CAPTAIN JOHNNO directed Mario Andreacchio won an International Emmy Award, beginning for him a career specialising in the “family movie”. This was after having made FAIR GAME, an action thriller that Quentin Tarantino acknowledges was a major influence on Death Proof.
Mario’s feature film, NAPOLEON, was inspired by his children, who wanted him to make a “proper film”. Napoleon pulls together diverse skills of documentary and drama to produce one of Australia’s most successful movies of the past 15 years, and due to be brought back by popular demand in 2012.
Mario served on the board of the Australian Film Finance Corporation and 2 terms on the board of the South Australian Film Corporation. He originally went to university to do experimental physics, but graduated in clinical psychology, then went on to be one of the first graduates of the prestigious Australian Film Television and Radio School.
In the past 20 years Mario has made 9 movies, 2 telemovies, and a host of television and documentaries. He has specialised in international movie co-productions with Japan, Canada, France, Germany, South Africa, UK, and now China. The current production, The Dragon Pearl, is the first treaty co-production between Australia and China.
Mario received the Convocation Medal from Flinders University.
Ray is currently President of the ADG, (Australian Directors Guild), a position he occupies while producing his own films. His latest work has been a return to making music video. Ray produced a clip with long time collaborator Rb Hirst for Joseph Roe called Joseph Roe Saving the Kimberley. Piccolo films has also produced a trilogy of clips for Reg Mombassa and Peter O'Doherty and their band Dog Trumpet. Buttons Undone, Great South Road and Manchester can be viewd on Vimea.
ONE OUT OF THE BAG is a feature length concert film of the SPLIT ENZ 2006 reunion tour. Ray worked with Sarah Watt as DOP for the box office success Look Both Ways, winner of the 2005 AFI award for best film and the Film Critics circle of Australia, and nominated for Best Non-European Film at the European Film Awards.
A graduate of the Australian Film Television and Radio School in 1980, Ray comes from a showbiz family. Both his parents are musicians and his sister is a TV director. His wife Lucinda is also a filmmaker and his children are already making films. His daughter Rachel is learning how to be a camera operator and his son Lewis hopes to become a writer.
Ray has enjoyed a colourful and productive presence in a filmmaking career spanning three decades. In that time he has directed short dramas, documentaries and features, and established a reputation as one of Australia's most innovative cinematographers through his work on features such as Wrong World, The Prisoner of St Petersberg and The Plains of Heaven.
Ray's first feature as writer and director, Return Home, received the 1990 AFI Award for best director, and the Film Critics circle of Australia Award for Best Director and Best Film. It screened at many festivals including Berlin, Edinburgh, Seattle and a retrospective in Cannes 1998. In 1991 Ray wrote and directed Eight Ball, produced by Timothy White and screened on ABC TV the following year.
In the 1980’s he produced forty odd music videos for MIDNIGHT OIL, CROWDED HOUSE and HOODOO GURU's among others. Ray has also been a lecturer at the Victorian College of Arts, teaching screen performance to the drama students and acting as supervising producer for the final year film students.
Ray has directed many hours of TV drama, and has specialised in setting up drama series such as MDA and SeaChange for ABC TV, the latter becoming the network’s highest rating drama to date.
Professor & Film director of Beijing Film Academy (BFA)
"Our Farmland"(Wo Men De Tian Ye)Wide-screen color feature film, director & screenwriter,1983
"A Girl from Hunan"(Xiang Nu Xiao Xiao)Wide-screen color feature film, director,1986. won Don Quixote award in San Sabastian film festival, Spain,1988. won Golden Panda award at Montpellier film festival, France,1988.Showed at "Certain Regard" of The Cannes. International Film Festival,France,1987. Showed at The Hong Kong. Tokyo. Montreal etc. Film Festival,1987---1990 Won The Humanitarianism Award, China, 1993
"Black Snow"(Ben Min Nian)Color feature film,director, 1989. won Silver Bear award at Berlin Film Festival,GDR, 1990. won best film of Hundred Flowers award,China,1990. Showed at HongKong. London. Washington. Sydney.Montreal Film Festival etc., 1990---1991
"Woman from the Lake of Scented Souls”(Xiang Hun nu)Color Feature Film, director and scriptwriter, 1992 Won The Golden Bear award at 43rd Berlin Film Festival in 1993. Won outstanding film award of Chinese Government, 1993. Won The Third place of Shanghai Film critic's Ten Best Films, 1993. Won Best Screenplay of The Beijing Film Academy Award, 1993. Won Best Actress Award of Chicago Film Festival in 1993. Won Best Ten Chinese Film award in Hong Kong,1993. Won First Place of The Ten Best Film of 1993 Chinese film by "Contemporary Film" in China. Won Public Prize of 5th Asian Film Festival in 1999, Vesoul, France.
"A Mongolian Tale"(Hei Jun Ma)Color Feature Film, Director, 1995. Won Jury Special Award of China University Student Film festival in 1995. Won Best Director Award and Music Artistic Award of 19th World Film Festival at Montreal, Canada in 1995. Won Best director award and The second place of Shanghai film critic’s Ten best films award , 1995,China Won Special award of organization committee of Saint Petersburg Film Festival, 1996, Russia.
“New China stories in screen”18 parts TV documetory, director, 1999
“Song of Tibet’’ (Yixizhuoma)Color feature movie, direcor & Screenwritor, 2000. Won best screenwriting and music award, best actress award of Chenise golden rooster award,2001. Won special award of jury of Beijing univesity student fiom festival, 2001. Won award of San luise international filom festival, USA, 2001. Won audence faver award of ocean film festival, Holand,2001.
“Sunrise”23 parts TV drama, director,2001
“Dream in the big family”35 parts TV drama, director,2003
President of Patrola Films, based in Los Angeles, and Patrola Films GmbH in Munich. His career in the entertainment industry has spanned more than 3 decades during which time he has produced and executive produced – in over 20 countries – a considerable number of motion pictures and highly acclaimed English speaking, international television movies and series. In 1986 Konstantin garnered an Emmy for Peter the Great, Outstanding TV Mini-series” - 1984/85 starring Laurence Olivier, Vanessa Redgrave and Omar Sharif) ) directed by Marvin J. Chomsky.
Konstantin was exposed to the entertainment industry almost from birth: his mother German actress, Erica Beer, and his father, U.S. screenwriter, Robert Thoeren - who wrote the original story of Some Like It Hot (Marylin Monroe and Tony Curtis). He grew
up in Munich and moved at a young age to Los Angeles where he did his early schooling and returned to Germany at the age of 12 and completed high school. At University in Switzerland Konstantin studied medicine, with a goal of working in a ‘serious 'profession to escape the mayhem of his childhood entrenched in show business. Through personal circumstances Konstantin left University, and it was a stroke of serendipity when the first person who offered him a job was a movie producer. The rest is history.
Konstantin met his wife, Carla in 1974, they married in 1975 and since then Konstantin has done only international English speaking productions, working with his wife and traveling the world. Their daughter, Patricia, who lives in Munich has also had the opportunity of exploring various countries whilst visiting her parents on location, and the Thoeren’s pet Jack Russell, “Quincy” has probably seen more of the world than most people. Konstantin’s substantial producer and executive producer credits include
Marvin Chomsky’s Catherine The Great (Catherine Zeta-Jones) and Inside the Third Reich, Daddy, directed by Giaomo Battiato, Dark Realm, Code Name: Eternity, Norberto
Barba’s Terror in the Mall, Ice Princess and Becoming Colette directed by Danny Huston, The Enemy, directed by Tom Kinninmont, Contaminated Man, directed by Anthony Hickox, G.Puccini’s Opera Turandot, directed (for television) by Hugo Kach, Hostile Waters, directed by David Drury, Dr. M,directed by Claude Chabrol, The Pyjama Man, directed by H. Schmiege and Chr. Rateuke, Deadly Game, directed by Karoly Mack, Horizons, directed by Hardy Kruger, Othello, directed by Herbert v. Karajan, In Devil’s Kitchen, Istvan Szabo’s Happy Islands, Lili Marlen, directed by Rainer Werner Fassbinder, and Dr. Harald Reindl’s Chariots of the Gods and Mysteries of the Gods.
Konstantin also produced the first European Film Awards (broadcast in 26 countries).
Konstantin was President and Producer at UFA International Film & TV Production GmbH in Germany, UFA International Ltd. in London, and UFA International Inc. in Los Angeles. He has been the European Representative for Motion Picture Guarantors Ltd. Toronto, and the Motion Picture Bond Comp. in Los Angeles. He is a member of the Director’s Guild of America.
Mike Walsh is a Senior Lecturer in the Screen and Media Department at Flinders University in Adelaide. He has a longstanding interest in watching, teaching about, and researching, contemporary Asian Cinema. He has published numerous journal articles and book chapters dealing with film history and film theory. He teaches courses on Asian Cinema, Australian Cinema, Film Narrative, and Film Style. He is currently working with the South Australian Film Corporation, documenting its history in preparation for its 40th anniversary.
In addition to his academic work, Mike has been a programmer and writer for the Adelaide Film Festival since its re-inception in 2002. In his role as a programmer specialising in East Asian cinema, he regularly attends films festivals in Hong Kong, Vancouver, Busan, Taipeh and Tokyo, as well as Australian festivals in Melbourne, Sydney and Brisbane. He is a member of the Film Critics Circle of Australia and has been on juries at the Melbourne and Brisbane International Film Festivals. He also has a longstanding association with the Media Resource Centre of South Australia, having served on its board for many years and being active in the programming policies for the Adelaide Cinematheque. In addition, he has worked with the Hong Kong Economic and Trade Office, writing programme notes and helping to curate several film seasons.
Mike is a contributing editor to RealTime, a national Australian arts magazine, and he is also a member of the advisory academic panel for Metro and Metro Education, journals published by the Australian Teachers of Media. He also writes and reviews for on-line journals such as Senses of Cinema and Screening the Past.
His PhD is from the University of Wisconsin-Madison, where he studied from 1987 to 1996. While there, he was co-ordinating editor of the international journal, The Velvet Light Trap. Prior to this he taught at the Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology in Melbourne.
