Screen highlights the films from Australia and New Zealand that will be ready for high-level festival debuts this year.
Audrey
Dir. Natalie Bailey
This first feature by Australian-born, UK-based Natalie Bailey, whose TV credits include The Thick Of It, is set to premiere at SXSW in March. It is a comedy drama about a former soap star-turned suburban mother , played by Jackie Van Beek, who takes on her daughter’s identity when an accident lands her in a coma.
Contact: Bankside
Bookworm
Dir. Ant Timpson
Nell Fisher and Elijah Wood star in this coming of age story about a 12 year-old girl whose life is turned upside down when her estranged father, who lives in the US and works as a magician, returns to New Zealand to look after her. Director Ant Timpson previously directed Wood in Tribeca premiere Come To Daddy and was a producer on The Greasy Strangler. Produced through Firefly Films and Nowhere and shot in New Zealand.
Contact: Mister Smith
Inside
Dir. Charles Williams
This crime thriller stars Guy Pearce as a soon-to-be-released prisoner and one of two father figures to an inmate transferred to the gaol from a juvenile facility. All three seek redemption. It is the feature debut of writer-director Charles Williams, who made the 2018 Palme d’Or short film winner All These Creatures. UK-based Australian Marian Macgowan (The Great) is among the producers and Thomas M Wright, director of 2022 Un Certain Regard title The Stranger, is executive producer.
Contact: Goodfellas
Memoir Of A Snail
Dir. Adam Elliot
Stop-motion animation specialist Elliot won an Oscar for his short Harvie Krumpet, and his 2009 debut feature Mary And Max picked up a major prize at Annecy. His latest is a bittersweet memoir of Grace Puddle, hoarder of snails, romance novels and guinea pigs, with Jacki Weaver, Eric Bana and Kodi Smit-McPhee among the voice cast. Arenamedia are producers, with Madman Entertainment handling distribution in Australia and New Zealand.
Contact: Charades, Anton
Went Up A Hill
Dir. Sam Van Grinsven
Vicky Krieps and Stranger Things’ Dacre Montgomery star in this genre-bending story of an estranged son and his dead mother’s grieving widow who find themselves inhabited by a ghost after meeting at the remote funeral. The director reunites with Jory Anast on the script, after previously collaborating on his Sequins In A Blue Room, which won the audience award at the 2019 Sydney Film Festival. Causeway Films’ Sam Jennings and Kristina Ceyton are producing this Australian/New Zealand co-production with Vicky Pope.
Contact: Bankside
We Were Dangerous
Dir. Josephine Stewart-Te Whiu
SXSW will host the world premiere of another interesting debut by a female filmmaker. New Zealand’s Josephine Stewart-Te Whiu turns her camera on the story of three girls trapped in a school for delinquent girls in 1950s New Zealand who rebel against the system. Maddie Dai wrote the script; Taika Waititi and Carthew Neal are among the executive producers through Piki Films.
Contact: Carthew Neal
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