Rodney (L) and Warwick (R) pose for a photograph. Photo (C) Jill Purdey

This is the site of Fernby Films, a South Australian film production company founded by brothers Rodney & Warwick Twelftree.

Rodney directed his first film in 1992, a school project entitled “Aliens 4″, shot with a camera utilising VHS tapes, and edited on a primitive VHS-to-VHS tape deck arrangement. Scarred by this for years, Rodney finally got over his fear of making movies when he purchased a digital camera in 2000, in order to make a film project about golf. Things got in the way, and prevented that project from seeing the light of day, however both Rodney and his brother Warwick formed their own film company, Fernby Films, in order to continue making their projects.

Warwick’s first major film project was Hello Annabel, an hour long film saying “hello” to a family friend from England.

It was the success of this project, and the continued rise of their ability with projects for various organisations, that made the brothers pursue this hobby with interest.

Key to the success of Fernby Films is the cornerstone of the studio’s output, Thrash Bus, and it’s sequel Thrash Bus 2: Clone of the Thrash Bus. The sequel quickly became the studios signature piece when it premiered in February of 2007.

Fernby Films association with production partner Grey Phoenix Productions began in 2005, with Michael and Rodney being introduced by a mutual friend. The two had a keen interest in film-making, and Rodney asked Michael to assist on a key filming shoot for Thrash Bus 2 in 2005.

Following this successful foray together, the two began production work on Schoolyard Justice. SYJ was released in 2008 on the world wide web.

fernbyfilms.com appeared online late in 2007, initially as a repository for Rodney’s thoughts and photos, generalised comments about life, the universe and everything. Following a trip to Europe in 2008, Rodney decided to focus the website on film reviews and as a platform to promote Fernby Films productions where applicable. The website remains the central point at which all information on Fernby Films news is presented to the world.

In 2008, Director of Fernby Films, Rodney Twelftree, began to invite more people to help write reviews on the site. Including James Ward, Greg Bowden, and Mick Kubler, the site has expanded to incorporate almost all kinds of review for films and TV. The website has also become home to the cutest furry member of the fernbyfilms.com family, the Secret Squirrel. While no doubt a squirrel has different opinions on human films, it was decided to allow the four legged fur-ball contribute on a weekly basis regardless.

In 2009, Rodney began work on scripting his next major project, Urban Golf, and in partnership with Grey Phoenix Productions, hope to have the film made within the next decade.

In May of ’09, Rodney and wife Lisa had their first child, Mikayla. Work on fernbyfilms.com slowed considerably at this time, and we also felt the loss of regular writer Doug Shearer due to personal reasons, and the Secret Squirrel also departed to expand his/her family.

Recently, Rodney has also begun to scribe reviews and articles for US based website, moviesmackdown.com, for Bryce Zabel. Our list of friendly movie-oriented websites continues to grow, with Al K Hall over at The Bar None, Dan at Top10Films and Bob Nowotny’s Need To Vent websites providing informative, humorous and quality reviews for you to read as well. We occasionally link to their material on our own site, generally at the bottom of a review, so keep an eye out for their stuff. We only link to sites we feel are written by like-minded people and reviewers, to add to the film community at large. Links to major commercial sites aren’t part of our plan!

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