Now it’s probably not as big as Cannes or Sundance but the Sydney Film Festival is a crucial industry event for the Australian film industry in particular.
Read More
An anthology series turned feature film Force of Habit combines the work of 6 female directors and 6 different stories of women going about their everyday lives openly revealing the often hidden world of sexual abuse, the male gaze, and power dynamics within society.
Read More
A Perfectly Normal Family is the story of 11-year-old Emma whose perfectly “normal” family is turned upside down when her father comes out as transgender. The film was based on debut feature director Malou Reymann’s real-life experiences with her own father as a child and seeks to tell a personal story of a family navigating this change together.
Read More
What came first human values or religion? It’s this chicken and the egg question that Penny Lane’s documentary Hail Satan? aims to unpack, focusing on the lack of separation of church and state that has become incredibly evident within American politics.
Read More
Have you ever laughed so hard that your insides hurt? Well if not I would recommend going to see Booksmart directed by Olivia Wilde.
Read More
This is a very colourful film with some great cinematic choices when it comes to shots, and the overall production design really gives each character their own identity and makes each location pop. It’s chaotic and fast and its comical tone is set right from the opening scene.
Read More
In today’s media landscape, the concept of immigration fear is prevalent, particularly in Australia. In Iceland, this issue has only recently bubbled to the surface and as such Ásthildur Kjartansdóttir’s feature film debut, The Deposit, is one of the only ones in the country to bring it to the forefront of discussion.
Read More
When you think of the zombie apocalypse genre images of rotting corpses lumbering their way through empty streets in a mindless search for brains are probably what you’d picture first along with titles like 28 Days Later, The Walking Dead, or World War Z. Well Endzeit, the second feature from filmmaker Carolina Hellsgard, takes this traditional concept and twists it challenging what we think we know about the disaster film.
Read More
I honestly didn't consciously choose to see two lesbian films in my Sydney Film Festival viewings, but I'm glad that it worked out that way. Both Rafiki directed by Wanuri Kahiu and The Miseducation of Cameron Post directed by Desiree Akhavan were new stories that I had not experienced before.
Read More
I began my Sydney Film Festival experience with The Breaker Upperers by New Zealand comedy duo Madeleine Sami and Jackie Van Beek who both wrote, directed, and starred in the film. What struck me straight away about this movie was its true New Zealand style of comedy.
Read More
When I first heard that Half the Picture was going to be at the Sydney Film Festival I knew I wanted to see it. The style was familiar documentary interview format but this meant that the film focused on the stories of the many women that were interviewed including Ava DuVernay, Mary Harron, Jill Soloway, and Lena Dunham just to name a few.
Read More