| Director Sophia Turkiewicz and I are proud to announce that our feature documentary, ONCE MY MOTHER, has been selected for the Sydney Film Festival. We're one of ten in competition for the prestigious Documentary Australia Foundation Award. 6.30pm, 8 June at Event Cinema 9, George St.Bookings at tix.sff.org.au/html/s_OnceMyMother.htm
Helen's life was riddled with misfortune. As a motherless child in Eastern Europe she was placed with uncaring relatives. She escaped, but then the Second World War began. Deported to a Siberian gulag, she survived starvation rations and a forced march of thousands of kilometres. Finally, this irrepressible woman finds happiness in a Rhodesian internment camp, but fate is about to play another trick. Helen's daughter, director Sophia Turkiewicz, tells her mother's miraculous story with archival and personal footage. Significantly, it is also Sophie's story. The bond between mother and daughter is examined in all its strength and fragility in this heartrending and redemptive documentary.
We've not been able to show the film in Sydney up to now because the Sydney Film Festival only screens NSW premieres. Please book and tell your friends!
We're also announcing a cinema season starting 24 July at the Hayden Orpheum, Cremorne, if you can't make the film festival.
It'll be vital to come along in the first week to encourage the cinema to keep screening the film. Please put it in your diaries. We have a very limited marketing budget so word of mouth is our best chance to develop an audience and demonstrate that independent documentaries can draw an audience to cinemas.
We're also showing from 24 July at the Nova in Melbourne, the Luna Palace in Perth and the Regal in Newcastle.
Please visit our website at www.oncemymother.com to see the Trailer and subscribe to our Newsletter or comment in the TALK TO US section.
Visit our Facebook page to keep up with news and 'Like' it at http://www.facebook.com/oncemymother
The film has picked up the following awards:
BEST FEATURE DOCUMENTARY, Australian Directors Guild Awards
AUDIENCE AWARD BEST DOCUMENTARY, Adelaide Film Festival
AUDIENCE AWARD BEST FILM, Canberra International Film Festival
BEST DOCUMENTARY BIOGRAPHY, ATOM Awards
BEST FEATURE DOCUMENTARY Nomination, AACTA Awards
BEST SOUND Nomination, AACTA Awards
Sophia and I are off next week to the Polish premiere at the Krakow Film Festival.
Best wishes and see you at the movies
Rod Freedman
Producer | 
