“It’s filmed in the UK, Ireland, the USA, Switzerland and Thailand,” Wolstencroft tells Beat. “I had some money to travel around the world and do interviews while I was working on a documentary about a porn star, and along the way I decided to adapt this poem by W. B. Yeats. It’s a low budget epic project. It’s not the standard way of doing things. It’s based on seven short stories. I didn’t start with an amazing script like all the film courses tell you to; I started with a five page synopsis and went from there. If it’s good enough for Jean-Luc Godard, it’s good enough for me. Mike Lee works that way, too, working from a basic plot instead of from a script. There are so many different ways to make a film. The first rule of film club is that there are no rules. If someone tells me how to do something or to do something a certain way my feeling is to do the opposite; I’ve got a contradictory personality.”
Wolstencroft has long been interested in the occult and says that The Second Coming Volume 1 involves themes of spirituality not often dealt with in cinema. The film has been five years in the making and refers to itself as ‘a vision’ by Wolstencroft. “I’m a spiritual person,” adds the film maker, who used to run the Hellfire bondage nightclub in the ’90s. “I’m fascinated by religion, and I’ve studied occultism and find it intellectually fascinating. I’m bored with atheism; dogmatic atheists close themselves up. Christianity resonates with me, perhaps because I was brought up with it. The film has a spiritual dimension not seen a lot in cinema; the film itself is a kind of spell. And there’s the interesting poetical side of it, it’s an epic film shot on a small budget.”
Wolstencroft is proud of the Melbourne Underground Film Festival he established in 2000 as a response to a film of his being rejected by MIFF. “It’s the only film festival run by a film maker,” he adds. “It’s a quarter of the size of the Melbourne International Film Festival – we have 25 other amazing features; not just mine. We’ve got 60 shorts.”
This year is the 16th MUFF and the festival just keeps growing. “It grows through word of mouth,” says Wolstencroft. “A lot of what we program is the stuff MIFF don’t like, low budget films, genre films. We love all that stuff at MUFF.” MUFF has an impressive list of alumni. “We were the first film festival to screen Saw,” continues Wolstencroft. Australian film makers whose work has been seen at MUFF include James Wan, Greg McLean, Scott Ryan, Spierig brothers, Stuart Simpson, Patrick Hughes, Andrew Traucki, Dave de Vries, David Nerlich, along with many others. Noteworthy international guests have included Bruce LaBruce (he of the controversial LA Zombie), Lloyd Kaufman, William Lustig, Ron Jeremy, American film director Chris Folino, Michael Tierney, Peter Christopherson, Jim Van Bebber, Bret Easton Ellis, Gene Gregorits, Terry McMahon and Geretta Geretta.
This year the festival opens with Under A Kaleidoscope by Addison Heath, featuring Aston Elliot, Kenji Shimada and the ubiquitous Kristen Condon, who is in both the opening and closing nights’ feature films and a few others; as well she makes an appearance in The Second Coming Volume 1. “It’s Kristen Condon’s festival,” notes Wolstencroft. Closing night sees a screening of Sizzler 77 from Timothy Spanos, a hilarious and entertaining tribute to ’70s Australian TV and genre cinema about the hooker scene of Melbourne in the days of Super8, flares and sideburns.
Wolstencroft is especially enthusiastic about the community of independent film makers surrounding MUFF. “The local independent film industry is really amazing. Any actor looking for a network opportunity should come along. It’s where the best young film directors are, the people who are going to be the next best directors. So many projects have come from actors, writers and directors who met at MUFF.”
The director says his festival is one of the longest running independent film festivals in the world. “When I started there was the New York Underground Film Festival and the Chicago Underground Film Festival. New York has now closed so we’re the second oldest.”
Wolstencroft sees the films screened at MUFF as amazing examples of what can be done with the right amount of persistence. His advice to aspiring directors? Don’t chase the dollars before you start making films. “You’ve got to make your own projects. Too many film school graduates wait around for funding. Pursue your creative life and eventually you’ll become good at what you do. And then you’ll make money.”
BY LIZA DEZFOULI
