Lights, camera and action here

A FULLY professional and kitted out film production sound stage in Cairns makes a lot of sense and is far from a pie-in-the-sky dream.

Movie fanatic and Queensland Speaker of the House and Mulgrave MP Curtis Pitt is championing the cause and has been actively working behind the scenes, even meeting Hollywood heavyweights, in a bid to make the sound stage a reality.

As he points out Tropical North Queensland has some of the most diverse locations in Australia within an hour of an international airport – tropical islands and beaches, desert, rainforest, farming country and amazing Art Deco architecture.

But the missing ingredient is a purpose-built sound stage to provide “weather cover” and allow for construction of interior sets.

Two ideal and currently available sites are the former Bunnings Warehouse and the defunct Masters Home Improvement Centre at Portsmith. They are close to the CBD and hotels, have lots of outdoor space (for parking and exterior set builds) with room to build more studios in time and have on-site office and production space.

Already Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk has approved $12 million to turn five disused warehouses in Brisbane into film and television production studios.

The Far North has plenty of talent living and working here and The

Pacific (2010, $200 million miniseries), the $70m Fool’s Gold (2008) and the $52m The Thin Red

Line (1998) were all filmed in the region.

Advance Cairns and Cairns Regional Council should dust off their Far North Queensland Film Industry Workforce Plan and get cracking with Mr Pitt.