Documentaries from Down Under

Showcasing eight seminal contemporary documentaries that explore and examine a wide range of issues including investigative, biographical and first-person stories reflecting the emotion and drama of the human experience, India International Centre is organizing a festival, Stories from Australia – A Festival of Award Winning Films from 17 to 20 July 2013. 

With a candid glimpse into a domestic issue unknown to even most Australians, the festival will open with Jennifer Crone’s Divorce: Aussie Islamic Way. The film portrays how couples with differing social and religious customs go about formally breaking up? This will be followed by

Closing Ranks – an extraordinary piece of investigative journalism that examines the process of police internal investigations into one of its own.  Then The Wind Changed – recipient of the Walkley Documentary Award 2012 will present an in-depth and personal account of a community recovering from a devastating bush fire, demonstrating both empathy and intelligence in story-telling. 

Scarlet Road directed by Catherine Scott and Pat Fiske to be screened on 20 July is an astonishing and illuminating insight about sexuality and disability that is surprising, funny, moving, informative and confronting.

The Tall Man, powerful and multi-award winning documentary to be screened on 20 July skillfully examines the circumstances surrounding the death of Cameron Doomadgee who swore at a policeman and died 40 minutes later in a watch-house cell.

Filmmaker Rick McPhee will personally present Go Back to Where You Came From – Season 1 on 20 July. It is a ground-breaking three part series that challenges a group of Australians – and through them, the viewer, to imagine what life would be like as a refugee.

The festival closes with multiple-award winning film, Mrs Carey’s Concert, a contagious and rousing documentary about the passion that music teacher Karen Carey feels for her music. An inspiring documentary in which all 1200 students of a Sydney girl’s school are required to participate in a classical concert at the Sydney Opera House.  

Many of these films have been shortlisted for the prestigious annual Walkley Awards, which recognizes excellence in Australian journalism across all mediums of broadcast.