“I don’t write a film that looks like a sci-fi blockbuster on paper that I’ll actually never be able to shoot,” Hill explains. “If anything, I kind of under-write. I let these things kind of unfold, so when you’re on set and you’re trying to make this film and you’re not sure how it’s going to end up, you’re pleasantly surprised. You can do martial arts. You can smash people over the head with candied glass bottles. You can go into the Chinese New Year Festival.”
Revenge Of The Gweilo tells an epic tale of action-packed retribution about a retired cop (played by Hill, who has actually studied a whopping seven different styles of martial arts). Hill goes “back to school” to rekindle the flame he once had for martial arts and defeat a sinister Triad gang, in order to avenge the death of the woman he loved. A dark adventure Hill likens thematically to revenge movies like Rolling Thunder, the film boasts an impressive array of fight scenes and location shoots, including an opening shot at the actual Chinese New Year Festival procession in the heart of Melbourne’s Chinatown.
“This is one of the brilliant things about Melbourne: you can shoot frigging anywhere,” Hill says, gleefully. “You can’t do that in every city. I’m casting director on Cult Girls at the moment, with Mark Bakaitis [directing]. He is shooting in forests, he’s shooting in mines, in underground caves – he’s just all over the place. Again, it’s another solidification for me that this city is ridiculous. There is so much you can do, if you’ve got the imagination. It’s all there. It’s all accessible. You just need the passion.”
Hill asserts that he’s “not afraid to mimic his heroes”. Growing up with candid directorial delights like Bruce Lee’s Enter The Dragon and Sylvester Stallone’s Rambo, Hill recognises the importance of understanding your creative strengths.
“The films that I love just happen to be acted in and directed by the same guy,” Hill explains. “I think that they’re the films that have the most effect on me, probably because when someone does that, they’re really serious about their vision. They’re almost like, ‘I’m not putting this in someone else’s hands to fuck it up’. If I was a seven-foot tall giant, hairy and fat, completely unattractive and the role was not suited to me, I wouldn’t cast myself. I’m only putting myself in those situations if I think I can pull it off. I’m being realistic. I’m not caving to my own ego and bullshit, and just putting myself in my own film because I think I can. It’s still got to work.”
Revenge Of The Gweilo won’t be the only appearance by Hill at MUFF. He’ll also be making a cameo in fellow director Daniel Armstrong’s sci-fi action-comedy SheBorg Massacre. With his dedication to DIY filmmaking in all forms, Hill belongs to a group of talented genre-filmmakers that MUFF-founder Richard Wolstencroft refers to as “the new vanguard”. Much like Wolstencroft, Hill laments the difficulty and compromise involved in securing arts funding for independent directors, but with the recent rise of devoted auteurs, he confirms that high-concept features aren’t leaving any time soon.
“With the Melbourne Underground Film Festival, what it’s doing is actually validating filmmakers that haven’t necessarily been given funding or won an AFI,” Hill states. “But they’re good, and what they’re doing is sociologically involved. I’m talking to you today because I’m promoting my movie, because I want the public to know about it. If I didn’t want the public to know about it, and I was scared of the public and I was scared of my own voice, then it wouldn’t work.
“When I first entered [MUFF] with my film Tomboys in 2010, Richard actually rejected it,” Hill laughs. “I fired up. I said, ‘Seriously, how the fuck can you let in movies like Razor Eaters and The Magician, and you won’t take Tomboys? Just – fuckin’ nah.’ He loved that so much, because it reminded him of why he started MUFF, which is that he couldn’t get into MIFF [Melbourne International Film Festival]. Me firing up actually got me in it. It got me respect. Then, when I entered Model Behaviour in 2014, I won Best Film Runner-Up. Now, with 2016’s Revenge Of The Gweilo, I’m really hoping to take the trophy.”
Like Quentin Tarantino before him, Hill was a self-proclaimed “video store guy” before breaking into the film world with his 2004 Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde adaptation, The Strange Game of Hyde and Seek. Since then, his work has collected accolades at the likes of Los Angeles’ Shriekfest, Australian Film Festival, California Film Awards, and the UK’s Shadowstar Film Festival – and he’s only getting more passionate about his craft.
“A lot of filmmakers are in it for the wrong reason,” Hill says. “They’re in it because they want to make money, or because they want a trophy. They’re not actually thinking about the work, and clearly, I’m thinking about the work, because I’m still going. This is the seventh feature I’ve directed in 10 or 15 years. It’s serious. It’s a lifestyle, not a hobby. It’s something I’m doing for life. That’s the difference.”
