Stranger With My Face Festival focuses on women’s perspectives in genre filmmaking with an emphasis on horror and related genres. The Film Festival will be held in Hobart from 4-7 May.
This year’s program includes the Australian premiere of Elizabeth E. Schuch’s debut film THE BOOK OF BIRDIE. She is a London-based director and producer specializing in creative visuals and has contributed to many films, TV, and theater productions in the art department as a production designer, matte painter or storyboard and concept artist (including Wonder Woman and Pacific Rim: Uprising).
“It’s a visually stunning piece, with a fascinating intensity and sense of its own style,” says Festival Director Briony Kidd. “I’ve no doubt Elizabeth is a filmmaker to watch.”
The film tells the story of a fragile teenage girl who’s placed in a gloomy convent to be looked after by nuns. Will her unusual obsessions become a mark of sainthood or a dark heresy?
The director says: “I’m absolutely thrilled to bring the mad, mystical world of The Book of Birdie to meet the perfect genre audience in Tasmania, and to meet the other filmmakers passionate about telling strange dark tales with a female eye.”
Screening at Stranger With My Face 2017:
- Australian feature film INNUENDO, directed by Saara Lamberg, in a micro-budget spotlight;
- The Laos feature film DEAREST SISTER, a ghost story with powerful social resonances from SWMF favorite Mattie Do;
The line-up of short films include:
- Blood Sisters (Australia, dirs. Caitlin Koller & Lachlan Smith)
- Doll (Australia, director Jia He)
- The Man Who Caught a Mermaid (Australia, director Kaitlin Tinker)
- What Happened to Her (USA, Kristy Guevara-Flanagan)
- Pendulum (UK, Lauren Cooney)
- Gardening at Night (USA, Shayna Connelly)
- Slapper (Australia, Luci Schroder)
And the following one-hour talks make up this year’s Mary Shelley Symposium:
- Print-maker Jazmina Cininas talking about her ‘Girlie Werewolf Hall of Fame’ body of work around the mythology of the female werewolf in culture (her exhibition Blood Moon will also be opened as part of the festival);
- Film academic Deb Verhoeven talking about the films of Gaylene Preston, SMWF’s featured retrospective for 2017;
- Writer, researcher and artist Lauren Carroll-Harris reflecting on the screen culture in Australia, with a presentation entitled ‘Why do we fund Australian films but not the cinemas to screen them in?’;
- And horror fan and broadcaster Chloe Black with ‘The Wolf in the Dress’, an exploration of transgender and transphobic representation in modern horror.
The 2017 poster is by Adelaide-based artist Amy Fairweather, who cites influenced including Robert Louis Stevenson’s Dr. Jeckyll and Mr. Hyde, and the Jennnifer Kent film The Babadook. “I had an image in mind of a Victorian-esque woman who’s in a trance-like state, her ‘darker’ side emerging in plumes of smoke.The monster is a representation of her tormented, malevolent and twisted self.”
For more information about tickets and upcoming events at the festival visit their website.
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