ANIMATION NEWS and rant…
Spotted in the latest issue of Kidscreen Magazine: Cool New Shows from Down Under : Shapies, Lucky Lydia (I worked on the pilot 3 years ago), & Tashi.
There is also an article on Australian animation production: The Aussie Balancing Act: “Australia struggles to become a viable international production territory without sacrificing local content”
…a weakened advertising market and some significant changes to the Australian Broadcasting Authority’s Children’s Television Standards (CTS) act are making it harder for both broadcasters and producers to ante up enough funding to get new projects off the ground.
…the CTS has always been a hotly contested initiative. On one side of the issue, the terrestrial broadcasters affected by the standards and quotas (Seven Network, Nine Network and Network Ten) refute the need for the guidelines period. But they also argue that the local production community is unable to finance enough good children’s programming to meet their mandated buying needs.
On the flip side, the producers claim the broadcasters’ position stems from a desire to save money rather than any actual lack of high-quality homegrown kids fare. “Our argument is simple,” said Joanne Yates, executive director of the Screen Producers Association of Australia, in February. “Australian kids deserve to see Australian-made kids television – television that is made specifically for them, that speaks in their language, and that educates and entertains them.” (and so on…)
It’s just as well that we haven’t yet needed to depend on local funding bodies & decision makers to get our cartoons made. From reading an article like this one, I can see how some would argue that our content is just not “Australian” enough … what with a Mexican-wrestling cartoon series, and now, a Cold-War inspired China-centric cartoon without a single marsupial, aboriginal kid, or ocker-speaking yobbo in sight… But who has the right to judge if something is “Australian” enough? Or what Australian kids want to see?
As a Cartoon Network exec. tells us: “We are into ENTERTAINING kids, not EDUCATING them. Stories can have a moral, but not a message”.
Basically Fwak! makes shows with subject matter and characters that interest us; that entertain us; that we like and care enough about, to want to devote long working hours to. Even as Australian residents, we would identify primarily as international citizens. (which we are after all; Eddie’s from the UK, I’m Malaysian Chinese) In being true to ourselves, I’d like to think we are breaking the mold, pushing boundaries, and promoting a trans-cultural sensibility in contemporary Australian animation – one that isn’t reliant on some limiting white middle-class PC notion of what constitutes “Australian-ness”.
Have you noticed it is rare for Australian animated kids series to be based in urban/cosmopolitan environments? Do we really need more koalas, kangaroos and outback stories? (From Dot and The Kangaroo to Lil Elvis Jones & The Truckstoppers and the latest offering – The Kangaroo Creek Gang…) It is no wonder that Americans and Europeans assume we have kangaroos hopping wild all over the place. As if Crocodile Hunter hasn’t done enough to tarnish our image…
NOTE: A subscription is required to access Kidscreen online. (lili’s e-mail address; S #320669)
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