A short film set against the background of the ‘Croatian Six’ terror plot convictions has taken out the International Grand Prize at France’s Clermont-Ferrand International Film Festival, just as an inquiry into the alleged conspiracy is about to resume.
Directed by actor Damian Walshe-Howling, Unspoken picks up in Sydney during 1979 as volatile protests for Croatian independence break out across the city.
Croatian-born Marina (Kat Dominis) is forced to expose a secretive love affair with her Australian boyfriend (Matthew Alexander), as escalating political violence spills into her childhood home with devastating consequences.
The film, produced by Walshe-Howling alongside Dominis and co-star Mariana Rudan, offers an intimate snapshot of community tensions at the time when six Croatian-born men were arrested in Lithgow and Sydney accused of plotting to bomb two Sydney travel agencies, a Serbian social club, the Elizabethan theatre in Newtown, and the city’s water supply pipe.
Following one of the longest trials in Australian legal history, the men were convicted in 1981 and sentenced to 15 years imprisonment. More than four decades later, NSW Supreme Court judge Robertson Wright ordered an inquiry into convictions amid doubts about the testimony of key witness Vico Virkez, as well as the conduct of police, including disgraced NSW detective Roger Rogerson, who died last year. The inquiry is adjourned until March 5 for oral submissions.
The journey of the short film goes back further, with Dominis and Rudan approaching Walshe-Howling with an early version of the script towards the end of 2021, following a recommendation from cinematographer Denson Baker.
“It was a project that was really close to their hearts,” Walshe-Howling said.
“They had a script that was pretty underdeveloped when they brought it to me. At that point, I had done three shorts and was more interested in moving on to long form, but once I got my head around the story and the political aspect of the story, I became really interested in it.”
The trio would develop the script further together during a workshopping session in Byron, after which Walshe-Howling did some further tinkering while his fellow producers raised money for the production.
Filming took place in Sydney in January 2023 with a crew that included cinematographer Jeremy Rouse, before completing post-production in Melbourne through ARC.
Just as production was about to start, Walshe-Howling crossed paths serendipitously with Princess Pictures EP Mike Cowap, leading the latter to express interest in developing the concept as a TV series.
Having previously worked with Princess on a 2016 campaign for Our Watch domestic violence organisation, as well as the TV series Wrong Kind of Black, the film and TV actor said the idea “really moving ahead” to the point where they are now preparing to go out to market.
“Princess already had some interest in the story and some development happening but they had quietly put it on the shelf for a bit of time,” he said.
“Then Mike heard me talking about it, it was one of those kismet situations where I said, ‘How do you know the subject?’ and he said, ‘How do you know it’, and we ended up talking.
He said [Princess Pictures founder] Laura Waters will want to have a chat with you and sure enough, the next day Laura called.”
Unspoken had its world premiere at last year’s Flickerfest and was awarded Best Short at last year’s CinefestOZ before being recognised at Clermont-Ferrand, France’s second-largest film festival after Cannes.