Hervey Bay is one of Australia’s fastest growing communities. The population in the last decade has boomed from 15,000 to 50,000. An hour and a half south of Bundaberg, it’s mainly a sugar growing area. Hervey Bay also now builds its economy on whale watching, so it’s a prime example of eco-tourism and a big supporter of conservation. It’s a strange place to drive into: flat and mostly very new, with strip malls in the suburbs that run off the coast. Along the coast itself you find evidence of the old summer resort and fisherman’s town that Hervey Bay once was; little beach shacks and big beach pubs.

Our venue is the Big Screen Cinemas (yeah! go figure) where the staff are a great bunch, another prime example of highly motivated country operators with real get up and go. The venue is a testament to local humour: it’s called Hervey Bay 6, but there are only five screens! Brenda, front of house manager, is full of ideas about how to make my festival bigger and better next year, which is fabulous because we have already increased attendances on last year. Derek the owner is as blase as they get, and simply runs the festival because he thinks it’s a great idea, never worrying too much about what he will make out of it, and Matt the senior projectionist is a technical wiz who makes sure every presentation is perfect. The Council’s Arts Officer has done everything to make sure that everyone who needs to know, knows about the festival, so it’s a town I love to work with.

Our opening night film is Peaches again and director Craig Monahan is up to present. He’s brought the family, and they head out for some whale watching. His older boy, 4, is convinced he is a reincarnated whale, so it’s very special for him. Craig draws a bigger crowd than Gary Sweet, who attended last year, which is fantastic, and the audience is a true all-ages turn out which is even better; Peaches is a perfect film for teenagers. Emma Lung’s character and her journey should have great appeal and at the meet and greet afterwards this certainly seems the case.

The opening night party is in the foyer of the cinema. It was originally planned for the Irish Bar but they have recently introduced lingerie and topless waitresses on Friday nights and, well, we all thought that a festival opening and topless waitresses just wouldn’t gel. Craig and I head into the bar for a quick beer after he has introduced the film (to an almost full house!), confident that we have time enough to knock one back before the bar turns too fleshy at 7.30pm. We find ourselves a booth on the outskirts of the action and chat away, oblivious to the fact that time has passed and the girls are already on patrol.

That is, until one then two sidle up to our table checking whether or not we need drinks. Don’t worry, we’re safe, they are still fully clad, albeit in lace lingerie; the skin show doesn’t start for a while. The funny thing is that they just keep coming over even though we are not ordering drinks. They both come from Melbourne and both just moved to sunny ‘climes’, obviously to be able to wear less! Craig and I decide that a couple of harmless looking arty types are a safe bet in this bar filling ever faster with feisty local lads out for a Friday night of frivolity.

The rest of the festival goes off beautifully, with more than 70 mums and dads, grandparents and kids coming to see Dot and the Kangaroo for the Bub’s Club screening on Saturday morning; it was interesting to see some unaccompanied grandparents in the audience! There was a great turnout for a screening of Craig’s first feature The Interview on Saturday afternoon, and a very good crowd to see Jedda and Rosalie’s Journey on Sunday afternoon. One of the most interesting statistics for the weekend is that for our single session of Somersault we almost had more people than came to see the film during its entire season at the cinema. I am not quite sure whether this is good or bad; perhaps a little of both. For the festival it means that we have, for Hervey Bay, created an event that has that special ‘festival thing’ going for it. But for a fantastic film like Somersault, it means that we still have some way to go to get Australians more interested in seeing their own films, particularly those that may be a little more difficult. So there’s the challenge for Big Screen in a nutshell, in one town, on the Northern Queensland Coast.

Onward and upward.

See you in Roma.

Peter Castaldi, Festival Director