Ruari Elkington, toughened by his labours in independent distribution and exhibition, casts a cool eye over the circus that is the Australian International Movie Convention. Entertainment meets commerce, art crashes into the wall, and George Brandis remembers his IP cred.
For an event focussed almost entirely on heavy promotion the Australian International Movie Convention is a tad shy in terms of backing themselves. 2013 marks the sixty-eighth year AIMC has been held. Mull on that for a moment. Via a quick back of the choc-top calculation that places the inaugural event in 1945 – that’s a year before Cannes! Old Europe is much better at celebrating this venerable history stuff. No doubt if the French were running AIMC it would have UNESCO world heritage status by now.