Mount Isa short film festival launches for National Youth Week

Young People Ahead (YPA) presents Identity Short Film Festival featuring six locally-made films by 13 young people, 12 to 25 years old.

Attendance is free from 6.30pm on the centre lawn with refreshments provided.

The productions were funded through Regional Arts Development and had support from Anvil Productions and Short Black Films. 

Festival producer Belinda Anderson said the team identified an opportunity to engage youth and explore their identity.

“To create films about identity and culture, they brainstormed to work out ‘what is identity’, which took two days in itself,” Ms Anderson said.

The young film-makers took part in writing workshops with Rebecca Lister from Anvil Productions, who taught them how to do a storyboard and write a script.

Filming was done by Sydney based Vincent McManus of Short Black Films who showed the students different camera techniques.

The project was made with support from Injilinji Youth Services, Mount Isa Neighbourhood Centre, Mount Isa Centre for Rural and Remote Health (MICRRH) and Headspace Mount Isa.

Ms Anderson said the 18 children who attended daily workshops leading up to filming week had different concepts of identity.

“It was great to see some of the Indigenous children talking about walkabout, sitting around yarning, and there was a lot of respect for others’ identities,” Ms Anderson said.

Twelve-year-old Sera Staples is a budding actor who said she took a lot from the experience.

“We played games to get ideas, we had a lot of sticky notes about identity, and once we started writing we knew where it would go,” Sera said.

Now that they have written, starred in, and produced their own films they can finally see them on screen on Monday night.

The film festival is part of National Youth Week, March 31 to April 9.