Telemovies may not have swanky red carpets and overseas premieres, but they do have a lot of practical advantages for working creatives. This was made very evident to producers Kylie du Fresne and Sue Taylor as they made An Accidental Soldier for the ABC.
While feature films can easily take between five and twenty years to bring into production, An Accidental Soldier went from commissioning to broadcast in less than a year. For that reason alone, they are a joy to create. What is more, a solid but unremarkable rating like 800,000 (which is about what the Sunday night ABC 8.30 timeslot has been rating with The Time of Our Lives), would earn $12m if those people were at the cinema. We think of that as a huge success in the current market. The comparison is crude, but worth some thought.
