Rachel Pronger Guest programmer screening + introduction.
On remote Christmas Island, thousands of asylum seekers are detained in a high-security detention centre. Locked away indefinitely deep in the jungle, they wait for the Australian government to decide their fate with occasional therapy sessions offering the only link to the outside world. The bleak and beautiful setting of Island of the Hungry Ghosts provides an eerie backdrop to this limbo – beyond the facility’s walls, local islanders conduct bewitching rituals and a tide of crabs, the island’s original inhabitants, find their way to shore.
Seahorse
Director Nele Dehnenkamp
2020, 16 mins
Hypnotic short Seahorse centres on the testimony of Hanan, a young Iraqi woman who describes her experience of nearly drowning as she crossed the Mediterranean to seek asylum in Europe. In the background of both films lies the sea, its ever-churning tides lent new horror and awe when viewed through the eyes of people who have been forced to cross the ocean in search of safety.
Guest curated by Rachel Pronger (writer, curator & co-founder of feminist collective Invisible Women).
