Discoveries from Australia World Cinema

A Colourful Life is a Docu/Drama based on the colourful life of flamboyant design pioneer Florence Broadhurst.

Smitten is the Australian Sport Climbing, Bouldering & BASE jumping movie. Prepare for a white knuckle, action packed, thrill ride as we tour through the Grampians, Mount Arapiles

"What a big week in football!" For twelve remarkable years, it was the line that Eddie McGuire used so many times to open another episode of the television phenomenon that is "The Footy Show". Hosted by Sam Newman, "What A Big 12 Years" stands as a fitting farewell to Essie McGuire.

A frustrated TV writer wishes to lose his job, so he pitches the worst idea he can.

Following the death of her mother, Margie leaves her family farm on a quest to search for an rare amphibian. Losing track of time in the forest she encounters a mysterious creature and then must fight to survive the night. FEIRG is a dark modern fairytale that examines the cycles of grief through the medium of a horror-thriller with a time travel loop -de-loop.

A women's prison gang battle for their lives against demon-possessed, private school girls.

Parody trailer for a low-budget grind-house thriller in which a woman rampages men with tampons.

A young woman must face the trauma of her childhood while spending an evening alone with her terminally ill father.

This documentary follows Paraskevas Mourikis as he fondly remembers his father Spiro.

City transplants Eva and Rose are invited to volunteer at their local town hall. After meeting all of the town’s folk and a game show host like Mayor they are excited about being part of this odd little community. Unfortunately their new home has some strange traditions and sinister undertones. When the mayor reveals a bingo cage they are excited about playing but they soon realise that their number being called could have catastrophic consequences. Tension builds while everyone waits to see who will be the next town sacrifice.

Houses, neat, some pretty, some with children playing in front, collide with sounds. Sounds remembered from so long ago, maybe from one of Beirut's many wars, maybe even from future wars. In this 6 minute video, the street scape of Broken Hill, 'the accessible outback' country town of Australia, is seen from the viewing platform of past realities, woven into a tapestry of morality, memory and experience. There, exponential repetition sets apathy on a collision course with fear and where displacement of the senses, synchronicity and loss accelerate at vertiginous speed. Mangled silences interrupt, but only to disrupt the remnants of illusion and safe living, to send eidetic shock waves through rose coloured lenses. The question of responsibility then emerges to demand if not an answer, then a pause for grief, for consideration due to the boundaries of the senses and the centrality of the body's, any-body's, pain and sorrow.

The plot outlines the story of the early Christian martyrs with a compendium of horrors such as maulings at the Colosseum, crucifixions, beheadings, savage hackings and burnings at the stake, burnings in the limepit, the spectacle of human torches in Nero's garden.

A group of three friends take turns possessing a backpack with unknown contents, instructed to not open the bag under any circumstance.

Undercover cop Luca is sent to infiltrate one of the UK's largest drug empires-unaware that internal fractures have left the organisation on the brink of collapse, and new, volatile powers are rising to claim control.

A young musician struggles to reconnect with his father after the passing of his mother.

Judith Lucy is single again. Reflecting on her entire history with men, she concludes that maybe it’s time to shut up shop: ‘Whatever it is that I’m selling, a lot of straight men simply aren’t interested in buying it.’ In this show Jude recounts her full history with the opposite sex and asks the audience to determine whether she should ever date again. Should Judith hang up her vagina for good?

This classic ethnographic documentary, by the renowned filmmaking team of David and Judith MacDougall, explores the nomadic life of the Jie of Uganda. During the dry season the Jie leave their homesteads in large numbers and take their cattle to temporary camps (nawi) in western Karamoja District, where water and grass are more abundant.

Nina Mitchell has spent her entire life living in the shadow of her parents' constant criticism and expectations. A few months after turning 18, she makes a bold and life-altering decision; she will leave her home and country in order to pursue her dreams and find the happiness she's always yearned for even when her parents will say anything in their power to stop her from doing so.

When two explorers crash-land on an alien-infested planet, a grim decision arises: as one is infected by the microorganism menace, the other must choose between containment and cataclysmic consequences.

This was a largely improvised and experimental set, filmed at a small pub on the Gold Coast.

The Gift That Gives follows the story of Callum Mori (Takaya Honda), the author of a book entitled, The Gift That Gives. He makes his first television appearance as a guest of The Arts Corner television show, presented by Kate Sedgeman (Lily Brown-Griffiths), who falls for him. Callum, however, falls for her best friend, Linda (HaiHa Le). Linda owns the bookshop where Callum launches his book but luckily for Kate, fate brings her and Callum’s brother, Austin (Damien Sato) together, as they discover hidden love letters, signed by aliases. Jointly, they all try to find out who penned them.

A Ngalakgan woman from Ngukurr, NT, just wants to catch a nailfish at her favourite fishing spot, Wanmari. But her family are thwarting her plans. When she sees an eagle, her grandfather’s dreaming, she remembers to use the knowledge she has of Country and soon, good luck comes her way.

John "Gravitas" Clearwater's Moto GP ended prematurely after a near fatal accident. Years later he wants to break out of the monotony of his life by rekindling his riding career, much to the chagrin of his wife, Jean.

Fashion model Hinata wants to get at the bottom of her uneasiness but something is hindering her. A designer gives her advice, a doctor tries to get her attention and all claim to know what she needs. The result of an old trauma seems only to be the tip of the iceberg.

A vegan couple are stuck in the apocalypse without food. When Mark and Ann encounter a stranger, they learn that somethings got to give.

An exploration of the Samoan fa'afafine, boys who are raised as girls, who fulfill a traditional role in Samoan culture. In the past they have shared women's traditional work but today are becoming more westernized and look more like drag queens. Several anthropologists comment on the phenomenon examining issues of culture and gender and the complexities of sexual identity.

An exploration of the complexity of mental wellbeing through the eyes of men today.

A young filmmaker begins shooting his 'perfect horror film' during a movie marathon, oblivious that a real life killer will exploit, inspire and alter the outcome of his movie.

Facing a short term in prison, wealthy Eisenstein heads off to a masquerade ball to enjoy his last evening of freedom. But Eisenstein's wife, Rosalinde, and her chambermaid Adele show up to the costume party in disguise, and each try to teach him a lesson or two. This revival of Johann Strauss's operetta performed by Opera Australia stars Anthony Warlow and Ghillian Sullivan.

Sunshine Soup captures the meeting and recording of reclusive French saxophonist Ariel Kalma and rising modular synthesist Robert Aiki Aubrey Lowe around their collaboration album. Set against the vibrant tones of Australia's outback, directors Misha Hollenbach and Johann Rashid focus an curious lens on the transportive qualities of musical exchange and friendship.

An encounter at the park.

A dinner party goes awry as powerhouse matriarch Rachel grapples for control with her peers.

Where do all those missing socks keep going in the washing machine and what happens when one comes back... And it's sentient.

Shut out and ignored for too long, Sandy suddenly receives what she’s craved desperately her whole life – love and attention, from Willow, her overpowering but magnetic boss. But when Sandy finds herself just as suddenly discarded, she’ll show the world just how dangerous a wallflower can be.

When a young woman is held captive by a psychotic killer on a remote Australian property, her only hope to save herself is to save his twisted relationship.

Trapped isolating alone in his apartment, a man begins to experience strange phenomena.

Sweethearts is a 1990 Australian film directed by Colin Talbot and starring Christabel Wigley and John F. Howard.

As Samantha attempts to keep up with the rapid changes of her new high school, she is convinced that in order to fit in, she must successfully summon a demon.

The rise and fall of a small time band in Melbourne's underground music scene.

Best friends and skilled abattoir workers David and Wani are saving to open their own butchery, but before they can realise their dream the arrival of a new worker and new reality will test the bonds of their shared life.

Dating apps have revolutionised the way that we find love – but are they also putting us in grave danger?

Chrysalis is an animated meditation on metamorphosis – on how things are constantly becoming other things. The moon is waxing and waning, cells are dividing, babies growing and grubs becoming butterflies. Nick Wilson (Sound Fossil) brings to life Lachlan Plain’s rudimentary handcrafted animation with a mesmerizing composition for guitar and prayer bowl.

When a mysterious creature bonds with Daniel's son, his world unravels, forcing him to fight for his family and eventually face the heartbreaking truth.

War-damaged facades, the frozen lakes of the Tiergarten, the Golden Angel of Victory, The Wall. (Arthur Cantrill & Corinne Cantrill)

UNIT #52 is a dark tale of delusion and fantasy. Beginning with an image of a postcard, a man is drawn into an unhealthy obsession with his neighbour. He becomes unable to discern between reality and illusion and dreams of taking her away 'from all this'.

A woman living an isolated lifestyle on her fathers farm, encounters a gender non-conforming stranger on the run from the law.

Dive is a mystery-drama that follows a complex & taciturn character attempting to deal with loss through his vices, before turning to a grotesque source to seek closure & clarity.

A mystical experience unfolds as the movements of celestial bodies envelop the landscape and its inhabitants.

A documentary exploring gender identity and what it means to be transgender.

It is estimated that today 80 per cent of Indigenous Australians live in urban environments. What impact is urbanisation having on Indigenous Australians and what does this mean for the future of Aboriginality?

George Greenough chronicles ground zero of the shortboard revolution, as it evolved in 1968. Experience remote Australia and hidden California, as ridden by Bob McTavish, Ted Spencer, Baddy Treloar, Chris Brock, Gary Keys, Russell Hughes and a brigade of the underground's best. Check out Norther NSW in the golden era of the late 1960s, with empty perfection at Lennox Head.

In a icy winter farmland, an accident leaves a young girl injured. 11-year-old Sam abandons her to continue looking after his grief-stricken family until the weight of his hasty decision bears down on him and he sets back out to find her.

Ruby executes an audacious plan to finally be alone with her crush, leaving a trail of destruction in her wake.

This Damien Parer/Ken Hall newsreel was shot at a time remembered as the dark days to Australia's north, with the Japanese still strong and threatening Port Moresby with air raids. The air battle for Port Moresby was a critical time for Australia. From this larger battle the newsreel selects a number of incidents for the visual record, as it looks at the damage to buildings in Port Moresby, the crash landing of an American bomber which had lost its undercarriage, and the sinking of the merchant vessel, the Macdhui, in Port Moresby harbour.

A documentary about a feminist run abortion clinic. Counselling is shown to be an important part of the procedure, which is carried out using local anaesthetic and the vacuum aspiration method. We follow one woman through the termination of her pregnancy, and other women tell why they chose to have an abortion.

True love can survive no matter what changes.

Steve, a lonely business guy, has spent the last 10 years of his life working at Company Industries in a unorthodox town named STEVE CITY, an Earth-like dystopia patrolled by demonic entities known as wraiths. Knowing escape to the real world may be next to impossible, he long accepts the perilous lifestyle, drinking himself to death with an anthropomorphic mouse woman named Basil. This all changes when he meets the newest arrival, a wimpy Australian named Cornelius, whose arrival kicks off the first domino to a potential escape out of the CITY.

Australian stand up comedian, Jordan Shanks aka Friendlyjordies from Youtube fame, explores media bias and it's impacts on politics in modern Australia in his 2021 live comedy tour "Cancels The Media".

A collection of short films critical of Australian Prime Minister John Howard, urging the public to vote him out at the Federal election in 2004.