‘Australian’, only when it’s convenient?

Screen Australia’s analysis of 2009 box office data considered the Melbourne-shot Knowing (and its healthy contribution of $7.6m to the reported $54.8m total) as an Australian film, even though director Alex Proyas openly complained about it not being eligible for the producer offset. It is unclear if it eventually received it. So, is it an Australian project, or not?

A Summit Entertainment production, Knowing is not an official co-production. It was shot in Victoria, and a number of Australian companies worked on its post-production. But Proyas himself told me last March: “Sadly, I regret bringing the production of Knowing to Australia […] we genuinely thought that we would qualify for the 40 percent producer offset, because it’s essentially an all-Australian production. Still to this day, I’m really upset that we were not able to qualify for that rebate, and I don’t understand why.”