Warwick Thornton’s latest feature, the 1940s-set The New Boy, sees Cate Blanchett star as a renegade nun, Sister Eileen, who runs a mission for Aboriginal children.
A new charge (newcomer Aswan Reid) is delivered in the dead of night – a boy who appears to have special powers. When the monastery takes possession of a precious relic, a large carving of Christ on the cross, the new boy encounters Jesus for the first time and is transfixed. However, the boy’s Indigenous spiritual life does not gel with the mission’s Christianity and his mysterious power becomes a threat. Sister Eileen is faced with a choice between the traditions of her faith and the truth embodied in the boy, in this story of spiritual struggle and the cost of survival.
The New Boy also stars Deborah Mailman and Wayne Blair, alongside new faces Shane Brady, Tyrique Brady, Laiken Woolmington, Kailem Miller, Kyle Miller, Tyzailin Roderick and Tyler Spencer.
It premiered in Cannes Film Festival’s Un Certain Regard and will open Sydney Film Festival tonight ahead of a theatrical release via Roadshow Films July 6.
Producers include Dirty Films’ Blanchett, Andrew Upton, and co-producer Georgie Pym, Kath Shelper for Scarlett Pictures and Lorenzo De Maio of De Maio Entertainment. Coco Francini is the executive producer for Dirty Films alongside Packer of Longbridge Nominees.
Heads of department include casting director Anousha Zarkesh, editor Nick Meyers, production designer Amy Baker, costume designer Heather Wallace and hair and make up design by Jen Rossiter.
The New Boy has received major production funding from Screen Australia’s First Nations department alongside Fremantle and Longbridge Nominees. Other backers include Screen NSW and the South Australian Film Corporation.