Director Kriv Stenders' dark comic thriller Kill Me Three Times, his follow-up to the hit Red Dog, will have its world premiere at the Toronto International Film Festival next month. Simon Pegg (Star Trek Into Darkness, Mission: Impossible – Ghost Protocol) plays an assassin caught up in three tales of murder in a surfing town in a film that also stars Sullivan Stapleton, Alice Braga, Teresa Palmer and Bryan Brown. Selected as well for the festival are Tony Ayres' true-crime thriller Cut Snake, which also stars Stapleton as well as Jessica de Gouw and Alex Russell, Rolf de Heer's Charlie's Country and Sotiris Dounoukos' French-Australian short film A Single Body (Un Seul Corps). The festival has previously announced that Mark Hartley's documentary Electric Boogaloo: The Wild, Untold Story of Cannon Films will screen in the Midnight Madness section. 

James Cameron takes Peter Jackson's approach

James Cameron is following in Peter Jackson's footsteps with his Avatar sequels. While in Sydney to launch the documentary Deepsea Challenge 3D, which charts his dive in a submersible to the bottom of the Mariana Trench two years ago, Cameron said the three sequels would be shot as one six-year project in New Zealand. “We’ve had a couple of years now developing the new hardware and software for our new production pipeline,’’ he told Short Cuts. ‘‘We’re about a year into it creatively. I’m working with four other writers and we’re collectively writing the scripts for Avatar 2, 3 and 4 as one big project. And I can’t roll a foot of film until I’ve got all three scripts exactly dialled in because it’s all being done kind of interleaved. The design team’s been working for a year. So I guess the best way of looking at it is we’re a year into a six-year project." The sequels are due out at Christmas 2016, 2017 and 2018.

Political thriller on the Tampa crisis a step closer

While preparing for the release of the Australian police drama Felony later this month, director Matt Saville (Noise, The Slap) has been finishing a draft of one of the most intriguing Australian films in development: Dark Victory, a political thriller about the 2001 children overboard controversy. It is based on David Marr and Marion Wilkinson’s book of the same name that chronicles the Howard government’s refusal to allow the Norwegian freighter Tampa to enter Australian waters with more than 400 rescued refugees. ‘‘I basically think of it as a war movie without a shot fired,’’ Saville says. While the sensitivities surrounding the refugee issue mean Dark Victory may easily be a challenging film to finance, Saville says that has not been the case so far: ‘‘That’s actually ignited interest because there are a lot of people who believe it’s as important to be discussed today, unfortunately, as it was at the time. We’re still hearing the same rhetoric.’’ Financing and casting begin once this draft is completed. Saville says, when he read the book, he could not believe it had not already been turned into a film or mini-series. ‘‘It’s a beautifully researched and written book,’’ he said. ‘‘There are passages in there that read like a Robert Ludlam novel."

Great wartime escape documentary to debut in Melbourne

Tunnel of Hope, a documentary about what is described as one of the greatest escapes of World War II, will have its world premiere in Melbourne later this month. Directed by Dror Shwartz, it chronicles the escape by 230 Jewish slave workers by digging a 200-metre tunnel from a work camp in what is now Belarus in 1943. The Jewish Holocaust Centre is presenting the screening as part of its 30th anniversary at Classic Cinemas, Elsternwick, on August 28. It will be followed by a Q&A with two sons of escapees, co-producer Michael Kagan and Jack Borowski.

Noyce tribute for Indian festival

After his sci-fi drama The Giver opens in the US this week, Australian director Phillip Noyce (Dead Calm, Patriot Games, Rabbit-Proof Fence) will have a retrospective of his work screened during the Australian Film Festival of India. Launched by Indian-Australian filmmaker Anupam Sharma and co-director Peter Castaldi, the festival aims to promote Australian cinema in India, and has screenings in eight cities, including Delhi, Chennai and Mumbai, from November to February.

Tribute screening of Good Morning Vietnam

Melbourne International Film Festival is paying tribute to the late Robin Williams with a screening of Good Morning Vietnam on Saturday. "He leaves behind an extraordinary cinematic legacy," say the organisers. "We pay tribute to the life of Robin Williams the best way we know how – with a special screening of one of his most beloved films." The screening is at 1.30pm at Hoyts Melbourne Central. Meanwhile, Manuel Abramovich's The Queen has won the grand prix for best short film at the festival. The the judges describe it as "intimate, confronting and utterly mesmerising". Eddy Bell's Grey Bull – described as "heart-warming and funny" – has won the Erwin Rado Award for best Australian short film. 

Forum to discuss Screen Australia cuts

Following Screen Australia's cut to Sydney Metro Screen – and to similar organisations in other states – a public forum to discuss "where we go from here" will be held at the Chauvel Cinema on September 2. Organisers believe "almost $2 million of the $5 million in recent Screen Australia funding cuts directly impact emerging talent and production".

US release for film about 11 year olds

Genevieve Bailey's documentary I Am Eleven is getting a release in US cinemas next month. Self-distributed in Australia and looking at 11-year-olds around the world, it ran for 26 weeks in Melbourne's Cinema Nova. The US opening includes AMC Theatres and art-house cinemas, starting in New York on September 12. "We shot the film in 15 countries and we've been very passionate and very hands-on with the film's distribution," said Bailey.