Colourfest Film Festival 2012: Preview

Several years ago young Sri Lankan-born Gary Paramanathan realised there was a plethora of ethnic-specific film festivals in Australia but no event which was devoted exclusively to celebrating the cultural diversity of filmmaking in Oz.

The result is the Colourfest Film Festival, the event Paramanathan founded as a solo enterprise. The third edition launches in Melbourne’s Footscray Community Arts Centre on September 8 and later this month in Sydney, Brisbane, Launceston and Hobart.

Colourfest is one of the shortest fests on the calendar, if not the most concise, screening just one feature and 12 short films in one day in Melbourne and Brisbane and over three days in Sydney; the one-day programme in Tasmania is shorts only.

It’s a labour of love for Paramanathan, 27, who moved to Australia with his parents when he was 11. He was working as a community organiser for the Information and Cultural Exchange (ICE), which fosters digital media and arts in Western Sydney, when he launched Colourfest in May 2010.

The inaugural event was staged at the Red Rattler Theatre in Marrickville in Western Sydney and featured 10 shorts. In 2011 it expanded to four venues, The Red Rattler and Riverside Theatres in Parramatta, The Edge in Brisbane and the Footscray Community Arts Centre, showcasing 17 shorts.

Paramanathan planned this year’s edition while he lived for a year in Sri Lanka, returning just a month ago, assisted by volunteers. Among the sponsors are SBS, the Australian Film, Television & Radio School, Film Victoria, the NSW and Queensland Governments and the University of Tasmania.  In Sydney the event moves to the Chauvel Cinema in Paddington, starting on September 12.

The culturally-rich mix of shorts features works from filmmakers from backgrounds including Taiwan, Vietnam, Turkey, Sierra Leone, Punjab and Lebanon. The feature is Kemi (pictured), a comedy-drama produced and written by Nigerian Daniel Okoduwa and directed by Korean Mike Kang. Inspired by the people whom Odukawa encountered when he worked in a home video store in Blacktown, it’s the saga of an unemployed Nigerian immigrant teenager who unknowingly wreaks havoc in her community through gossip.

The shorts were selected from about 50 entries. The director says of his approach to programming, “I try to find gems that don’t turn up at other festivals.” He also looks for films that challenge negative portrayals of culturally and linguistically diverse Australians.

The highlights include Handy, Vinh Nguyen's mockumentary about a group of hands fleeing the war-torn nation of Handgaria who arrive in Australia as refugees and experience the trials and tribulations of life in suburban Sydney. "Refugees is hardly a new issue. I wanted to give light to the subject via the personification of hands. We gravitate towards characters like Wall-E or Buzz Lightyear because of their human qualities, and hands have this shape which makes them very expressive" said Vinh.

Paramanathan lauds the film’s comical vein, observing, “Sometimes humour is the best way of approaching a subject that is taboo or sensitive.”

Cigdem Serce’s Naked Lady is the chronicle of a young Turkish woman in Australia who faces the prospect of being forced by her parents to marry a man with a shady past.

Neilesh Verma’s Letters Home examines an international student from India who struggles to adapt to living in Sydney until he meets at girl at the convenience store where he works.

Corrie Chen’s Wonder Boy looks at a Chinese-Australian boy who is torn between his heritage and his loyalty to Australia, set against the backdrop of Chinese New Year.

Joshua Dang’s General Dang centres on the son of South Vietnamese General Dang Van Quang who speaks of his father's struggles to cope with allegations of  heroin trafficking and his mission to clear his name.

Cassandra Nguyen’s Play Lunch focuses on Molly, a young girl who takes to school a lunch packed by her mother and strikes up a friendship with the boy who sits next to her.

Mike Kang’s It's About Survival relates how a middle-aged office worker despises his estranged gay son’s sexuality and literally tries to beat it out of him.

Tania Safi’s Trab Laus follows a young Australian-Lebanese woman as she leaves behind her comfortable life in Sydney for her grandmother’s squalid apartment in Tripoli.

Hawanatu Bangura‘s Money Tree is an animated film about an African boy who tries to escape poverty by planting an orchid of stolen money (Sydney, Melbourne only).

The AFTRS is donating $2,000 in cash to the short adjudged the best by a panel representing the SBS, the School and the director of the Persian International Film Festival. The screenings in Hobart and Launceston are free thanks to the support of University of Tasmania."

Next year Paramanathan aims to expand the festival to Adelaide and Perth and to screen at least one or two additional features. Longer term his goal is to raise enough sponsorship to put the fest on a proper organisational footing.


For more info go to the official website.