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00:00:13
S1: Well, the Melbourne International Film Festival is right on our doorstep. Let's find out a bit more about it from Hamish Reid, who's the operations manager. Hamish, great to meet you. Thanks for your time.
00:00:23
S2: My pleasure. Thanks for having us.
00:00:25
S1: How much are you looking forward to this? This is probably your highlight of the year, obviously.
00:00:30
S3: Yeah, no, it's a really special time for us all kind of to come together. I work seasonally, so I come back to this festival every year. Yeah, it's a really special thing. The second longest running film festival in the world. And I really feel like it belongs to the people more than anywhere everyone else. And I love coming to a festival where people have been coming for 30, 40 years and saying, this is the way it should be, and this is how it is. And yeah, it really feels like it belongs to Melbourne. So it's always a joy to to bring it to people.
00:01:01
S1: Now, what about in terms of your access and inclusion details? You're doing a lot in that area.
00:01:07
S2: Yes.
00:01:08
S3: So we're quite excited for the access program for this year. We've kind of been growing it over the past So a decade or so. So yeah, we've got a lot of kind of breakdown of our access program from sort of physical access, communications access and sensory access from a lot of, uh, audio described films this year, which we're really excited about, particularly one that's, um, playing with open audio description. It's a feature called Joy bubbles, a documentary about the man who actually hacks the telephone. He realizes he has perfect pitch and can do a 2600Hz whistle. Uh, at seven. Yeah. And it's an amazing, amazing story of this man who was born blind and he's kind of journey into sort of telephone hacking. And yeah, there's this whole trove of his audio, basically of him telling his life story, um, mashed with audio description along with it. So it's a really amazing feature to see.
00:02:10
S1: Where's that from?
00:02:10
S2: Hamish that's from the US.
00:02:12
S3: So that's just recently screened at Sundance. But yeah, it's amazing. Uh, Um, if we've had before Rachel J. Morrison and yes, we're really, really thrilled to have that as well as the airport chaplain, um, which is sort of by Bonnie Moir, which is, uh, sort of a yeah, it's actually a TV show. Uh, it's three episodes featuring Hugo Weaving and Shabana Aziz. It's kind of a compelling drama. Yeah. About airport chaplain and kind of unorthodox approaches to solving people's crisis. So yeah, we're excited to have Aidy for that one as well.
00:02:45
S2: Yeah.
00:02:46
S3: So there's a whole range of things. I think the best approach for anyone looking to come to me, uh, with accessibility needs or wanting to know a bit more is to, is to reach out to our box office team directly, obviously trying not to hack our phone lines. Um, but, uh, yeah, we think that's kind of the best way just to give you as much information when you're in, in session is also so we can best sort of suit and tailor the experiences to you.
00:03:11
S1: Yeah. Bookings have opened, I'm assuming.
00:03:14
S3: Uh, yes. Yeah. Tickets went on sale a couple of weeks ago. Um, so definitely reach out, particularly if there's sessions that you have requirements for, where you have some contingencies for people to try and make sure that we can make sessions as as accessible as possible. So yeah, it's good to talk to box office to see if there's things that we can do for you. Regarding tickets.
00:03:35
S1: Irish. What about relaxed settings? Have you got some of those for some of the films?
00:03:39
S3: Yeah. So we run a what we call sensory friendly sessions. So with these we'll sort of have the capacity of about 75%. We provide a quiet space outside of the cinema, um, and sort of run the session within the context of that. So it's more of a dimming of the lights, give people as much information prior to the session to really be across how it's going to run, maybe where you're going, uh, who we are, what it will kind of be like. And yeah, we've got a whole range of beautiful films within our programme. Uh, so there's stuff like documentaries about animals and one of our features called whispers in the woods, as well as, yeah, a new film from Bus Stop Films, which we're really excited to be doing a sensory friendly of as well. The tale of Cillian, which is about a man who befriends a stork. So there's a whole range of of different features that we're doing with those. So yeah, we're very excited for our sensory friendliest.
00:04:39
S1: How much you touched on a term a bit earlier in the interview that we haven't heard that often, but I think it became a bit more prominent. Is open a open, um, open AI open audio, you know, the brain. Yeah. Sorry about that.
00:04:54
S3: I think the, the thing that we're really excited about with things like open ID and, and open audio description is I'm not sure if your listeners may have had experiences of using different devices. And, you know, these devices offer accessibility to very distinct different groups of people in very distinctly different ways. So for some people that might be audio described, that's some people that might be assistive listening. And the two devices do very different things. And the two tracks are very different things. So it's really. Wanting to make sure that that works well. But you know, devices are only as good as is in someone's hands or someone using it. And there's user error that can happen there with open ID, it's playing through the main speakers throughout the cinema, so everyone's hearing the same audio track. And why I think we're so excited about a film like Joybubbles is this has kind of been mixed, um, and, and executed as well as all of the other audio that is, you know, kind of traditional for a film. Uh, so yeah, I'm not sure. Sometimes audio tracks, audio describe tricks might not be mixed as well. You might, you
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know, miss bits of dialogue because of the description. This is yeah, it's I've listened to and watched this film and it's a really, it's wonderful to sort of hear and see it kind of align really well, both, um, with so much of its audio being the, the, the voice of its, its subject. And yeah, it's a, it's a great experience for anyone of interested in the content. So it's yeah, I'm excited to see it come to life.
00:06:25
S1: Yeah. For sure. Hi. Um, yeah, we have a quick chat. Before coming to when you were telling me maybe about a part of the, the market, if you like, part of the people that might like to come along to films that you've kind of included, one that I hadn't thought of much before that might be people or, you know, maybe those who are new moms.
00:06:43
S3: Yeah, yeah. So we have, we have baby friendly sessions, uh, which I'm really excited about. I think it's a thing that often, you know, people find themselves at home not being able to go out and feel like they can just be themselves with a young baby. And so we're really excited to have a couple of sessions where it's, you know, full prams at the front, lots of babies running around, um, make all the noise they need to. And at that, that's okay, you know, and not trying to have those situations where people are shushing or, or uncomfortable with those. So yeah, we're running a couple of sessions of those. One called The Cycle of Love and the Siege of Paradise, both doco cycle of loves. Uh, it's about a couple who have, yeah, been long lost lovers, essentially. It's actually a documentary and they're kind of journey from him cycling from one side of the world to the other to go find her. And then the other doco, Siege of Paradise is about Cinque Terre in Italy, and a whole bunch of people's uncomfortable locals experiences as everyone tries to to come every day to get, you know, good touristing photos and such. So yeah.
00:07:48
S1: You're making it hard for people to choose the story lines. They're thinking, I wouldn't mind going along to see that. Um, what about in terms of the physical access? Because of course you talked about the sensory, which is great, but what about in terms of physical access?
00:08:03
S4: Yeah.
00:08:03
S3: So fortunately for me, if we're lucky to offer 100% step free access to all of our venues, um, as well as, yeah, this sort of, we're excited this year to be welcoming Hardy's Park, which is a director, uh, who is a wheelchair user and focuses on, uh, a para ice hockey team, uh, from Australia and their journey to go play in, you know, para ice hockey World Cup, which is a I watched the doco. It's amazing. And it's just like a classic Australian heartwarming, like larrikin Aussie sport film that I think really. Yeah, is a great form of representation where it's not necessarily a tragic story of disability. It's it's just an Aussie sport doco. Um, which I really loved. And we're, you know, we're really excited to, to have him as a guest to the festival as well as hopefully welcome some of the, the subjects of that as well. And, you know, that's a, that's a wonderful challenge to, to try and push some of these venues that we're working in to, to make them as accessible as possible. And, and look at ways we can make sure people are comfortable. And yeah, it's, we're definitely limited at times by, by the places that we're in, but it's in operations, it's stuff that we really want to keep getting better at and, and want to keep pushing other venues to, to keep making them more accessible or thinking about ways that we can accommodate people and that there's not a one one solution for everybody. And, and the best way to, to work and approach that starts with with communication and dialogue and, and honesty about what we can offer and, and how we can look to accommodate people. The other thing to note as well is we also have an online stream. So if there's people who, for whatever reason, can't make certain sessions or can't get out into the city, there's also our myth online program.
00:09:51
S1: Oh, sensational.
00:09:53
S3: Yeah. So head to our website and you can sort of access the same certain features. And yeah, it also provides a different opportunities to engage with it. Yeah.
00:10:03
S1: I mean, it's brilliant. You've thought of everything, which is tremendous. Now how can people find out more? Where does it get underway? It's early in August, isn't it? First week?
00:10:10
S4: Yes.
00:10:11
S3: So the festival dates are from the 6th to the 23rd of August. The program is live on our website as well as there should be physical copies of it out in the city for those who are interested. But yeah, you can absolutely just call our box office if you ever need that kind of a really great way of giving you a rundown of anything. If you have any questions about both sessions. We have a full access page on our website indicating venues how to get to these places, which as well as navigation videos. Yeah, there's a, there's a whole array of stuff on our website. We've tried to make it as accessible as possible. Um, in terms of getting information out of it, but yes, definitely reach out to our team on the phone if it's something that you're particularly interested in.
00:10:56
S1: What is your website?
00:10:57
S3: Uh.com.au.
00:11:00
S1: Okay. MIFF yep. Now the phone number handy Hamish.
00:11:04
S4: Yes I do. It's 03 8660 4888.
00:11:11
S1: Terrific. All right, we'll put those details up on our show notes. Want to give it to us again?
00:11:17
S4: Uh 03 8660 4888.
00:11:23
S1: Hey Mitch, congratulations to you on all those involved. It sounds like you are really going out of your way to make it accessible. I guess the other side of the equation is that I hope people get along and kind of patronize the the options that people have got. It's good if you put them on. It's even better if people use them up.
00:11:38
S3: Yeah, exactly, exactly. And I think that's the big thing. We try and make sure we've got some stuff available to people. And the biggest thing is to make sure that if you are someone that requires and wants to come along to these things, definitely reach out because it might look like to the, you know, the untrained eye that it's, you know, not there or sold out or whatever. But if there's, if it's something that we're offering and you're someone that would really benefit from that, we really want you to come and experience it. So, so yeah, please let us know. And we're excited to, to have as many people as we can to myth 500 or so sessions. We're doing this festival. So it's a lot of films. Yeah.
00:12:14
S1: Hi miss. Wish you well.
00:12:16
S3: Thank you very much. It's been it's been nice to talk to you.
00:12:18
S1: Sir. Hamish read the. Hamish is the operations manager for myth, the Melbourne International Film Festival from August the 6th. And certainly lots and lots of opportunities to get along and very, very inclusive access festival indeed.