CINEMA REBORN - OCTOBER NEWSLETTER - A TRIBUTE TO TOM ZUBRYCKI + DAVID STRATTON, ROSS CAMPBELL and BILL MOUSOULIS

A TRIBUTE TO TOM ZUBRYCKI Tom Zubrycki (pictured above) is one of Australia's leading documentary film-makers. For over forty years  he has chronicled Australian society. His awards include the Stanley Hawes Award in recognition of an outstanding contribution to Australian Documentary, the Cecil Holmes Award from the Australian Directors Guild, and an International Emmy. Cinema Reborn, OZDOX and the Randwick Ritz are proud to present  a screening of newly restored copies of two of Tom’s highly regarded landmark films: KEMIRA – DIARY OF A STRIKE (1984) and HOMELANDS (1993). Tom will introduce the films and take part in a conversation about his life, career and documentary film-making in Australia. The evening will be hosted by Maree Delofski - filmmaker, scholar and historian. KEMIRA – DIARY OF A STRIKE (1984)  A day by day account of a sixteen day underground colliery sit-in strike which led to the storming of Parliament House in Canberra. The story is mirrored through a family of one of the striking miners. KEMIRA premiered at the Sydney Film Festival, had a cinema release and won awards including the AFI for Best Documentary, Silver Bear in Leipzig, and Best Film at Tyneside.  HOMELANDS (1993). A story about a refugee family living in Melbourne but torn apart by their conflicting desires to return to their homeland in El Salvador or to stay in Australia. HOMELANDS follows the personal dramas in the life of the family over eighteen months. The film had a nation-wide festival and cinema release and was awarded the Film Critics Circle Prize for Best Documentary. International festival screenings included Cinéma du Réel, IDFA and Margaret Mead. Tom would like to acknowledge the work of Ray Argall who has lovingly restored both of these films. 5.00 PM ON SUNDAY 8 DECEMBER BOOKINGS CLICK THIS LINK DAVID STRATTON’S NEW BOOK AUSTRALIA AT THE MOVIES Coming in November is David’s new book, the third of his critical studies of the history of Australian film. David has been kind enough to send through the Introduction to the book to allow Cinema Reborn friends and subscribers to get an early taste of what our longstanding patron’s book, a massive 660 page survey, delves into. Our thanks to him. The book goes on sale in November. The peaks and lows that have characterised Australian feature film production over a period of 30 years are the subject of this survey.  My aim has been to provide basic information, and brief critical commentary, on Australian feature films made between 1990 and 2020.  I previously published books about Australian films of the 1970s - The Last New Wave (1980) and the 1980s, The Avocado Plantation (1990) - but they were rather different from the current book, which is effectively an encyclopaedia that attempts to list all the feature films made over that thirty year period.   The 70s was a decade in which the Australian cinema, which had been virtually dormant for about thirty years, burst into life, thanks to Government support (Federal and State) and to a new sense of identity and cultural blossoming. Most of the young directors who made their first films in the 70s were interviewed for The Last New Wave and many of them went on to successful international careers. The 80s was the decade of tax concessions for the film industry, a period in which so many films were made that the level of quality inevitably declined.  There were, of course, significant highlights during the decade, but in writing about them for The Avocado Plantation I divided the films into genres rather than placing the major focus on the film directors. I had always planned to follow these books with another about the 90s, but the pressures of participating in a weekly television programme, and other commitments, intervened and the years slipped by.  So now there’s a lot of catching up to do, and the following pages contain an account of feature film production (and sometimes co-production) over three decades. I have attempted to include every feature film made in Australia between  1990 and 2020, but during a period when an increasing number of films are being independently made and when release patterns are increasingly chaotic, I haven’t been entirely successful in accomplishing this. I have no doubt that some films are missing, but I hope there are not too many of them. …I hope this book will provide useful information and perhaps encourage further investigation and research into some of the forgotten feature films of the past quarter century. David Stratton BUT WAIT THERE’S MORE…. Veteran Melbourne cinephile Ross Campbell has published a remarkable memoir titled …MELBOURNE AT THE MOVIES: Confessions of a Certified Cinephile. The book is a labour of love chronicling what Ross describes as the excitement and brilliance of the city’s vibrant film culture as seen through the life of a movie obsessed Melburnian. More information and a link to purchase IF YOU CLICK HERE BILL MOUSOULIS PRESENTS MY DARLING IN STIRLING Stalwart supporter of Cinema Reborn and champion of independent Australian cinema Bill Mousoulis is screening his new film in Sydney on Wednesday 16 October at the Randwick Ritz.The film premiered at the Adelaide International Film Festival and is a contemporary and experimental musical, Bill’s 11th feature in a career spanning 40 years. My Darling in Stirling is a low-budget community effort, highlighting the town of Stirling situated in the Adelaide Hills. A fairy-tale but realist musical, where every line is sung, it is a joyful but also melancholic film, about lost innocence. A young woman, Emma (Amelie Dunda), studying at university and living at home with her mother and brother in the Adelaide suburbs, falls in love with a cafe waiter Nick (Henry Cooper), (both pictured above) who lives and works in the town of Stirling in the Adelaide Hills. Entranced by the man and the town, she begins to feel a sense of excitement and vitality in her life. My Darling in Stirling is inspired by the all-singing 1964 film directed by Jacques Demy, The Umbrellas of Cherbourg. There will be a filmmaker introduction prior to the screening and a Q&A after the film, moderated by film critic Anne Rutherford. "A dream film, a bittersweet celebration of ordinary life."- Frankie Kanatas, Senses of Cinema "The film has compact eloquence, stylistic finesseand emotional force."- Adrian Martin, Film Critic: Adrian Martin CINEMA REBORN DATES FOR 2025 In case you need to make a diary entry, Cinema Reborn 2025 takes place at the Randwick Ritz from 30 April to 6 May and the Hawthorn Lido from 8 to 13 May. Programme announcements from early in the New Year and full programme published in mid-March.