South African brother and sister Grant and Dee McLachlan won awards at the Inside Film (IF) awards in Australia for the film The Jammed. This film about Australia’s illegal sex trade won Best Film, Best Script and Best Music that was composed by Grant McLachlan.
The Jammed, a self-distributed social thriller was turned down by all distributors and set to go direct-to-DVD but that soon changed when it won the awards. Negotiations are underway for the movie to be released in various countries, and hopefully in South African cinemas. The Jammed is one of the most talked about films in Australia. It was written and directed by Dee McLachlan from The Picture Tank production company and received six nominations.
Held on 16 November this year, the awards aim to celebrate and champion Australian film and creative talent. Australian Julian Shaw’s film about a South African subject matter titled Darling! The Pieter-Dirk Uys Story won the Independent Spirit Award at the Inside Film Awards.
“I am very thrilled that Julian’s film has made such an impact,’ comments Pieter-Dirk Uys about the Independent Spirit Award.
After watching Uys perform his one-man show in Australia, Shaw came to South Africa to shoot the award-winning film. “His extraordinary courage and determination at the age of 16 to come from Australia and spend all that time with me while I toured schools with my aids-awareness programme has resulted in a unique voice-the voice of the youth,’ he explains.
The film will be screened by invitation at the Berlin Film Festival in February 2008 and will be released in South Africa through Nu Metro and M-Net.
