FRANKLIN had its World Premiere at the Melbourne International Film Festival (MIFF) on 12th August 2022 at the Forum Theatre Melbourne, with nine additional MIFF Regional screenings taking place on the same day. Audience demand resulted in four additional screening sessions at the festival. The World Premiere MIFF screening included a Q&A with environmental activist Bob Brown, Director Kasimir Burgess and the film’s Co-Producer and protagonist Oliver Cassidy.
A national cinema launch followed on Sunday 4 September 2022 (Father’s Day) with 22 cinemas nationally simultaneously screening the film followed by a streamed Q&A, featuring Bob Brown, Oliver Cassidy and moderated by Ruby Jones from the 7am Podcast. Audiences around the country were able to get involved by sending questions to Bob and Oliver via the slido app.
The film officially commenced its cinema run later that week on Thurs 8 September 2022. The Franklin team successfully worked with impact and outreach partners to drive audiences to the cinema for the very critical opening weekend. After a strong opening the film continued on a very successful cinema campaign.
Highlights included a 22 week run at the State Cinema (Hobart), an 18 week run at Cinema Nova (Melbourne), an 8 week run at Nova Palace, East End (Adelaide). The film also did well at quite a number of regional cinemas, including a 6 week run at The Pivotonian (Geelong VIC) and the Sun Cinema (Launceston TAS), a 5 week run at The Regent (Murwillumbah NSW) and a 4 week run at Dendy Newtown (Sydney), Classic Cinema (Melbourne), Gala Cinema (Warrawong NSW) and Huskisson Cinema, (Huskisson NSW). To date it has screened at a total of 74 Australian cinemas, and to our delight continues to screen weekly on weeknights at the Paragon Cinema in Queenstown, South West Tasmania.
The cinema-staying-power of the film far surpassed our initial expectations and Franklin finished 2022 as one of the top two best performing documentaries for the 2022 Australian Box Office.
Community screenings followed the cinema release. To date there have been 47 Franklin community screenings. 19 of these were cinema-on-demand screenings via FanForce and 28 were community facilitated. Just under 2,500 people have viewed the film at these community events.
The film has now screened at 15 Australian and International film festivals and has been nominated for a number of prestigious awards:
AWARDS
Nominated, Best Documentary, AACTA Awards 2022
Nominated, Best Documentary, Walkley Awards 2022
Nominated, Best Documentary, Australian Film Critics Association Awards 2022
Won, Third Jury Special Award, FIFO Tahiti 2023
Won, Audience Award, Darwin International Film Festival 2022
Won, Best Environment Film, Kendal Mountain Festival 2023
FESTIVALS
World Premiere Melbourne International Film Festival 2022
Official Selection Cinefest Oz 2022
Official Selection BANFF 2022
Official Selection Nordic Adventure Film Festival 2022
Official Selection Kalakari Film Festival 2023?
Official Selection Mendocino Film Festival 2023
Official Selection Colorado Environment Film Festival 2023
Official Selection Salt Spring Film Festival 2023
Official Selection EIDF Korea 2023
TELEVISION BROADCASTS & STREAMING PLATFORMS
Franklin has been broadcast in Austraila on SBS TV in 2022 and SBS Viceland in 2023 and in New Zealand on the Rialto Channel in 2023 and is currently available to stream on Vimeo on Demand, DocPlay, Stan, Kanopy, Clickview and was available on SBS on Demand up until 30 November 2023. It was also available to view on Qantas flights during 2023.
