Festival Director Nashen Moodley said, “Sydney Film Festival has gone from strength to strength over recent years, with attendances increasing over 42% since 2011 to 156,000.
“As well as adding two new screening venues in Newtown and Liverpool, the numbers of titles to be screened have jumped from 183 last year to 251 this year.”
And that means there are too many to list here, so we’ll give you a taste.
The 2015 Festival reflects a strong year for Australian cinema, leading with the world premieres of Ruben Guthrie, Brendan Cowell’s adaptation of his hit play; and Neil Armfield’s Holding the Man (pictured). As a result, it’ll be only the fourth time in 62 year’s that two Australian feature films have opened and closed the Festival.
More Aussie prominence results from three of the 12 titles in the internationally recognised SFF Official Competition, are Australian. Two Australian feature debuts have been selected; The Daughter, directed by leading Australian theatre director Simon Stone; and Strangerland, an outback-set thriller starring Nicole Kidman and Joseph Fiennes; as well as the Sherpa, a documentary exploring the cultural relationship between Sherpas and Mount Everest in the face of disaster.
The Official Competition awards the Sydney Film Prize and $60,000 in cash in recognition of courageous, audacious and cutting-edge cinema.
World premieres will screen for Australian films Women He’s Undressed, Gillian Armstrong’s documentary about Academy Award-winning Australian Hollywood costume designer Orry-Kelly; Jeremy Sims’ feature film Last Cab to Darwin starring Michael Caton and Jacki Weaver; and three documentaries – Cambodian Space Project – Not Easy Rock ’n’ Roll, Freedom Stories and Wide Open Sky.
For more, visit: www.sff.org.au
