Screen Australia Announces Funding Of $20.4m Across Features, Series & Shorts
Screen Australia has announced $20.4m of production and development funding across 91 narrative projects, including the first projects through its new Short Film Production Funding Program.
Among the titles is debut feature The Laugh Of Lakshmi, written and directed by S. Shakthidharan and produced by John Maynard (Balibo) and Vivek Rangachari (The Lunchbox); an untitled feature that has been set up as an official Australia-Canada co-production and marks the feature directing debut of actor Cody Fern; and six-part crime thriller Fortitude Valley, created and executive produced by Moving Floor Entertainment co-founders Stephen M Irwin and Leigh McGrath and produced by Andrew Walker (Deadloch).
The Laugh Of Lakshmi, about a mother and a son separated by civil war, was filmed in Tamil and English in Northern Sri Lanka and Western Sydney, with support from Screen NSW. Local distribution is by Footprint Films and international sales by Maze Film Sales.
The untitled Cody Fern project, about a celebrated actress whose life begins to unravel on the eve of her greatest performance, stars Naomi Watts, Sarah Paulson and Odessa A’zion and is produced by Matilda Comers and Will Howarth for Fictious. Also backed by Telefilm Canada, the film is distributed by Icon in Australia and Elevation Pictures in Canada, with MK2 handling international sales.
Set in Brisbane, Fortitude Valley stars Hunter Page-Lochard and Kat Stewart and is directed by Sian Davies (Black Snow), co-produced by Ross Allsop (The Artful Dodger), with executive producer Greg Sitch (Fisk), and also received investment from broadcaster ABC and Screen Queensland.
Screen Australia’s latest funding round also includes support for Hyun Lee’s horror film Asian Girls, produced by Georgia Noe and Matt Noonan (Hunt For The Wilderpeople), about a Korean‑Australian woman who receives a stark warning from a Korean shaman that she must give up her career aspirations to become a shaman herself; and Agata The Writer, a debut feature from Poland-born Australian video artist Kuba Dorabialski starring Mia Wasikowska as a Polish-Australian satirical novelist who travels from Sydney to Sarajevo to write a war novel.
Other supported projects include six-part romantic comedy The Funeral Singer, created by Lucy Durack and written by Leon Ford for Jungle Entertainment; a new season of award-winning children’s series Little J & Big Cuz; and animated mystery musical direct-to-audience series The Art Of Murder, made for YouTube.
The first short films to receive support through Screen Australia’s return to direct investment in the format are Sundowner, a romantic comedy from Western Australian First Nations filmmakers, produced by Shakara Walley and directed by Gary Hamaguchi; The Novelty, driven by a female‑led creative team including writer, director and producer Charlotte Mungomery (This Is Not Here); coming-of-age story Inferno, directed and written by Mark Wills (Blood Orange); and adult animation Lazy Love (Lasagne 365) from director Haein Kim and writer-director Paul Rhodes.
The four shorts will also receive mentorship from industry directors including Beck Cole (Deadloch), Isobel Knowles and Van Sowerwine (The World Came Flooding In), Noora Niasari (Shayda) and Goran Stolevski (Of An Age).
Screen Australia Director of Narrative Content Louise Gough said: “The range of these 91 projects showcases the depth, diversity and bold creativity of local storytellers, shaped with Australia’s unique blend of humour, style and perspective. We’re particularly lucky to have industry figures of such calibre to mentor the four directors of our Short Film Program, guiding them to hone their unique, imaginative shorts for cinema and festival audiences.”
