When award-winning film director Glendyn Ivin was given the green light in May 2021 to create the streaming TV series, The Lost Flowers of Alice Hart, he struggled to find local Australian film crews to help in production.
With big names like Sigourney Weaver and Asher Keddie leading the cast, and full funding from streaming service Amazon Prime, it was an attractive project.
But with so many other Australian productions happening at the same time, Ivin had to call in international film crews from New Zealand to help cover the skills shortage.
He questions how the Australian film-making industry will be able to respond to federal government changes to the National Cultural Policy, which will impose a quota for major streaming platforms to invest revenue into producing local content from mid-2024.
