Netflix film crew falls in love with 'Canberra's Kakadu' while shooting survivalist thriller

Filming is underway at Ginninderra Falls for a new Netflix ‘survivalist thriller’ starring Charlize Theron, Taron Egerton and Eric Bana after the US-based producers happened to stumble across the site’s property listing online.

While it hasn’t started smoothly, the film crew has already said they’re so impressed by the site’s natural beauty that they might return.

According to Ray White real estate agent George Southwell, the film crew has described it “as one of the most amazing sites” and one that “could quite possibly become a permanent fixture for their filming in the future”.

“We launched the sales campaign last year, which went global, and Netflix picked it up off that,” he said.

“It could be a very lucrative opportunity for incoming purchasers.”

According to Netflix fan site Tudum.com, Apex follows the story of a grieving woman seeking solace in the wilderness, “only to find herself ensnared in a deadly game of cat and mouse with a serial killer”.

Hollywood stars Theron (Monster, The Old Guard 2), Egerton (Carry-On, Kingsman: The Secret Service), and Bana (Hulk, Untamed) are in the cast, with most of the scenes set among the “rugged landscapes” around Sydney and the Blue Mountains, according to director Baltasar Kormákur.

“For a film like Apex – where the elements and the terrain are characters that loom just as large as the movie stars battling in it – no other country in the world could have taken the place of Australia as our primary location,” Kormákur told Tudum.com.

“The unrivalled landscape, studio facilities, and talented crews in New South Wales have been a boon to this production.”

The crew were first spotted in the ACT region over the weekend at an old service station in Bowning, near Yass.

“The Bowning servo hasn’t seen action like this since the 70s,” a resident posted to the Yass Photos and History group on Facebook.

They then rolled onto the Ginninderra Falls site on Monday (3 February), where they are expected to remain for three weeks.

However, owner John Hyles said the crew found there wasn’t enough water flowing along Ginninderra Creek for their liking, even after attempts to clear debris from around a weir further upstream.

After the producers put in two requests, the ACT Government agreed to briefly open the floodgates at Lake Ginninderra on 31 January and 4 February to allow more water to reach the site.

“Yesterday was a bit tense, but the water’s expected to get here in a day or so,” Mr Hyles told Region on Wednesday (5 February).

A government spokesperson said, “Both requests were considered individually and assessed against a range of legislative, operational and environmental considerations”.

There’s no word yet on when Apex is expected to land on Netflix, but when it does, it might be the most anyone has seen of Ginninderra Falls in years.

The 55-hectare privately owned freehold in Wallaroo has earned the nickname ‘Canberra’s Kakadu’. However, for public liability reasons, it has been off-limits to visitors since 2004.

And despite calls from the community for the ACT and NSW governments to work together to buy the site and open it up again for public access as a national park, neither has expressed much interest.

Most recently, and in response to questions from the Canberra Liberals, ACT Deputy Chief Minister Yvette Berry confirmed on 4 February the government’s Suburban Land Agency (SLA) made “initial queries” but decided against participating in the recent expression of interest (EOI) process.

Mr Southwell told Region his team had entered “very serious discussions” with three parties but wouldn’t confirm or deny if any of them were related to a government agency, except to hint at a possible “joint venture”.

He said the site had received “increased interest in the last week”.

“My phone’s starting to ring again … with the filming of this Netflix movie and the presence of some pretty big Hollywood stars,” he said.

“From an asset point of view and from a very proud local’s point of view, I think that’s huge. I mean, Canberra’s never really been acknowledged as a film Mecca, but in reality, it can be.”