The Australian Film Institute (AFI) announced yesterday the Non-Feature ‘Best Film’ nominees for the L’Oréal Paris 2007 AFI Awards with three South Australian productions scoring nominations. Forbidden Lie$ was nominated for Best Documentary and Swing and Spike Up were both nominated for Best Short Film.
Forbidden Lie$, funded by the South Australian Film Corporation (SAFC) and the Adelaide Film Festival (AFF) and was written and directed by Anna Broinowski (Burga, Romancing the Chakra), and produced by Sally Regan (Chairman Marr’s Party, Postcard Home). Forbidden Lie$ tells the story of Norma Khouri’s best-selling book ‘Forbidden Love’ being exposed as a fake. The film premiered at the 2007 Adelaide Film Festival and has secured rave reviews from around the world.
Also funded by both the SAFC and AFF Swing was written by AFI Award winning writer Cath Moore (Lightness, Into the Night, Lillian & I), directed by Christopher Houghton (Lightness) and produced by Louise Pascale. Swing is the second film that Chris and Cath have worked on together. Their last film Lightness won numerous awards including best screenplay at St Kilda Film Festival in 2003.
Swing has already won Australia’s highest cash prize for a short film, collecting $10,000 at St Kilda Film Festival for Best Short Film and only last week screened to a sold out audience at Sydney Film Festival. Swing also won the audience award at the Adelaide Film Festival and premiered to a sold out home crowd.
Spike Up, funded by the SAFC and AFC, was written and directed by Anthony Maras (Azadi) and produced by Kent Smith (2:37, Frames). Spike Up is Maras’ second film to score an AFI nomination with Azadi nominated for Best Short Film in 2005. Azadi also won many awards including prizes at the 2006 St Kilda Film Festival, SA Short Screen Awards and the Flickerfest International Short Film Festival.
Maras hopes success at the AFI Awards will help him with his next projects including one he is developing about a death row inmate set in the Texas, USA, which he is hoping to develop as a South Australian/US co-production.
Chair of the SAFC Cheryl Bart said ‘These nominations provide further proof of the exciting group of filmmakers working in South Australian and will hopefully lead them to many future successes. This outstanding news caps an exciting past month which included the announcement of new CEO Richard Harris as well as $3.8 million in additional funding for Film South Australia allowing the SAFC to promote SA and its film industry as an exciting place to make films.’
The AFI nominees were selected by juries of industry professionals and will screen as part of the AFI Australian Screenings, where AFI members vote to select the winners.
The AFI Australian Screenings will be held in Adelaide on Wednesday 29 August at Palace Eastend on Rundle Street. For full details on other nominees and how to vote visit the AFI website (www.afi.org.au )
[release from the SAFC]