Like Minds 2006
A forensic psychologist must determine if a minor should be charged with murder.
A forensic psychologist must determine if a minor should be charged with murder.
A short film about the relationship between an Aboriginal daughter and her white mother. The daughter, now the sole carer of her dying mother, dreams of far away places, the haunted look in her eyes loaded with a sense of what could have been. Famous Aboriginal singer, Jimmy Little, sings 'Royal Telephone', evoking the presence of Christianity and its role in the assimilation of Aboriginal people. The final scene sees the daughter lying in a foetal position next to her mother, crying. Assimilation, then, can be understood as a pain experienced by both the Aboriginal daughter as well as the white mother.
A group of English, American, Dutch and Australian women creates a vocal orchestra while being imprisoned in a Japanese POW camp on Sumatra during World War II.
As World War I rages, brave and youthful Australians Archy and Frank—both agile runners—become friends and enlist in the Australian and New Zealand Army Corps together. They later find themselves part of the Dardanelles Campaign on the Gallipoli peninsula, a brutal eight-month conflict which pit the British and their allies against the Ottoman Empire and left over 500,000 men dead.
The world has finally managed to blow itself up and only Australia has been spared from nuclear destruction and a gigantic wave of radiation is floating in on the breezes. One American sub located in the Pacific has survived and is met with disdain by the Australians. The calculations of Australia's most renowned scientist says the country is doomed. However, one of his rivals says that he is wrong. He believes that a 1000 people can be relocated to the northern hemisphere, where his assumptions indicate the radiation levels may be lower. The American Captain is asked to take a mission to the north to determine which scientist is right.
A small town in Australia, in the late 1950s: Brownie and Lola are deeply in love. But because they are under-age, their parents are against their relationship and try to separate them.
Residents of peaceful Pebbles Court, Homesville, are being used unknowingly as test experiments for a new 'Body Drug' that causes rapid body decomposition (melting skin etc.) and painful death.
An eccentric marketing guru visits a Coca-Cola subsidiary in Australia to try and increase market penetration. He finds zero penetration in a valley owned by an old man who makes his own soft drinks, and visits the valley to see why. After "the Kid's" persistence is tested he's given a tour of the man's plant, and they begin talking of a joint venture. Things get more complicated when the Coca-Cola man begins falling in love with his temporary secretary, who seems to have connections to the valley.
Detective James Quinlan has left his alcoholic wife, sprouting a bloom of insecurity, anger and self-motivation within him to expose the corrupt police force that surrounds him. He abandons his straight life to join his partner Detective Church in order to get on the inside of the circle of double-agents. He secretly sides with a reporter and an Internal Affairs lawyer to expose them to the press.
When 13 year old Maria Merryweather's father dies, leaving her orphaned and homeless, she is forced to leave her luxurious London life to go and live with Sir Benjamin, an eccentric uncle she didn't know she had, at the mysterious Moonacre Manor.
Australian lawyer David Burton agrees with reluctance to defend a group of Aboriginal people charged with murdering one of their own. He suspects the victim was targeted for violating a tribal taboo, but the defendants deny any tribal association. Burton, plagued by apocalyptic visions of water, slowly realizes danger may come from his own involvement with the Aboriginal people and their prophecies.
An intimate story set during the 1860s in which a young Irish woman Sarah and her family find themselves on both sides of the turbulent wars between British and Maori during the British colonization of New Zealand.
As Indonesia prepares to invade the tiny nation of East Timor, five Australian based journalists go missing. Four weeks later, veteran foreign correspondent Roger East is lured to East Timor by the young and charismatic José Ramos-Horta to tell the story of his country and investigate the fate of the missing men. As East's determination to uncover the truth grows, the threat of invasion intensifie
Follows the stories of the four men of the Kirby family. As Alex's marriage breaks apart, Toby tries desperately to start a family, and Marty tries to kick-start his faded music career as well as find a meaningful relationship with someone his own age, all three must come to terms with their father's mental state. Cliff, suffering from Alzheimer's disease, is reliving his disturbing memories of the war and his first love, as a part of his experiences of the present . Through all four stories, we uncover a families troubled past, and their struggle towards a reconciled future.
Sent to rescue survivors from the site of a plane crash in the South Pacific during WWII, Captain Kelly and his elite squad of Australian commandos must keep tabs on a defecting Japanese official who could hold the secret to peace.
A portrait of an albino Aboriginal teenager, her feelings of alienation while at a convent boarding school, and her dreams of escape.
A boy climbs an unsteady path to adulthood under difficult circumstances in this drama from Australia. Shaun (Kane McNay) is a teenager growing up in a run-down suburb of Melbourne. His father Sam (Brett Swain) is in prison, while his mother Jenny (Nell Feeney) is too lost in her problems with alcohol to provide much guidance for her children. Left to his own devices, Shaun commits petty theft, smokes pot, and deals drugs to his friends as they hang out at the nearby shopping mall. Shaun seems unable to reach out to anyone, not even his girlfriend (Lauren Hawker) or Darren (Brett Tucker), a social worker eager to help him. When his father is released from prison and brings his mistress to the "Welcome Home" party Jenny throws for him, Shaun comes to realize that if he is ever to resolve his problems, he will have to do it without the help of his family. Mallboy marked the feature film debut for writer/director Vincent Giarrusso.
A bright young teenager from a broken home uses his quick wits and glib tongue to get out of trouble - but they also get him into it.
A young woman investigates the death of her mother, who drowned when her daughter was still a baby. The question is: was it murder, suicide or merely an accident?
A group of Australian SAS regiment soldiers are deployed to Vietnam around 1967/8 and encounter the realities of war, from the numbing boredom of camp life and long range patrols, raids and ambushes where nothing happens, to the the terror of enduring mortar barrages from an unseen enemy. Men die and are crippled in combat by firefights and booby traps, soldiers kill and capture the enemy, gather intelligence and retake ground only to cede it again whilst battling against the bureaucracy and obstinacy of the conventional military hierarchy. In the end they return to civilization, forever changed by their experiences but glad to return to the life they once knew.