Central Vic Indigenous Film Festival Screens at Yandoit

Screening of CONTACT- Introduced by co-director, Bentley Dean, followed by Q&A

Award winning film CONTACT is constructed around one of the most extraordinary pieces of footage in Australian history: The moment when a group of Martu women and children walk in from their nomadic existence of millennia into the universe of European modernity. The film centers on Yuwali, the beautiful 17-year old girl we see making that giant leap on the 24th of September 1964.

Now 62, Yuwali’s account of the ‘first contact’ experience is probably the fullest and most revealing ever caught on film. Her group of twenty were the last remnant aboriginal mob still living traditionally, without any contact or knowledge of modern Australia, in the remote Great Sandy Desert.

A huge space rocket test – Blue Streak – was to be fired in May 1964 at their home in the dry Percival Lakes. The authorities sent in patrol officers to evacuate anyone living there to protect them from rocket debris.The days counting down to blast off drive the narrative of the film. Back at the Lakes, Yuwali gives a riveting account as she and her group are chased hundreds of kilometers around the desert trying to escape the ‘devilmen’ in the ‘rocks that move’ (four wheel drives). The climax is both extraordinary and emotional.

The film will be introduced by co-director, Bentley Dean , followed by Q&A

Directed by: Bentley Dean and Martin Butler.
Awards: Joint Winner- Best Documentary – Sydney Film Festival, 2009; Winner Best Achievement in Directing for Documentary- Australian Directors Guild, 2009.

Entry by Donation- support film makers, indigenous programs & community venues.

Where: Yandoit Cultural- the old church in the bush- Uniting Church Rd, off High St, Yandoit

Bookings: https://yandoitcultural.org/bookings/