Image via miff.com.au
Pretty much all I knew about Matangi a.k.a. Maya Arulpragasm a.k.a. M.I.A. is the song Bad Girls. The anthem to girls doing whatever they want has a killer video clip of stunt drivers in the Middle East and M.I.A. resplendent in shades and gold chains. I now know there is so much more to her than this song and her Grammy and Oscar nominations. Continue reading
Image via miff.com.au
Virtual Reality at its best immerses you in a human experience in a way that cinema can’t. Parragirls Past, Present floats you slowly through a mostly ghost-like recreation of the Parramatta Girls’ Home while former inmates – survivors – recount their stories. Continue reading
Image by Digby Duncan via miff.com.au
I love MIFF for the chance to experience or revisit important pieces of filmmaking and Witches, Faggots, Dykes and Poofters is a great example of this. Continue reading
Image via miff.com.au
Although unalike in style and purpose, this inventive blend of animation, interviews and live footage reminds me of Laurie Anderson’s Heart of a Dog in its approach to subjective documentary. Filmmaker and animator Anja Kofmel creates a story around her cousin Christian Würtenberg, who was a journalist and sometime mercenary, killed under mysterious circumstances in Croatia in the early 90s. Continue reading
Image via miff.com.au
Sari Braithwaite’s hour long introspective documentary built from clips cut out of films by the Australian Censor Board goes some way to exploring the notion of censorship. Continue reading
Image via miff.com.au
My film before this one, Ukrainian Donbass, was an unrelenting, grubby onslaught of caricature, corruption and violence. Following it with 100 minutes with Ryuichi Sakamoto was like a balm for the heart and soul. Continue reading
Image via miff.com.au
You know that the story of a woman being kept essentially as a slave in contemporary Hungary is going to be hard-hitting. Filmmaker Bernadett Tuza-Ritter does an outstanding job of inserting us right into the exhausting day-to-day existence of Marish. Continue reading
Image via miff.com.au
An intriguing albeit flat documentary by Irene Lusztig, Yours in Sisterhood has contemporary women reading unpublished letters sent to Ms magazine in the 1970s. Continue reading
Image via miff.com.au
The Bay City Rollers was my boyband obsession. Tartan scarves were banned from my primary school because we used to wear them tied to our wrists to show our devotion. My cousin called them the Bay Shitty Rollers, just to annoy me. Continue reading
Image via http://www.theaustralian.com.au
I’m so glad I caught this heartbreakingly beautiful documentary about the late Dr. G. Yunupingu at the State Cinema in Hobart on its last day of screening. The story and the man alone is enough reason to see it yet you don’t have to be a fan of his music to enjoy it. It is made all the more rewarding by its respectful narrative and exquisite sound editing and cinematography. Continue reading
fillums 