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THE SILENCES 2015  73min

|     FALL/WINTER 2023 

Produced, Written and Directed by Margot Nash

 

A personal essay documentary about the tangled bonds, secret histories and unspoken traumas of family life, that stretches from New Zealand to the Australian suburbs. It is an exploration of early childhood and the “silences” of the past that resonate in the present.  It draws upon a wealth of photographs, letters, oral histories, documentary footage and clips from the filmmaker’s previous work. It unfolds a mother’s story of lost opportunities, lost love and grief; a father’s story of work, mental illness and war; and a daughter’s story of trying to piece together a more complex picture of the confusing ties of love, loss and kinship between a mother and daughter.

Watch: via Vimeo On Demand: Ronin Films https://vimeo.com/ondemand/silences

 

Composer and Pianist – Elizabeth Drake, Editing and Narration – Margot Nash, Sound Mix and Picture Online – Michael Gissing

Narration Recording – Luke Bacon, Additional Sound Design – Liam Egan, Dialogue Editing – Megan Wedge, Location Camera & Sound – Margot Nash, Producer's Assistant – Melissa Ippolito, Research – Margot Nash, Natalie Krikowa, Melissa Ippolito

 


Distributed in Australia and New Zealand by Ronin Films

 

The Silences IMBD  
 

Download the Press Kit

 

Awards
2017
CASTELL AWARD: Barcelona International Film Festival Independent

Film Awards

BEST FEATURE Illawarra Film Festival

2016
AWGIE AWARD: Documentary Broadcast or Exhibition, Australian Writers' Guild 

JURY PRIZE Best Feature, Reel Sydney Festival of World Cinema  

Nominated Documentary Feature Australian Directors Guild Awards 

TROPHY AWARD WAYMI (World Association of Young People with a

Mentally Ill Parent) 

2015
Nominated Documentary Biography Australian Teachers of Media Awards  

Film Festivals and Screenings

2019

Hazelhurst Film Society, Gymea Arts Centre, Sydney

2018 
APS Psychoanalytically Oriented Psychologists screening, Brisbane
Melbourne Women In Film Festival (MWFF) 22-25 Feb

2017

Dunedin School of Art - screening New Zealand
Screenwave International Film Festival, Bellingen and Coffs Harbour

Wauchope Arts screening NSW

2016

Australian cinema release in selected cinemas: Cremorne Orpheum Sydney,

Cinema Nova Melbourne, The Mercury Adelaide, The Arc Canberra, The Regal

Newcastle, The Golden Age Sydney, Soroptimist International - Zenith Theatre,

Chatswood Sydney
Queensland Film Festival  

Griffith University - Research seminar screening

2nd Reel Festival of World Cinema, Sutherland Sydney - opening night film
Between Past and Present: the films of Margot Nash, Melbourne Cinémathèque, ACMI. 

American Documentary Film Festival (Amdocs) Palm Springs USA
Ozdox  International Women's Day screening  March 8 AFTRS

2015

The Golden Age Cinema Surrey Hills, Sydney preview. 

Local Heroes:​ Documentary screening, Sydney preview 

Canberra International Film Festival 

Adelaide Film Festival - Australian Showcase 

Melbourne International Film Festival - Australian Showcase 

New Zealand International Film Festival (Auckland, Wellington, Christchurch, Dunedin) 

Conferences and Talks 

2017 Screenwave International Film Festival Industry Seminar, Coffs Harbour 
2016 ASPERA conference Canberra.  Process structure and the construction of memory in a personal essay documentary
2015 Camera Stylo - Sydney University Building 'The Silences' - a personal essay documentary

MIFF - Talking Pictures: True to Life - Meet the Documentary Filmakers 
2014  Sightlines -  RMIT Melbourne The Silences: an auto-ethnography

Philippa Hawker Review Sydney Morning Herald and The Age

 

Adrian Martin Call Her Mum: Margot Nash's The Silences

http://www.filmcritic.com.au/reviews/s/silences.html

 

Keith Gallash, Realtime Arts: Love and Pain: a crystalline memoir

 

Defending Cinefilia (10) - Stephen Gaunson on the Australian Cinema 2015
 

Abandonment Loss and Longing in Margot Nash's The Silences 
Senses of Cinema 78, March 2016

Margot Nash on cracking the structure of the memoir documentary The Silences.

IF magazine interview, April 2016

 

Margot Nash: Experimentation and the Documentary

FilmInk, April 2016

 

Kit McFarlane, Metro Magazine:Media and Education No. 188, 2016: 'The silences', autoethnography and mental health  The Tyranny of the Unspoken

 

The Silences at Adelaide Film Festival 

 

The Age - Interview at Melb International Film Festival (MIFF)_

 

Award Winning Film in Wauchope

 

Otago Daily Times

Greg King's Film Reviews

 

From the Heart - Otago Daily Times

 

A Discovery Driven Screenwriting Process - interview with Margot Nash
 

The Silences - Radio and Podcasts

 

The Silences - In Conversation with Margot Nash - OzDox March 2016

Held on International Women's Day 2016 'The Silences' was screened in the AFTRS Theatre, followed by Writer/Director Margot Nash in conversation with Jeni Thornley, then an audience Q&A. 


The Silences Interview with director Margot Nash on The Final Cut with Jason Di Rosso on ABC RN

 

Radio Adelaide - Behind The Screens interview with Margot Nash
 

RRR Margot Nash on Film Buffs Forecast

 

The Silences 2SCR Real radio - Margot Nash interview with Jess Kalijman

 

3CR Annie McLoughlin The Silences Margot Nash 

The Movie Pack #16 - Interview with Margot Nash (Writer/Director/Academic) at MIFF 1 hour

Pod cast interview with Margot Nash at MIFF

Radio NZ Nights interview 

13th Floor New Zealand radio interview and transcript

 

Memoir with Margot Nash - Writers Block Plains FM Christchurch NZ

Interview with Margot Nash and chat about the cinematic memoir 'The Silences', 27 min Deadlines & Poetry

 

RELATED LINK

The First House and The Hop Farm. by Margot Nash
Chapter 3, Page 31 in Locating Suburbia: memory, place, creativity

Edited by Paula Hamilton and Paul Ashton, 2013

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