News

Allan Clarke’s The Bowraville Murders is a feature documentary which investigates one of Australia’s worst unsolved serial murder cases.

From Mint Pictures and Jumping Dog Productions, the film will be released in cinemas nationally from September 2 with a special world premiere screening at Majestic Cinemas, Nambucca Heads, on August 29.

In 1990-91 three kids disappeared from an Aboriginal Mission on the same street in Bowraville, a tiny country town in northern Nsw: 16-year-old Colleen Walker-Craig, 4-year- old Evelyn Greenup, and 16-year-old Clinton Speedy-Duroux. Evelyn and Clinton’s remains were found off the same dirt road, as were the clothes Colleen was wearing on the day she disappeared.

There has always been one suspect – a local white labourer who was acquitted for two of the murders after a botched, racially biased police investigation; he’s a man the families desperately want retried.

For 30 years the families of the murdered children...

Adg awards nominee Jennifer Peedom.

More than a third of nominees for this year's Australian Directors Guild awards are women.

Two of the four nominees in the Best Direction in a Feature Film category are women and all five films in the Best Documentary Feature category were directed or co-directed by female filmmakers, the Adg said in a statement..

The 2016 awards will be presented across sixteen categories including film, television, animation, multiplatform, music and advertising..

The nominees for Best Direction in a Feature Film are Sue Brooks for Looking for Grace, Jocelyn Moorhouse for The Dressmaker, Bentley Dean and Martin Butler for Tanna and Jeremy Sims for Last Cab to Darwin.

This year there are five nominations for Best Feature Documentary: Nick Bird and Eleanor Sharpe for Remembering The Man, Jennifer Peedom for Sherpa, Margot Nash for The Silences, Stefan Moore and Susan Lambert for Tyke Elephant Outlaw and Lisa Nicol for Wide Open Sky.

Australian documentary Tyke Elephant Outlaw has been selected to screen at its 15th international film festival after winning a swag of awards at major international festivals in the Us, UK and Australia.

The film, directed and produced by Australian documentary filmmakers Susan Lambert and Stefan Moore, and co-produced by Megan McMurchy, has been selected as a finalist in the International Elephant Film Festival..

This follows its broadcast on the BBC Storyville strand, CBC's The Passionate Eye in Canada and Drtv in Denmark.

It is also available now on Netflix Worldwide (exclusive in the Us)..

The film has also recently sold to National Geographic in Latin America and will screen on Channel 9 in Australia mid 2016.

Tyke Elephant Outlaw was produced with the financial assistance of Screen Australia, Screen Nsw and Voiceless. .It is distributed by ABC Commercial and Dogwoof..

The winners of the International Elephant Film Festival will be announced at...

Netflix has bought the Australian directed and produced documentary Tyke Elephant Outlaw.

The film is directed and produced by Australian documentary filmmakers Susan Lambert and Stefan Moore, and co-produced by Megan McMurchy.

The documentary will be released in the Us on December 1 and will be followed with an international release in August 2016.

The film tells the story of Tyke, a circus elephant who went on a rampage in Honolulu in 1994, killed her trainer in front of thousands of horrified spectators and died in a hail of gunfire..

Her break for freedom traumatised a city and ignited a global battle over the use of animals in the entertainment industry..

Tyke had three sold-out screenings at the Hawaii International Film Festival in Honolulu. .

The Hawaii premiere, attended by several State senators, took place just days before Hawaiian lawmakers voted on regulations that will make Hawaii the first Us state to ban...

Neil Armfield.s Holding the Man, Simon Stone.s The Daughter, Jeremy Sims. Last Cab to Darwin and Jen Peedom.s feature doc Sherpa will have their world premieres at the Sydney Film Festival.

The festival program unveiled today includes 33 world premieres (including 22 shorts) and 135 Australian premieres (with 18 shorts) among 251 titles from 68 countries.

Among the other premieres will be Daina Reid.s The Secret River, Ruby Entertainment's. ABC-tv miniseries starring Oliver Jackson Cohen and Sarah Snook, and three Oz docs, Marc Eberle.s The Cambodian Space Project — Not Easy Rock .n. Roll, Steve Thomas. Freedom Stories and Lisa Nicol.s Wide Open Sky.

Festival director Nashen Moodley boasted. this year.s event will be far larger than 2014's when 183 films from 47 countries were screened, including 15 world premieres. The expansion is possible in part due to the addition of two new screening venues in Newtown and Liverpool.

As previously announced, Brendan Cowell...

Screen Australia today announced it will invest $5 million in 13 documentary projects. The National Documentary Program has given the green light to three series and a one-off documentary, Welcome to Puntland, which follows the plight of a group of Somali Australians who return to their homeland in hope of repairing the fractured state. Produced for the Sbs by Andrew Ogilvie and Claire Jager, the project comes from writer/director Victoria Pitt and director/camera operator Tim Wise. Once Upon a Time in Carlton comes after the success of Sbs.s Once Upon a Time in Cabramatta and, subsequently, Once Upon a Time in Punchbowl, which is currently in production. The series, produced by Sue Clothier, will delve into 70 years of Italian migrant history in Carlton, Melbourne. The second series of art + soul will build on its success, offering new insights into contemporary Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander artists, art and culture,...

Joe Hildebrand will return to Australian TV screens in 2013 with a new factual series taking aim at Australia’s belief it is ‘the lucky country.”

The Daily Telegraph journo reunites with Cordell Jigsaw Zapruder, the team behind his previous series Dumb Drunk & Racist for a six part series to air on ABC2.

The series is one of 13 documentary projects announced to receive funding from Screen Australia. The $5m agency investment is expected to trigger nearly $15m worth of production.

Produced by Michael Cordell and Toni Malone, and directed by Ivan O’Mahoney, “The Daily Telegraph’s rebel-rousing columnist travels the lucky country, shattering our myths, bursting our bubbles and slaughtering some sacred Australian cows,” according to a press release.

Dumb Drunk & Racist delivered a decent audience for ABC2, it’s debut episode rating 266,000.

Cordell Jigsaw Zapruder has also received funding for Two Men in China, the continuing environmental buddy series...

Screen Australia has announced a round of investment, with $2m for nine documentaries, with production valued at $12m.

“Among the domestic projects, the critically acclaimed Anatomy series will continue to deliver visually inventive arts documentaries, while Running to America promises a feel-good story from the Top End. The seven international projects will further extend our uniquely Australian stories and voices on the world stage,” said CEO Ruth Harley.

The projects that received funding are:

Anatomy Series 3

Matchbox Pictures

Executive Producer Tony Ayres

Producers Michael McMahon, Polly Staniford

Writers/Directors Paola Morabito, Alethea Jones, Kim Munro

Broadcaster ABC TV

Sales None as yet

After the success of the first and second series of Anatomy, Matchbox Pictures are currently developing a third series, which, following the form of the previous series, will consist of three documentaries that explore art, sex and the body. The three films – Hair, Nerve and Tissue – will all...

More than 84 Australian documentary filmmakers have signed a petition asking Prime Minister Julia Gillard “to confirm publicly Australia’s commitment to freedom of political comunication”, in support of Wikileaks founder Julian Assange.

They’re being coordinated by Carmela Baranowska, as part of a broader petition started on the ABC’s website and incorporating more than 500 signatures.

The petition has been signed by:

Carmela Baranowska – director, journalist Sharon Connolly – producer Bree Mckilligan – filmmaker Jono Van Hest – director Sarah Zadeh – filmmaker Joan Robinson – director Kerry Negara – director, producer Rebecca McLean – director Daryl Dellora – director, producer Sharyn Prentice – producer Fabio Cavadini – director, producer Mandy King – director, producer Sally Ingleton – documentary filmmaker Trish FitzSimons – filmmaker Georgia Wallace-Crabbe – producer, director Lana Schwarcz – puppeteer, filmmaker Tim Anderson – filmmaker Nick Torrens – director, producer Deborah Szapiro – producer Liz Burke – producer Nicholas Hansen – director, producer Philippa Campey – filmmaker Marsha Emerman – director, producer Trevor Blainey – producer Gil Scrine – distributor and...

So, who out there is already sick of hearing about Twitter? I know there are a few people in my life that can't help but roll their eyes when they even hear the word, but I'll totally admit it to being full fledged addict. The number of smart-phone users and people on social networks like Twitter are reaching all-time highs, and in a piece for Variety, Susan Lambert looked at some of the ways in which movie studios are looking to cash in. But the bad news is that nobody is quite sure about whether or not this new style of advertising is a success. Now that four out of the six majors already have Twitter accounts, and poster launches and Arg games are popping up daily, it would seem that everyone loves a new toy -- whether it works or not.

If you think back to a year ago,...