After its conception in 2010, the EFFA has blossomed into a groundbreaking staple of Australia’s film festival calendar. In a time where supermarkets are at war with proponents of plastic bags and a man who almost became PM joked about rising sea levels while simultaneously denying climate change, it seems that Australia needs a slap in its metaphorical face. EFFA will encourage you to wake up and smell the swollen sea-water.
For 2018’s program, over 580 films were submitted and 43 were chosen ranging from 16 countries and all covering the theme of ‘Face the Films’. This calls for the wider community to face facts surrounding climate change, and face the future impacts of decisions made today.
Highlights for this year’s huge program include Into the Okovango, which follows an expedition to save one of the world’s last remaining wildlife habitats from human intervention, and As Worlds Divide, which sees a Melburnian filmmaker move from Melbourne to Mentawai and thus immerse himself in the Indigenous culture over an eight-year period.
Seeing as there are over 43 films to be screened, it’s difficult to summarise the myriad of ideas, stories, themes and scopes that are presented by each; so, to break it down for you, here are some of the broader categories to be picked from. You’ll find personal stories of courage, hope desperation and despair; explorations of the impacts of industrial pollution; animal rights and the threats to natural habitats; untouched landscapes; and virtual reality.
The festival is to be shown at ACMI and Palace Westgarth Cinema, so it’s only fitting that Aussie films and filmmakers are repping in abundance; particularly Water is Life, which documents Australian Indigenous communities fighting back against fracking plans in the NT.
If you care about the future of our oceans, animals, and Indigenous communities, EFFA 2018 is definitely not to be missed. After all, there’s no time to waste when it comes to climate change education.
