Author: leebutler

Belly of the Beast: A Torquay Story is available as part of the Melbourne Documentary Film Festival

Roughly one hour’s drive south of Melbourne is the little coastal town of Torquay, a small town that houses the Australian National Surfing Museum. This makes sense considering the history of Torquay as a surfing mecca, a place where several surfing legends got their start and the location that would end up inspiring the creation of well-known surf brands Rip Curl and Quicksilver. Its history is tied to the growth of one of the most Australian sports of them all, surfing… but I’m a big nerd who wouldn’t go to the beach if you paid me, let alone get on a surfboard, so I don’t know any of that history, or at least I didn’t until seeing Belly of the Beast: A Torquay story and now I have a fairly good education on the matter because this is an insanely informative film.

Continue reading “Belly of the Beast: A Torquay Story (2023) – Hang Ten Dudes!” →

Walkatjurra is available as part of the Melbourne Documentary Film Festival

Since 1954 Australia has been mining uranium to supply it to other countries (mainly the US and UK, though there have been others in recent years) where it can be turned into nuclear weapons or used in power plants. Those weapons were tested in several parts of Australia up until 1963 so several areas are still pretty radioactive… and hey, there is still uranium to be mined and profit to be made so we keep digging it up. It’s been 70 years since we started digging and more and more protests are happening to try and be a force for change, hopefully ending this system once and for all. One group’s protest that’s filmed as the central focus of Walkatjurra involves a 200km walk through the desert where a lot of this mining has taken place, a mobile protest that shows that this land is precious and used by a lot of people. 

Continue reading “Walkatjurra (2023) – Takes Action” →

Dig Deeper is available as part of the Melbourne Documentary Film Festival

Getting into the art world is an obscenely difficult thing to do at the best of times, especially when it comes to getting your work displayed at any major gallery. This is especially hard for indigenous art which is often not given the amount of respect, attention and potential space that it deserves. It also tends to often be pigeonholed as art rooted in history that predates most people viewing it which leaves out a substantial element of indigenous art. Dig Deeper takes a look at four specific indigenous artists who stand out for pointedly defying that image and making it big in the art world and their work is absolutely stunning.

Continue reading “Dig Deeper (2023) – Digs Deep” →

Teacher is available as part of the Melbourne Documentary Film Festival

There is no job that’s more thankless than that of a school teacher, this is a universal truth that has only become more accurate as time goes on. Not only is it a job that requires incredible time, knowledge and passion but in dealing with kids there’s the requirement of almost saintly patience and ability to deal with just about anything that comes up, all while being obscenely underpaid and working with limited resources because for some reason society has decided to make this job as hard as possible. This was all true BEFORE a global pandemic but when that happened and teaching had to be done online it got exponentially harder. In Teacher, we get a glimpse into just how much harder.

Continue reading “Teacher (2023) – Lesson Learned” →

This Man’s Worth is available as part of the Melbourne Documentary Film Festival

Very occasionally there’s a need to give a trigger warning about what topic might come up during a review of a movie, basically a way to tell the reader ahead of time if a subject is involved that might create a mental health crisis. It’s often quick and simple and a way for you to click away but this time I have to say that while this review and this documentary deals with Suicide and if that’s triggering to you that you should absolutely avoid it, this is also a documentary about suicide that specifically requires people who might have such problems to hear its message. Basically, if you think you might be OK, it’s worth giving This Man’s Worth a try but if not… well, there’s the trigger warning.

Continue reading “This Man’s Worth (2023) – Worthy” →