Foreshore film seeks investors

A FEATURE film planned to be produced and shot on the Surf Coast is seeking financial and other help to make it happen.

Foreshore aims to start principal photography in the autumn of 2023 and be released in 2024, and the production team hopes to raise $500,000 in monetary donations, donations in kind and investment to bring it to the silver screen.

A family drama exploring similar themes as Hotel Sorrento, The Dressmaker and Crackerjack, the 90-minute film poses the question: what do we need to give up and what are the things we must embrace when the family unit is in a state of disrepair and there’s an urgent need to make things right?

Meryl Whiteside from Mezza Productions is the film’s associate producer, and said the team was approaching local small and large businesses, various organisations and the general public to come on board.

She said the $500,000 budget would give the movie the production values it needed to be launched in the national and international marketplace, and would go towards hiring a highly professional cast and crew, securing top-notch film, sound and editing equipment and local film shoot locations, booking suitable accommodation and catering for the four-week shoot.

“We strongly believe that by tapping into the corporate sphere and general community, this exciting project will create a quite a buzz not only within the Torquay and Surf Coast area but in all of Victoria.”

Actors attached to the film so far include Anne-Louise Lambert (Picnic at Hanging Rock), Libby Tanner (All Saints, Wentworth, Back to the Rafters) and Michael Veitch (The D-Generation, Fast Forward, Full Frontal).

Foreshore will be written and directed by Angelo Salamanca, who has many years’ experience in the film industry and performing arts as a scriptwriter, director and actor, as well as judging produced films and scripts for the small and large screen.

“My aim as writer/director of Foreshore is to tell this poignant and emotionally charged story simply and convincingly,” he said.

“It’s a story for our time – a fractured family attempting to reunite during the rigors and challenges of a pandemic.

“My intention is to create an on-screen dynamic which is at times heartbreaking, but at other times, inspirational.

“A movie which is redolent with colour and seascapes, incisive social commentary; a movie which is ultimately compelling and entertaining.”