"A lot of people would read the script and get very excited, but never enough to push us over the line and invest in the film."

– Christopher Weekes, Director

Unable to secure any form of Government assistance to either develop or fund the project over what became many years, writer/director Christopher Weekes was close to abandoning the idea. "One of my parents died soon after I turned 24. Months later, I was crawling out of this very dark period and realised I could channel some of these painful observations of grief into what I'd already written. My whole life I've been so aware of how the past shapes who we are as people today,but I realised I hadn't been saying that. I'd been listening to everybody else telling me how to make this a better film, how to make this work, but I hadn't trusted myself. I tried one more stab at it, desperate to make good of this situation and prove to everyone who said 'move on'. It was either that or crawl into a hole and hide. Painful as it was, this time was also a defining moment for me personally."

– Christopher Weekes, Director

Soon after, Christopher met producer Bridget Callow whilst both were working at a TVC production company in Inner Sydney. She had also only just turned 24. "The odds were very much stacked against this film, but I felt so passionate about the characters Chris had created, I was prepared leave my job and join him in taking the much riskier route to see it get made."

– Bridget Callow, Producer

Determined, they decided to make the film alone. Using whatever money Christopher had saved over the years, they began production.

"We were very aware of the dangers in self-financing a film – but there was a lot of freedom offered as well. Given the road-blocks Chris had encountered earlier on, it seemed the only way to move forward anyway. You need plenty of faith and trust to pull off such a risky proposition. It's not enough to just make do with the little we had. We wanted to tell this story with the least amount of compromise possible, and that takes hard work, planning are more than a little thinking outside the square. Chris is a fantastically hard worker and put absolutely everything he has into this film, that alone made it much easier."

– Bridget Callow, Producer

The role of Penelope Lombard had always been written with well-known Australian actress Noni Hazlehurst in mind. Christopher begged a sound recordist friend from her TV show to drop a copy of his screenplay on her makeup table. A few days after Christopher got a call from Noni saying she loved the script and wanted to be involved. "I loved the script first up, and the idea of working with a young director / producer team on something that meant so much to them was exciting."

– Noni Hazlehurst, Actor.

Knowing that Noni had a gap in her schedule of ten days at the end of January, BITTER & TWISTED found itself locked into shoot dates with no turning back. Offers soon went out to a dream list of actors to appear alongside her, and even with little to no money, the response was overwhelming. "I'm not quite sure how we did it, but we ended up with the most incredible list of Australian actors I could have imagined."

– Christopher Weekes, Director

The main cast of well-known and much loved Australian actors came together very quickly. In addition to Noni Hazlehurst (Little Fish) the cast was rounded out by: Steve Rodgers (The Bank), Leeanna Walsman (Looking for Alibrandi), Rhys Muldoon (Danny Deckchair), Gary Sweet (The Tracker), Penne Hackforth-Jones (Paradise Road) and Matthew Newton (My Mother Frank).

BITTER & TWISTED was shot in thirty-two locations over twenty days on Super 16mm. Filming mostly in the Southern shires of Sydney, the crew, almost all under 30, worked on average more than twelve hours a day stretching physical and emotional endurances. "The cast and crew showed an incredible sense of passion and commitment. I remember being nervous about how an experienced group might respond to our very basic working conditions, but it ended up making us a much closer production. By the end we'd all become family. Everyone rose to these challenges, no matter the obstacle – from doing makeup against the side mirror of a car to roping their parents in for extra work. Everyone sacrificed so much of them self for this film. We were very lucky. I look at Bitter & Twisted now and I wonder how on earth we managed to get through it all."

– Bridget Callow, Producer

Racing unplanned and unannounced through shopping malls and city streets at night, the production utilised every trick in the book of indie filmmaking. "We lovingly joked that the film was 'Dogma on a Dolly'. Even the cast found themselves raiding their closet for costumes. We were working without a safety net, so we were always thinking about other and more interesting ways to solve these problems without losing the integrity of the story."

– Christopher Weekes, Director

Remarkably, BITTER & TWISTED was shot and completed for less than the catering budget of many feature films.

Film editor Simon Wright worked for many months with Director/Writer Christopher Weekes to pull the story of BITTER & TWISTED together, often from the floor of his living room. "We found the story we shot took on a life of its own once when we started cutting. We'd play shots backwards, insert stills, even shooting extra scenes with home video cameras just to explore every option possible. We wanted this edit to be everything it could, and even without resources, we knew there was a way to do it."

– Simon Wright, Editor

Soon after finishing the first cut, Michael Favelle of Odin's Eye Entertainment came on board as executive producer, recognising the films potential straight away. "A good friend at another distribution outfit brought the film to me and I immediately fell in love with the characters and world Chris had created. It was surprising to me that such an interesting project was totally ignored by the funding bodies, so it became a bit of a mission to see it completed and for it to find an audience. I think this film will surprise a lot of people. Chris is a great talent and is truly a director to watch in the future. I can only imagine what he would be capable of with a real budget at his disposal"

– Michael Favelle, Executive Producer