Speakers:
Paul Cox, director/ writer (Salvation, Man of Flowers, Innocence, Vincent, Nijinsky)
Amiel Courtin-Wilson, director/ writer (Bastardy, Cicada, Chasing Buddha)
Kirsty de Garis and Timothy Jolley, directors (Celebrity: Dominick Dunne)
Daryl Dellora, producer (Hunt Angels, Against the Innocent)
When: Thursday 31 July 2008, 12.30 - 2pm
Where: Digital Harbour Theatrette, Innovation Building, 1010 Latrobe St, Docklands
BASTARDY (Dir. Amiel Courtin-Wilson)PAUL COX
Born in Holland and settled in Melbourne, Paul Cox is an auteur of international acclaim. He is one of the most prolific makers of films in Australia, with numerous features, shorts and documentaries to his name. He is the recipient of many special tributes and retrospectives at film festivals across the world, including a major retrospective at the Lincoln Centre in New York in 1992, and he is the subject of Alexander Bohr’s 1997 documentary Ein Fremder In Der Welt (A Stranger in the World).
He migrated to Australia in the mid-'60s, had training in photography, and taught photography for many years at Prahran Technical College. His first films were short impressionistic pieces. In the mid '70s he began making low-budget features, and has fiercely stuck to the ideals of low-budget and artistic filmmaking.
Throughout his career, Cox has received numerous international awards. These include Best Film at the 1982 Australian Film Industry Awards for Lonely Hearts; Best Film & Best Director at the 1985 Houston Film Festival; Best Director at the 1984 Rio de Janeiro Film Festival; and Best Director, Actor and Screenplay at the 1984 Australian Film Industry Awards for My First Wife.
Man of Flowers premiered in Un Certain Regard at the Cannes Film Festival in 1984, and went on to win Best Film at the 1984 Valladolid Film Festival as well as Best Foreign Film at the 1991 Warsaw Film Festival. Cactus premiered in Director’s Fortnight at the Cannes Film Festival in 1986 and Vincent, his docudrama on the life and death of Vincent Van Gogh (narrated by John Hurt), won the Jury Prize at the 1988 Istanbul International Filmdays.
A Woman’s Tale won the Grand Prix at the 1992 International Flanders Film Festival in Ghent as well as being selected for the 1992 Tokyo International Film Festival and Exile screened in competition at the 1994 Berlin International Film Festival.
More recently, Cox’s highly acclaimed feature Innocence (2000) won massive audience and critical acclaim, including the Grand Prix of the Americas (Best Film) and the People’s Choice Award at the 2000 Montreal World Film Festival; the FIPRESCI Critics Award at the Taormina International Film Festival; Best Film at both the Vlissengen and Saint-Tropez Film Festivals; third prize in the Toronto International Film Festival’s People’s Choice Awards and 5 Australian IF awards including Best Film, Independent Filmmaker of the Year for Paul Cox, and Best Actress for Julia Blake. The film was also awarded the Marquee Audience Favourite Award at the CineVegas International Film Festival 2000. Paul's new film Salvation is screening at MIFF 08.
AMIEL COURTIN-WILSON
Combining visceral imagery with highly personal stories, Amiel Courtin-Wilson's unique directorial style has evolved from working in documentary and drama over the last thirteen years.
After making his first film at age 9, Amiel's short film Charlie's Toy Meets Madeline Moritz won the Longford Nova Award at the 1996 St Kilda Film Festival when he was 17 years old.
In 1998, Amiel directed and produced the feature documentary Chasing Buddha which premiered at Sundance in 2000 and was nominated for an AFI for best direction. Chasing Buddha also had a successful theatrical season in both Sydney and Melbourne and went on to win a string of awards including Best Documentary at both the 2000 Dendy Awards and the 2000 IF Awards.
In 2000, Amiel co-directed the docu-drama Islands which won the Documentary Excellence Award at the Real Life on Film Festival (2001), Best Short form Documentary at the 2001 ATOM Awards and went on to tour the U.S. for a year in 2002 as part of the Margaret Mead International Documentary festival.
After collaborating with Opera Australia and the Chunky Move contemporary dance company, producing a series of music clips for SBS and Film Victoria and directing several successful music clips of his own, in 2003 Amiel directed the short film Adolescent which premiered at the Melbourne International Film Festival. As a result of this screening Amiel went on to participate in the inaugural Accelerator program as part of the Melbourne Film Festival in 2004.
Amiel has currently completed directing short film Cicada; the feature length AFC/ABC funded documentary Bastardy; the feature length theatrical documentary Catch My Disease about renowned Australian pop singer Ben Lee; and the documentary Til Hell Freezes.
Amiel's most recent short film On the Other Ocean had its world premiere at the Melbourne International Film Festival in 2006 and his upcoming feature projects include the AFC Indivision-developed drama Warm Blood and the black comedy High School.
Amiel has also worked as a freelance journalist for Inside Film and Metro Magazine, exhibited his video installation work internationally and lectured at institutions, conferences and festivals including VCA, RMIT, Australian Film Television & Radio School, Melbourne International Film Festival, the Australian International Documentary Conference and the University of California Los Angeles.
DARYL DELLORA
Daryl Dellora has been making documentaries for many years. He is an award-winning writer and director and he executive produced, co-wrote and directed his first feature length film Against The Innocent in 1989. Daryl has been a recipient of an AFC Documentary Fellowship and in 1991 his Mr Neal Is Entitled to be an Agitator won the Australian Human Rights Award. In 2005 he was accepted to the prestigious Rockefeller Foundation study centre in Bellagio. Daryl co-produced the feature Hunt Angels (2006) and has worked closely with producer Sue Maslin through their company Film Art Doco on a raft of documentary films including The Edge of The Possible, A Mirror to the People, Conspiracy, The Highest Court and Koories and Cops. In 2006 Daryl wrote and directed the new media project www.williambligh.com.au which is currently available on ABC on-line. Daryl's first film Hollywood Ten, Melbourne One screened at the Melbourne Film Festival and was nominated for an AFI award. Daryl's films have screened and sold all over the world including in the South East Asia, US, UK, France, Spain, Italy, Germany, Austria, Portugal, Louisiana Museum Denmark, and the Museum of Modern Art Ljubljana, Slovenia.
TIM JOLLEY
Tim Jolley graduated from the VCA School of Film and TV in 2004, where he completed the Post Grad. Dip. (Producing). At the VCA, Tim produced two acclaimed short films, Tin Truck and Blue Tongue, both with writer/director Justin Kurzel. Blue Tongue screened at the Cannes Film Festival in 2005 in the Critic’s Week section. The film also screened at the New York Film Festival, the Oberhausen Short Film Festival and the Melbourne International Film Festival, where it won the prize for Best Australian Short Film. Celebrity: Dominick Dunne is Tim’s debut feature length documentary which he co-wrote, -directed, and –produced with his partner, Kirsty de Garis. Prior to pursuing his passion for filmmaking on a full-time basis, Tim worked for the international corporate strategy consultancy, Bain & Co.
KIRSTY DE GARIS
Kirsty de Garis completed an Arts degree at Sydney University in 1998, where part of her studies focused on the adaptation of books into films. She began her journalism career at 'The Observer' newspaper in London, where she also completed a Masters degree at London Metropolitan University. At 'The Observer' Kirsty wrote a variety of arts-based features such as TV and book reviews, and current affairs in the arts sphere. A highlight of her time at 'The Observer' was a series of interview with people who whose lives had been developed into feature films – including Larry Flint, Bella Freud, Frank Serpico and Frank Abagnale Jr. She returned to Australia in 2004, where she secured a role in documentary at The Australians at War Film Archive, interviewing war veterans, The work took her across rural and metropolitan NSW, interviewing war veterans from World War Two, Vietnam and Korea. She developed skills in extensive, in-depth interviewing over long time periods. The material gathered by the archive is used as an oral history record & also for documentary films made about any conflict in which Australia has been involved. 2000 people were interviewed over the course of two years for the archive. It was during this experience that the idea formed about making a documentary film about Dominick Dunne, when she interviewed him for the Australian magazine 'Autore'. Kirsty currently lives in Sydney, Australia and works as a freelance journalist for China 'Vogue', 'Belle' and 'Vive' and has contributed to British 'Elle', 'New Woman', 'Cooler' and 'Heath & Fitness'. Celebrity: Dominick Dunne is her first feature-length documentary as co-director, -writer and –producer.
