SATURDAY NIGHT (18+)
Dir: Brian Hill
UK 1996 50min

It’s Saturday night in Leeds. Ian’s an ex-con with a fistful of Es. Jackie’s a hostess with a dinner party to feed. Lola’s a drag queen out for the night. Mike’s a singing millionaire in trousers too tight. Just another ordinary Saturday evening? Or one to remember? With narration in verse by poet Simon Armitage, we go in search of the heart of Saturday night through the lives of assorted revellers, ravers, rogues and cross-dressers.

THE RISE OF LEATHERMAN (18+)
Dir: Kim Munro
2008 10mins

This part-fantasy musical documentary tracks Scott Watterson's journey through his preparation for the Mr Leather Australia New Zealand Competition. Delving into Scott's personal reasons for wanting to compete, his struggle to come to terms with his sexuality and motivation to accept himself following his experiences of depression and living with HIV.

World Premiere

MAKING MARY AND MAX (18+)
Dir: Stella Kinsella
2009 57mins

A satirical behind-the-scenes obsession with the making of Mary and Max. Filmed over the two years it to took to produce the painstaking feature length animation written and directed by the Academy Award winning Australian Adam Elliot, the filmmaker set herself a task to see how long she could place Elliot under a bell jar without getting thrown off the set.

KEMIRA: DIARY OF A STRIKE (G)
Dir: Tom Zubrycki
Australia 1982 60mins

At the height of an economic recession, BHP announces its intention to close down one of its coal mines in the Wollongong area south of Sydney. 31 miners decide to resist the closure by organising an underground sit-in which leads to the storming of Parliament House, Canberra. A day by day account of these events and their aftermath is personalised through one of the families of the striking miners.

World Premiere

NIGHT FARE (18+)
Dir: William Head
2009   5min40s

In the dead of a lonely night, Melbourne's Punjabi taxi drivers meet post-shift at the Red Pepper Indian restaurant. Outsiders in a foreign land, they find solidarity and companionship by sharing the food, language, music and culture of their homeland.

NIGHT FARE follows one driver as he steps out of the cold night and into the bustle of this early morning scene. What emerges is an impression of a lively and unknown pocket of a culture establishing itself in the heart of a sleeping metropolis.

LOVE, LUST & LIES (M)
Dir: Gillian Armstrong
2010 88mins

This is the fifth film in the documentary series Gillian Armstrong has been making about the lives, hopes and dreams of three ordinary, working class Adelaide girls since they were fourteen in 1976. In 2009 Armstrong returned to Adelaide to explore where Kerry, Josie and Diana are now. Significant changes in their lives make this film compelling viewing when new and old footage is interwoven. Over more than thirty years, three ordinary girls have grown into three extraordinary women.

THE FARM: ANGOLA USA (18+)
Dir: Jonathan Stack, Liz Garbus and Wilbert Rideau
1998 88mins

In 1997, Jonathan Stack spent a year shooting inside Angola Prison, Louisiana’s maximum security penitentiary, capturing the reality of six men living - and dying - in one of America’s oldest and largest penal institutions. By revealing a powerful and universal truth - to err is human and to forgive, Divine – THE FARM strikes an empathic chord amongst audiences worldwide.

World Premiere

UMOJA: WHERE WOMEN RUN WILD (18+)
Dir: Elizabeth Tadic
2010 33mins

The amusing and life-changing story of a group of tribal Samburu women in Northern Kenya who reclaim their lives, turning age-old patriarchy on its head. In 1995, the women banded together to establish the village of Umoja [unity], on an unoccupied field in the dry grasslands where no men were to be allowed.  These women have rewritten traditional tribal laws and with a taste for freedom, there's simply no turning back.

MOLLY AND MOBARAK (M)
Dir: Tom Zubrycki
2003 85mins

Mobarak, a young refugee from Afghanistan finds work in a small Australian country town and falls in love with a local school teacher Molly. The events of 9/11 and the Bali bombing divide the town. Some people want the Afghans to stay and others to leave. Meanwhile Molly and Mobarak's relationship runs into difficulties, and to complicate matters Mobarak's temporary visa is running out.

MY HOME THE BLOCK (M)
Dir: Trevor Almeida
Associate Dir: Penelope McManus
2009 52mins

An intimate portrait of Aboriginal Elder Joyce Ingram, resident of the first inner-city land grant allocated to the Indigenous people that would become a symbol for Indigenous land rights - the infamous Redfern Block. This observational documentary follows Joyce’s struggle over several years to save her home and her community. Her strong religious beliefs and defiant spirit compel her to oppose enforced relocation until she is left in the last house standing on Eveleigh Street.

Australia Premiere

THE BIGAMIST BRIDE: MY FIVE HUSBANDS (18+)
Dir: Brian Hill
UK 2009 75mins

Emily Horne is tabloid gold, a giddy mixture of sex, deceit and betrayal. At the age of thirty she'd been married five times but never bothered to get divorced. In her wake she'd left a string of confused husbands and lovers. She’d worked in the porn industry and as an "escort", she'd served one jail sentence for bigamy and she was on trial again during the making of this film for the same offence. Emily said she wanted to be in a film in order to present the truth about herself. But can we trust the testimony of a woman who has been lying all of her adult life? Behind the lurid headlines is a darker tale of mental illness, addiction and neglect.

WORLD CHAMPION SANTA (PG)
Dir: David Downey
2009 26mins

Every year hundreds of Santas from around the world converge on the North Pole to take part in the highly competitive Santa Winter Games. Reindeer racing, chimney climbing and porridge eating are just a few of the hilarious events that these Santas are competing in for the highly coveted gold medal. This year the Australian contingency included an unexpected entrant, self-confessed bad boy, Dave Downey!

Australia Premiere

THE FARM: 10 DOWN (18+)
Dir: Jonathan Stack & Nancy Novack
2009 98mins

Ten years on, Jonathan Stack goes back inside Angola Prison to reconnect with the characters he profiled in THE FARM: ANGOLA to witness first hand Time’s impact on their spirits, their bodies, their sense of hope and purpose. Have the family members who visited them ten years ago disappeared in time from their lives? Does their language change as men become increasingly hardened by time? Do memories of freedom and life on the outside fade with the hope of freedom? Time moves slowly in Angola, but hope survives.

World Premiere

DRIVE (18+)
Dir: Bronwyn Purvis & Telen Rodwell
2009 55mins

Tasmania, the southern most isolated state of Australia lays claim to the nation's highest rate of road fatality. Young men are dying in high speed, single vehicle crashes, crumpled in metal coffins, on lonely rural roads.  This is a film about identity and the rites of passage young men face on their journey to adulthood - gaining a driver's license and the legal right to drink alcohol.