Leela Varghese and Emma Hough Hobbs’ Lesbian Space Princess and Chadden Hunter’s The Raftsmen were the people’s choice at Sydney Film Festival, taking home the audience awards for Australian narrative film and documentary, respectively.
International winners included Cherien Dabis’ All That’s Left of You, a generational epic about a Palestinian family’s search for home, and Lindsay Utz and Michelle Walshe’s documentary portrait of Jacinda Ardern, Prime Minister, which also won the audience award for world cinema documentary at Sundance.
This year’s audience awards were based on more than 23,000 votes.
The Sydney Film Festival audience award is yet another prize for Lesbian Space Princess, having previously won Best Feature Film at the Teddy Awards in Berlin and the Feature Fiction Award at the Adelaide Film Festival.
Produced by Tom Phillips, Lesbian Space Princess is the first full-length animated feature made in South Australia, a product of the South Australian Film Corporation and Adelaide Film Festival’s Film Lab: New Voices initiative.
Shabana Azeez voices the lead character, who is thrust out of her sheltered life and into a galactic quest to save her bounty hunter ex-girlfriend from the ‘Straight White Maliens’.
Hunter’s The Raftsman, produced by Wildbear Entertainment, made its world premiere at Sydney Film Festival.
The documentary follows 12 misfits from seven countries who in 1973 set out to cross the Pacific Ocean on handmade wooden log rafts. More than 50 years on, the surviving raftsmen revisit the journey, with their original 16mm footage remastered into 4K. Hunter produced the film with William Ward, with Bettina Dalton, Anna Godas and Oli Harbottle executive producers.
Sydney Film Festival director Nashen Moodley said the four films were examples of the “fantastically diverse kinds of storytelling that move, inspire, and connect with audiences.”
“Leela Varghese and Emma Hough Hobbs’ Lesbian Space Princess is a singular achievement in animated cinema. This wildly imaginative feature is hilarious, heartfelt and unapologetically out there – and our audiences adored it.
“The Raftsmen is a gripping and meditative exploration of adventure and human endurance. Chadden Hunter’s evocative storytelling, blending archival 16mm footage with survivor testimony, brings to life one of the great oceanic journeys in modern history.”
“Cherien Dabis’ All That’s Left of You is sweeping in scope and deeply personal in its portrayal of love, loss and legacy. Tracing seven decades of Palestinian history through one family’s experience, it is an emotionally resonant and beautifully crafted film that left Sydney audiences spellbound.”
“Finally, Prime Minister offers a rare and deeply human look behind the scenes of political leadership. With unprecedented access, this nuanced portrait of Jacinda Ardern captures a leader navigating major global and national crises with empathy and resolve – clearly something that resonated with audiences in these times,” said Moodley.
The Sydney Film Festival GIO Audience Award winners:
Australian Feature
Winner: Lesbian Space Princess
Runner Up: Birthright
Australian Documentary
Winner: The Raftsmen
Runner Up: The Golden Spurtle
International Feature
Winner: All That’s Left of You
Runner Up: DJ Ahmet
International Documentary
Winner: Prime Minister
Runner Up: Cutting Through Rock