Australian talent will lead the way at the 2015 Sydney film festival, both in front and behind the cameras. Bookended by homegrown premieres, the festival will open in June with the writer and actor Brendan Cowell’s directorial debut of Ruben Guthrie, and close with Candy director Neil Armfield’s much anticipated Holding the Man.
Nicole Kidman stars in the emerging director Kim Farrant’s feature debut, Strangerland, and Michael Caton leads Last Cab to Darwin, based on the stage play of the same name and also starring Jackie Weaver and Leah Purcell.
Theatre director Simon Stone will premiere The Daughter, his first feature film based on Henrik Ibsen’s play The Wild Duck, which he directed to great acclaim at Sydney’s Belvoir theatre.
A strong documentary selection for 2015 includes the world premiere of Women He Undressed, Gillian Armstrong’s documentary about the unsung Oscar-winning Australian costume designer Orry Kelly, who created costumes for Some Like it Hot, Gypsy and Irma la Douce.
An Australian documentarian, Jennifer Peedom, will present the world premiere of her film, Sherpa, about the deadly 2014 avalanche at Mount Everest, and the Sydney director Maya Newell will show Gayby Baby, a child’s eye view of the same-sex marriage debate.
Now in its 62nd year, the festival will feature 251 films (up from the 183 screened in 2014), with 34 world premieresand 135 Australian premieres. There are 12 feature films in the running for the annual Sydney film festival prize, worth $62,000, including Australian titles Sherpa, Strangerland and The Daughter.
A diverse range of on-screen storytelling will be showcased, says the festival director, Nashen Moodley, pointing to the US film Tangerine, shot entirely on an iPhone 5s, and The Tribe, which is performed entirely in Ukrainian sign language.
Once again, the program features a selection of family-friendly films as well as the popular Freak Me Out program, including a double bill of cult classics, Invasion of the Body Snatchers and Them. Dedicated movie buffs can sign up for one of two cinematic endurance tests: the six-and-a-half-hour Arabian Nights, and From What Is Before, which clocks in at five and a half hours.
Fans of Joshua Oppenheimer’s documentary The Act of Killing, a hit at the 2013 Sydney film festival, may want to book now for its follow-up, The Look of Silence. Other treats include a two-part screening of the ABC television mini-series The Secret River, based on Kate Grenville’s award-winning bestseller about early convict colonists and their clashes with the Indigenous population.
Plenty of Australian talent is expected to descend on Sydney for the festival, with appearances scheduled for Brendan Cowell, Michael Caton, Simon Stone and Neil Armfield. The US documentary-maker Alex Gibney will also be in town to talk about his two festival films, Going Clear: Scientology and the Prison of Belief and Mr Dynamite: The Rise of James Brown.
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Sydney Film Festival runs from 3 to 14 June across Sydney. Tickets are on sale now.
Sydney film festival: our top 10 to see
Ruben Guthrie
Strangerland
Tangerine
Me and Earl and the Dying Girl
Gayby Baby
Women He Undressed
Love and Mercy
Amy
The Tribe
The Look of Silence
