A festival that has showcased films around Australia for five decades is set to screen on the Sunshine Coast for the first time.
The Travelling Film Festival will be at BCC Cinemas Maroochydore at Sunshine Plaza from February 21-23.
Co-founded by legendary film critic David Stratton in 1954, the festival has visited hundreds of centres across every state and territory, bringing exclusive screenings of the best new films from around the world.
It will come to Maroochydore with one of the most acclaimed and awarded lineups in the festival’s history.
It will feature five Golden Globe nominees, three Cannes Film Festival Award winners and two Venice Film Festival winners.
TFF manager Beatrix Brady looked forward to the occasion.
“After 50 years, we’re excited to continue the legacy and keep bringing TFF to new locations like Maroochydore and give audiences a rare opportunity to enjoy acclaimed international and local films,” she said.
“The TFF has been going strong for 50 years now, and whilst we no longer need to pack huge film reels into the back of combi vans to drive around Australia, the mission and the joy audiences feel are the same: it’s a chance to discover stories, worlds and spectacle as a shared experience.”
Screen Queensland CEO Jacqui Feeney said the group was “delighted to support TFF for another year”, extending the festival’s footprint to Maroochydore through its Screen Culture Fund.
“The Sunshine Coast is fast becoming a leading destination for screen production and this festival provides an incredible opportunity for locals to engage with a diverse, award-winning program of feature films, documentaries, and short films that highlight the very best of both international and Australian storytelling,” she said.
The festival will open with the latest film from legendary Spanish director Pedro Almodovar (All About My Mother) who has made his first ever English language feature with The Room Next Door. Winner of the Golden Lion at the Venice Film Festival, the film stars Tilda Swinton and Julianne Moore as two friends reunited by tragic news and an unexpected request. Swinton was also just nominated for Best Actress at the Golden Globes for her performance.
Other Golden Globe nominees include Luca Guadagnino’s (Call Me By Your Name) latest dazzling romance Queer, starring Daniel Craig in 1950s Mexico City.
The Brutalist has been collecting awards since its premiere at the Venice Film Festival. The epic is about a visionary World War II survivor trying to rebuild his life as an architect in the USA, starring Adrien Brody and Guy Pearce.
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Australian filmmaking voices will also be celebrated at TFF Maroochydore, with the Sundance hit documentary Every Little Thing, from Aussie filmmaker Sally Aitken. Hummingbirds fill the screen in her story of a woman finding herself as she cares for the tiny birds. Producer of the film Bettina Dalton will be there in person to present the film and answer audience questions.
Local short films will also screen, including the Sydney Film Festival prize-winning The Meaningless Daydreams of Augie and Celeste and, from New Zealand, First Horse, the inaugural winner of the First Nations Award at the Sydney Film Festival.
Audiences can experience stories from across the globe, including the thriller The Seed of the Sacred Fig, featuring a family caught in the personal and political pressures of an Iran in revolt. It’s a film so daring that its director Mohammad Rasoulof was forced to flee Iran when he was sentenced to imprisonment and flogging for the film’s criticism of the government. The film went on to win a Special Jury prize at Cannes and is now nominated for Best Foreign Language Film at the Golden Globes.
Another hit from around the world is Black Dog from China. It features a classic man and mutt friendship, who tackle loneliness and crooks together.
The romantic All We Imagine As Light will also be shown. It won the Grand Prix at Cannes and has made history as the first Indian film to be nominated for Best Director at the Golden Globes.
Tickets are on sale via the TFF website.
