How to Please a Woman wsas shot in Fremantle. Photo by David Dare Parker.
A MOVIE made in Fremantle will open this year’s WA Made Film Festival.
Featuring gorgeous shots of Leighton Beach, Renée Webster’s How to Please a Woman is a funny and heart-warming story for women who have been afraid to ask for what they want – at home, at work and in the bedroom.
The film follows Gina (Sally Phillips) as her all-male house cleaning business spirals out of control, forcing her to embrace her own sexuality.
WA Made Film Festival co-founder Matthew Eeles says How to Please a Woman is one of the funniest WA films he’s seen.
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“It also has a warmth and depth to it seldom seen in most local comedies thanks to the film’s incredibly talented cast which includes Sally Phillips, Tasma Walton, Erik Thomson, Caroline Brazier and Myles Pollard, who’s the funniest he’s ever been,” Eeles says.
According to reports, Fremantle mayor Hannah Fitzhardinge has seen it and is also a big fan.
Despite launching under the pall of Covid in 2020, the WA Made Film Festival has gone from strength-to-strength and is now in its third year.
Eeles says this year’s festival will be the biggest yet with 67 local films, three world premiere feature films, a world premiere web series, a live musical performance, more than 55 short films, a filmmaking workshop and the return of WA’s only smartphone filmmaking competition.
“Not only was our submission record broken for the third year running, it was absolutely smashed,” Eeles says.
To accommodate demand, the festival has been extended from three to four days.
So how did Eeles and his film producer chum Jasmine Leivers nurture a hit festival in such turbulent and unpredictable times?
“The festival has only ever operated during covid. We know no different,” Eeles says.
“It was literally born into covid with the first ever festival opening in 2020 on the weekend the entire planet was being locked down.
“Thankfully there is a strong appetite out there for local art, whether that’s screen art or art in general.
“People love to see their hometowns, suburbs they grew up in and characters they recognise on the big screen.
“The WA Made Film Festival showcases all of those things and I think that’s why it has been such a success.
“It’s a reprieve from another painfully ordinary Marvel or Disney film.”
The screening of How to Please a Woman on Thursday March 10 will include a Q&A with super-producer Tania Chamber (Kill Me Three Times, Tango Underpants), actor Caroline Brazier (Wakefield, Rake, Three Summers, crocodile horror Rogue, and the upcoming Mystery Road: Origins).
The WA Made Film Festival will be held at Palace Cinemas Raine Square in Perth from Thursday March 10 to Sunday March 13, with many screenings include networking events, before and after parties and Q&As.
For more info and the full program go to http://www.wamadefilmfestival.com.au
by STEPHEN POLLOCK