Charlie’s flick makes the cut

By Monique Ebrington
SHORT films bought big opportunities for aspiring directors at this year’s Show Us Your Shorts short film competition as part of the Warburton Film Festival.
Entrant Charlie Sturgeon won Best Drama, in the under-18 category, for his five minute film ‘Timmy’ and received a Victorian College of the Arts (VCA) School of Film and Television short film course of his choice as part of the prize.
Charlie had applied for a VCA course when he finished his Year 12 last year, however, was unsuccessful in this year’s intake.
He said with the accolade and completion of the short course he believed the experience would help his success in next year’s VCA intake.
“The VCA short course has just been fantastic,” Charlie said. “The whole experience has just been so beneficial. The film and theatre industry is where I’d love to be, in any role, it’s my passion.”
Australian director Paul Cox and actress Wendy Hughes were guests at this year’s Warburton Film Festival and provided Charlie with valuable feedback on his film.
“It was great to have that exposure, to get to meet a professional film-maker,” he said. “Paul congratulating me on the film and Wendy Hughes was very encouraging and wished me all the best in my acting and film career.”
The popular and annual short film competition is aimed at not only providing young people with an opportunity to express themselves but also the chance to expose their creativity to a large audience.
Prizes were awarded for the three categories of film including Best Drama, Best Documentary and Best Animation.
Other award winners included Steve Murray for Best Drama and Kim Munro for Best Documentary in the over-18 category.
Joint-winners Lawrence Smith and James Thomas-Officer received the title of Best Documentary in the under-18 category.
Sonia Mansour won Best Animation for her film “Keepsake”, Daniel Porto won the Golden Shorts Award for his film ‘Sei-Ow-Hai’ and the NRCL Winner was Asuka Sylvie Baskett for ‘The Half Light’.