Australian filmmakers jet off as Rotterdam announces its selection

Cited: AFC Website 22nd January 2008

Five Australian films have been selected to screen at the 37th Rotterdam International Film Festival later this month.

The teams responsible for Men's Group, Unfinished Sky, Shmetamorphosis, Spike Up and Wasting Away will join the strong delegation of Australians participating in the co-production market Cinemart and the AFC-sponsored Rotterdam Lab this year.

The feature film Men's Group, directed by Michael Joy and produced by John L Simpson has been selected to screen in the Time and Tide section of the festival. The Rotterdam screening will mark the film's world premiere. John L Simpson recently won the Digispaa Spaartan Award for his work on the film.

Continuing its success on the international festival circuit, the feature film Unfinished Sky will have its European premiere in the Time and Tide section of the Rotterdam program. The film is written and directed by Peter Duncan and produced by Cathy Overett and Anton Smit, with Mark Overett, Hanneke Niens and San Fu Maltha attached as executive producers. Unfinished Sky previously screened at Pusan International Film Festival and Toronto International Film Festival.

Three shorts, Shmetamorphosis, Spike Up and Wasting Away have been selected to screen in the Shorts: As Long As It Takes program of Rotterdam. Shmetamorphosis, written, directed and produced by Jack Feldstein, will screen as part of the New Arrivals section of the program. Spike Up, written and directed by Anthony Maras and produced by Kent Smith and Anthony Maras, will have its international premiere as part of Short Stories 1: I Fought the Law. Wasting Away, written and directed by Tim Dean and produced by Nick Heydon, will have its world premiere in the It's All About Economy section of the program.

The five films join the two previously announced Australian projects participating in Cinemart - Venice, written and directed by Miro Bilbrough, and Errors of the Human Body, written and directed by Eron Sheean.

http://www.afc.gov.au/newsandevents/mediarelease/2008/release_604.aspx