weighs up Lowenstein's latest instalment in the share household genre.
St. Kilda Tales: Notes on Fifty Films Jake Wilson June 2001 Festival Reports Intro The following are various ideas and impressions from the ten screenings I attended at the 2001 St. Kilda Film Festival. It is, of course, impossible to provide 'fair' assessments of fifty or so films in ...
Hollowing Out the Romantic Comedy: Russian Doll Jake Wilson June 2001 Essays/on/Films Now that he's directed two feature films of his own, as well as contributing to the scripts of two directed by Emma-Kate Croghan (1), it should be possible to infer a few things about Stavros Kazantzidis (f...
Walk The Talk Jake Wilson April 2001 Australian Film An astute discussion of characterisation and mise en scène in Shirley Barrett's latest film.
Mallboy Jake Wilson February 2001 Contemporary Australian Film A sensitive account of this recent Australian film.
Better Than Sex Jake Wilson November 2000 Current Releases What could be 'better than sex'? I'm not sure that Better Than Sex (Jonathan Teplitzky, 2000) really wants to answer this question: the title is a provocation, a tease, a come-on. It's also a sign that the ...
Out of this World: The Colour of Catastrophe Jake Wilson July 2000 Feature Articles Melbourne becomes unreal in the Cantrills' City Of Chromatic Dissolution.