The world’s longest film festival – clocking up 25 consecutive days over 26 venues – announced two new MIFF (Melbourne International Film Festival) awards at the Closing Night Gala on August 20. The AUD$140,000 “Bright Horizons Award” – supported by the state’s film commission, VicScreen – was given to Neptune Frost, from Rwandan filmmakers Anisia Uzeyman and Saul Williams and the AUD$70,000  “Blackmagic Design Australian Innovation Award” was won by Jub Clerc, indigenous writer and director of the coming-of-age drama, Sweet As. The MIFF Audience Award went to Greenhouse by Joost, an environmental documentary made by two Melbourne filmmakers, Bruce Permezel and Rhian Skirving.

The new awards were created to celebrate the 70^th anniversary of the festival and the festival now boasts the richest prize money in the Southern Hemisphere. “The Bright Horizons Award” elevates both Australian and international directorial voices and fresh filmmaking talent, with a specific focus on first and second-time features.

Many of the 11 nominated films came from Melbourne-based filmmakers and were immediately picked up for U.S. distribution, including Thomas Wright’s The Stranger (Netflix)) and Goran Stolveski’s Of an Age (Focus Features). Also competing with her second film was Melbourne filmmaker Alena Lodkina, whose film Petrol earned plenty of buzz at both MIFF and premiering in the same week at the Locarno Film Festival in Switzerland. 

Bright Horizons winner Neptune Frost has been described as an “avant-garde cyber-musical confronting ever-changing technology, racial capitalism, human labor and the slippery strictures of gender.” Visionary poet and musician Saul Williams and actor and playwright Anisia Uzeyman have already attracted the support of unlikely executive producers, Lin-Manuel Miranda (Hamilton), and Ezra Miller (The Flash).

The “Blackmagic Design Australian Innovation Award” specifically recognizes an Australian filmmaking talent for their work – as director, cinematographer, or other key creative lead – in any Australian feature-length film screened at the festival. Nyul Nyul/ Yawuru director Jub Clerc (identified by the traditional indigenous names of her home city and state) wrote and directed the uplifting coming-of-age road movie described as, “The Breakfast Club meets the outback” which has already been selected for the upcoming Toronto Film Festival.

Alena Lodkina – who flew from Switzerland to Melbourne to be present for both premieres of her film Petrol – says the support of MIFF has been essential in her career. “I’ve shown my films at the Melbourne Film Festival since 2014, starting with a short film and then my first feature film, Strange Colors, so this is my fourth film at the festival, and it feels like a family to me,” says the Russian-born Australian-raised writer. “It’s also a festival I’ve attended since I moved to Melbourne and has completely shaped my education as a filmmaker.”

Lodkina also highlights the importance of MIFF’s Premiere Fund, which taps into VicScreen’s $191.5 million creative budget that helps fund MIFF and showcases the state as a global screen powerhouse. “That fund was an important stakeholder in the financing of Petrol,” she adds gratefully, “so it’s incredible that MIFF also has a financing stream where they help films get made in the first place.”

The MIFF audience award winner, Greenhouse by Joost, highlights two more Melbourne filmmakers as they follow activist Joost Bakker on his project to devise the Future Food System; a self-sufficient residence that provides shelter, food and energy while reusing any by-products like fuel or fertilizer.

The 2022 event showcased 107 Australian releases and an international program totaling 371 features and shorts representing 71 languages with over 70 films coming straight from the Cannes Film Festival. The independent jury of industry figures included Jury President, actress Shareena Clanton, Emmy-winning filmmaker Lynette Wallworth and acclaimed Australian cinematographer Adam Arkapaw (Animal Kingdom).

MIFF Artistic Director, Al Cossar, told the packed Closing Night Gala audience, “MIFF’s Awards are about elevating distinctive, ambitious, bold new voices that deserve and demand a global stage. We are vastly proud of the introduction of MIFF’s Bright Horizons Competition and the jaw-dropping lineup of emerging international and Australian filmmakers competing.”

The 70th-anniversary event was enlivened with the festival’s first XR-commission, Night of Creatures, by long-term collaborators Isobel Knowles and Van Sowerwine, and the curated MIFF “Signatures” program entertaining audiences prior to screenings with specially commissioned short films from three Australian filmmakers; Justin Kurzel (Nitram), Ivan Sen (Mystery Road) and Soda Jerk (Terror Nullius).