The 52nd Annual Sydney Film Festival ran from the 10th - 26th of June. This year there were over 170 international films for audiences to see.

GIRL IN A MIRROR is a film about Australian Carrol Jerrems. Jerrems worked as a photographer in Australia during the 1970s and used her work to challenge convention and morality. The film is a documentary which looks at Jerrems' life through both her photographs and the eyes of her friends.  The film is extremely personal and insightful, particularly as a voice reads from the journals Jerrems kept as she confronted her impending and early death at thirty years old.  Much of the content in the film is sexually based, and while not always comfortable to watch - it certainly doesn't feel overt . There are very frank discussions about Jerrems' sexuality as well as her adventurous and forthright nature.

GIRL IN A MIRROR had its world premiere during the SFF, I went along and as with many of the screenings the films' producer and director introduced the film. Kathy Drayton, the director is a former editor who used to work for SBS TV. When saying her thankyous she made particular mention of her editor Anna Craney. She praised Anna for her work on the film and also mentioned Anna's ability to be patient in the editing suite as Kathy struggled with the transition from editor to director. In the end she said that Anna enabled her to take the film much further than she would have been able to on her own.

THE MAGICIAN is an Australian film and along with Hungarian film KONTROLL, the highlight of my festival viewing. THE MAGICIAN has a very simple story, it is in the style of a mockumentary in which the "crew" follows hitman Ray Shoesmith around Melbourne while he goes about life and... work. The film is dark, but also very funny. At the end of the film, Scott Ryan (the writer, director and lead actor in the film), Nash Edgerton and Michelle Bennett (producers) gave a Q&A. During this session the audience learnt that THE MAGICIAN was made by Ryan for about $3000 and he shot it over ten days across two years. The film screened as a short at the 2003 St Kilda Film Frestival, which is where Edgerton originally saw the film and picked it up as producer. The film was recut for subtlety by Ryan, Edgerton and Kristine Rowe - Ryan had initially cut the film for laughs - the new cut is apparently darker, but certainly still very humourous.  Also, with over twelve hours of footage to work with, THE MAGICIAN is now feature length. I really enjoyed this film - its story, performances, darkness and humour make it a great Australian effort. Due for limited release in September - I'd recommend seeing it.

The Sydney Film Festival synopsis states that the American film CASTING ABOUT is "[a] lyrical documentary that explores the experience of casting for a dramatic film, weaving together footage from auditions in Berlin, Boston, Chicago, London and Los Angeles." After reviewing more than 70 hours of casting tapes, from 350 individual auditions, CASTING ABOUT  was made. It is a film which took director Barry J. Hershey and editor Marc Grossman two years to cut. The films runs for 86 minutes.  The documentary, having been made from audition tapes, makes the viewing audience privy to interviews, performances of monologues and scene work from the film actually being cast. With 184 of the 350 who auditioned being shown, the film gives a very raw insight into the audition process.

CASTING ABOUT is quite a revealing film, it shows women begging for parts, freezing as they go to audition, absolutely nailing scenes, bringing the filmmakers to tears and constantly selling themselves for the roles on offer. In some of the women, their desperation to act is blatant while others remain cool as ice. This film left me a little uncomfortable, it is quite emotionally charged and I felt a massive empathy for a lot of the women shown. The film is very well made - the actresses and their performances and interwoven - as a viewer you see a lot of different people doing many of the same things, but you don't get bored.  The one thing I really found lacking in this film was closure. While we see a lot of women working extremely hard in their auditions, the film they were auditioning for has not been made. Honestly, I wanted to know who "won". I find it somewhat demoralising that Hershey chose to put his original film project on hold to make this documentary, and while the 184 women all gave permission for their auditions to be shown and all have ended up in a documentary - that's not what they where there for.

This is just a taste of what was on offer in Sydney. Congratulations go out to former ASE President Jane St. Vincent Welch for her work on THE MEN WHO WOULD CONQUER CHINA. The film picked up two of the 2005 Dendy Awards for Australian Short Film - taking out the Documentary and SBS Language Services Prize. For more information on the Sydney Film Festival go here - http://www.sydneyfilmfestival.org

AND, don't forget The Melbourne International Film Festival is coming up in a week or so - click here for more information: http://www.melbournefilmfestival.com.au