FRIENDS WITH BENEFITS: THE MAIKE BROCHHAUS INTERVIEW.

For Maike Brochhaus, sexuality in cinema is due for some redefining. An advocate of pro-sex feminism who lectures on the role of pornography in art history, the German filmmaker has directed a contemporary sex comedy called Schnick Schnack Schnuck (the title a Teutonic variation of ‘Scissors Paper Rock’). In the frank and fearless film, a group of 20-something friends deal with life and love while frequently indulging in what 20-somethings do best; the sex is full penetration, the scenarios designed to convey character and drive plot but also question the nature of audience reaction. Brochhaus seems to have tapped into a groundswell of like-minded support for real-world/real-people sex within a conventional narrative. In 2015, she won the prestigious Best Director honour at Berlin’s PornFilmFestival; last week, Schnick Schnack Schnuck won the Audience Award at the Kinky Film Festival in New York City. From her base in the city district of Kalk in Cologne, Maike Brochhaus spoke to SCREEN-SPACE about the daunting mission she faces in changing the contemporary view of sex on film….

(Pictured, above; front row - producer Sören Störung and Brochhaus, with cast members)

SCREEN-SPACE: What did you set out to achieve with Schnick Schnack Schnuck?

Brochhaus: Sören (Störung, producer) and I always liked those classic 70s porn flicks. They are fun to watch, with great music, a little naive and silly but still kind of hot and honest. After watching a lot of them, with Sören or a couple of girlfriends or at the PornFilmFestival in Berlin, we started asking ourselves, ‘Why don't they make 'em like that anymore?’ So we decided to do something about it. Most of the 70s humour was plain sexist, which can be fun if you look at it now because it's so old, but we didn't want that in our film. So we tried to find a way to capture the spirit but with a fresh, modern feel to it.

SCREEN-SPACE: There is a compelling honesty about the sex your camera captures. Why do you think the sensation of watching your actors have sex is very different from the reaction one experiences with ‘mainstream’ pornography?

Brochhaus (pictured, right): Back in 2013, I crowd-funded a documentary called häppchenweise, in which six real people around the age of 30 get drunk and play spin-the-bottle. I wanted to see if they would have sex in front of the camera without forcing them. I called it a "post-pornographic experiment". We ended up with one shy and very harmless sex-scene, which I really liked. It was so honest! Schnick Schnack Schnuck is the first scripted film we’ve made, and I wanted to have amateur actors in unscripted sex scenes as well. The situations leading to sex were of course scripted, but not the actual sex. We just let them do whatever they liked for how long they wanted. This comes with some risks, because you never know what's going to happen, but I'm very happy with the result.

SCREEN-SPACE: Another point of difference is the range of sexual acts that your cast presented you with. Is the willingness to experiment with the sexual experience common to the generation represented in the film?

Brochhaus: I know women and men who live deliberately adventurous and/or promiscuous lives. They talk openly about their desires, experiences and problems, which is a very healthy thing. I wanted to show a little of that in a happy and relaxed way. But there are also friends of mine feeling very insecure about themselves, their bodies and sex in general. And I feel like mainstream porn is not helping at all. In fact, it can lead to a lot of pressure. So in Schnick Schnack Schnuck, you don't get to see muscular androids working out, just some slightly hairy people having fun.

SCREEN-SPACE: What exactly is the director’s role when staging such intimate moments? What techniques do you apply when shooting sex scenes?

Brochhaus: We essentially came up with three simple rules - show individuals rather than just interacting bodies; show real female pleasure; and, don't be afraid of a flaccid penis. We shot the sex scenes with two cameras, a sound guy, the performers and I. We talked about what they would and would not like to do during the shoot and I asked them if I'm allowed to give them some simple directives, like move an arm a little or stuff like that. (Pictured, above; Brochhaus on-set, with Störung)

SCREEN-SPACE: I love the film's notion of ‘Pornotopia’! A world in which sex exists unburdened by any negative connotations or social stigma; where it just ‘is’, like in a porn film. Can such a state of being ever really exist?

Brochhaus: Unfortunately, I don't think so. That's why I want to remind the viewers that they are still watching a porn flick. In Pornotopia, sex is always an answer and able to solve all kinds of complex problems. In reality you have to deal with so many more things. It couldn't hurt if we ease up a little, though.

SCREEN-SPACE: In broader terms, why is there not a film genre that allows for the frank portrayal of real sex within a conventional narrative? Why do you think that, despite films like Shortbus and 9 Songs, actual sex in mainstream plots remains a taboo?

Brochhaus: This is a question I could talk about for hours. I think part of it comes from our Christian background, which always tabooed sex for pleasure. Its influence is getting weaker, but it's still powerful. Sex remains something a lot of people don't like to watch, especially with other people in a cinema. I always find it strange that fighting and killing seems to make people much less uncomfortable than sex and dealing with emotions. Another big thing is obviously sexism. Over centuries there were men trying to restrict female sexual development because they were afraid of it. Pornography was created by men for men; women were only tools for their pleasure. Nowadays, there are even women who have adapted to this all-male view on sex, and that needs to be changed. And I'm happy it is changing right now! You can feel enormous fear if you read anonymous men commenting online on feminism and women commenting on pornography. There is part of men who are deeply afraid of dealing with female pleasure but there's no need to be afraid. Men and women think a lot about sex, that's a fact, and I think we should talk about it. I don't think it's healthy for an individual nor for society to suppress it or let mainstream-porn and advertising tell us how we have to do it. So let's put real sex back into film and enjoy it! (Pictured, above; leads Jana Sue Zuckerberg, as Emmi, and Felix Anderson, as Felix)

Watch the trailer here (NSFW Warning - Explicit Sexual Content)

WATER WORLD: THE ANGIE DAVIS INTERVIEW.

From her home in the Byron Bay hinterland, Angie Davis has reached across oceans and continents to tell the story of Lobitos and its people. The Peruvian coastal village, its self-sustained emergence from under the shadow of ‘big oil’ and the surfing culture that has helped reform the region’s innate strength are examined in Double Barrel, the journalist-turned-filmmaker’s picturesque and deeply humanistic documentary.

In the US to support the festival rollout of her debut long-form work before returning home for the Australian premiere on February 27, Davis (pictured, above) spoke at length to SCREEN-SPACE about her love for the Lobitos community and how their struggle has inspired her, creatively and intellectually… 

What made the culture and people of Lobitos so alluring to you?

The people of Lobitos live a simplistic lifestyle without the modern comforts that we are accustomed to in the West. The rawness of north Peru’s coastal regions make for a number of complexities, such as a dramatic lack of rain, clean drinking water, and fertile soil. The locals are dependent on the ocean for food sources, yet the oil industry combined with commercial overfishing has significantly affected the fish stocks. Local fishermen have to venture further out to sea, in small boats or handmade balsa rafts at night, to hook a decent catch, which translates to greater running costs. I respect the local fishing community for enduring such hardships, while living with big smiles on their faces. And now the son’s of fishermen from the area are getting into surfing and living their lives around the tides and swells. It is this ocean-inspired lifestyle with the backdrop of the raw Peruvian desert that drew me to the area. 

How has the emergence of a modern surf culture integrated with the traditions of the township?

It hasn’t been so seamless. Lobitos was created as an oil town 100 years ago by BP, became one of the richest towns in Peru, and then fell to ruins when the lefts took power in the 60s, expelling all foreign oil companies from the country. In the 90s, the beaches attracted the affluent surfers from Lima who built hostels and surf lodges straight onto the shoreline, which wasn’t exactly welcomed by the existing community who lived back off the ocean a few blocks inland. Surfing has definitely put Lobitos on the map, both domestically and internationally, but the rate of development is alarming. A combination of profit-driven objectives and an ignorant lack of knowledge about how delicate sand-bottom surf breaks are to the movements of sand, tides and wind (means) overdevelopment on the beachfront can lead to the complete destruction of the town’s primary profitable resource - the waves (pictured, right; Davis with environmental advocate and big wave surfer Harold Koechlin and an Andean local). 

Double Barrel balances a human-interest story, environmental/social issues and sports travelogue elements. How did you reconcile your objectivity of a journalist and empathy of a social commentator?

This story was close to my heart. I started writing humanitarian journals for Amnesty International and throwing fundraisers for Surfrider Foundation from when I was 18. I was a surfer with a burning desire to travel and soon recognized a link between great waves being located in underprivileged regions and wanted to explore that more. I was working on a luxurious surf travel piece when I found myself in Peru, but abandoned that story when I saw first-hand that Lobitos was not ready for an influx of wealthy surf tourists. I decided that a film would give Lobitos a chance to move forward more sustainably and challenge audiences to consider their role in the rise and fall of surf communities, or any developing communities, worldwide.

Which filmmakers inspired you? 

I grew up with Taylor Steele’s surf movies. My interview with him on his film Sipping Jetstreams was my first published magazine piece, and I watched him evolve as a filmmaker from action-packed surf films to more travel-inspiring cinematic ‘journey’ pieces. Taylor was a great mentor on Double Barrel. In the end I wanted to make a surf film with ‘everyday’ people that everyone could relate to, with inspiring travel cinematography supporting a story that inspires hope. Too often environmental films finish with that feeling of “wow, I have no idea what I can do to help save the world.” Double Barrel highlights marine environment protection initiatives like the Juntos Por Las Playas Del Norte, a project that was inspired by our efforts making the film. 

The impact of industry on a population and their natural habitat is key to Double Barrel. How did your experiences living in Japan at a time of enormous hardship influence the film?

The Japanese disaster in 2011 was devastating. After the earthquake, we were forced to evacuate for what started as one night but eventually turned into about three months of uncertain life on the road. Nothing could prepare you for living through something like that. The aftershocks were constant and powerful, the constant threat of tsunami was exhausting, not to mention the unknown consequences of the Fukushima fallout. As someone who surfed, swam or walked alongside the ocean daily, and with a one-year-old toddler and being pregnant at the time, the entire experience was life changing. When I first visited north Peru and saw the aging refineries and platforms so close to the shore, the thought of what could happen brought up so much pain inside of me. My experience in Japan made me feel there was an urgency to make this film. I couldn’t bare to see another place I love and the people who inhabit it become so devastated by the consequences of building industry right on the coast. Surviving an event like Fukushima stays with you forever, but it has to be taken as an opportunity to grow and evolve from the experience. 

What are your thoughts on ‘film’ as a force for change? How would you define the relationship between your artistic vision for Double Barrel and the message you had to impart? 

Until I went to Peru and had the idea to make Double Barrel, I had never desired to be a filmmaker. I loved storytelling through writing and producing. Taylor had done a short film for Charity Water in Ethiopia, and helped raise $1million for fresh water wells. I was blown away by how much documentary film could appeal to a global audience, and actually impact developing communities. I knew I had to have a script and storyboard, so that it had structure and context. I didn’t really know a thing about filmmaking, but I knew I wanted the film to be of the highest quality possible, and placed myself around geniuses in their fields that were also passionate about the project. Dustin Hollick was a surfing ambassador for Patagonia who had made surf films growing up in Tassie, including a film ‘El Gringo’ which had sequences from Peru, so I went to him with the script knowing I could trust him. I could not have made the film without him. Dustin recognized my emotion to the place and knew that had to be included in the film, resulting in a transparency that tells the story as it truly happened. Cinematographer Tim Wreyford had previously shot Mick Fanning’s ‘Missing’ film and we shot the first half of the film together. Then I returned with Alejandro Berger who is one of the world’s best water photographers (pictured, above; Davis, left, whith her key crew members). I wanted to combine the format of surf films with longer music-driven surf and travel montages that would give a real sense of the place. We learnt a lot of lessons the hard way, and threw in a lot of our own money to get this off the ground, but the response so far has been incredible. I am very proud of everyone for sticking with it.

A Switchboard Media production, Double Barrel has its Australian premiere in Byron Bay on February 27. Ticket and venue information available here.

THE POWER OF ONE: THE PHILLIP VIANNINI INTERVIEW

With his director Jonathan Taggart, producer Phillip Viannini spent two years documenting the off-grid existence of the sustainable communities in some of Canada’s most extreme wilderness. The result is Life Off Grid, a picturesque and profound insight into the commitment needed to live disconnected from the accepted fossil fuel-driven culture of western society. A Professor and Research Chair at Royal Roads University in Victoria, Canada, Viannini (pictured, below) spoke to SCREEN-SPACE about the vast range of personalities his lens captured, the harsh realities of off-grid living and what Australia can do to further the off-grid cause…

When did you first become aware of the Lasqueti Island ‘Off Grid’ movement, whose residents are central to Life Off Grid?

I visited an off-grid home for the first time in 2008 whilst researching small island lifestyles and I became fascinated by the idea of living in such a different home. Where I live, the Salish Sea archipelago, many islands are off-grid and even those on-grid make use of renewable energy and practice sustainable living. I was first exposed to the Lasqueti community by a student of mine who, incidentally, now lives in Australia. When Jon and I travelled to Lasqueti for the first time I had already visited a few homes on Vancouver Island.  

Via beautiful widescreen images, you capture some extreme locales at their most photogenic. How did you settle on the aesthetics of your film?

Jon and I discussed the aesthetics of the film throughout our travels. We operated on a very small budget and, like many off-gridders--we had to make virtue out of necessity and sought beauty in simplicity. Everything we needed had to be carried by us, on our backs and hands. To get places, we had to bike, canoe, kayak, skidoo, walk, or fly small bush planes. We often stayed at off-grid cabins that we rented for the duration of our travels. Recharging batteries at the end of the day wasn't always easy so we had to carry as little equipment as we needed to recharge. So what you see is the result of a ‘Spartan’ aesthetics: one that would be as mundane as the images and sounds we captured, and therefore one as unassuming and genuine. That's why we have no aerial scenes, no camera tricks, no flashy stuff. We just let our eyes and ears dwell on what was before us--whether that was a live tree or a piece of firewood--and let that come to life. 

How has off-grid living benefitted the Lasqueti community in a ‘human’ sense? How has this living improved their outlook on life?

Practicing an off-grid lifestyle teaches anyone that life isn't easy. It's not meant to be easy. The notion that easy living, extreme comfort, and constant convenience are somehow a modern right--a cornerstone of consumer society and culture--makes absolutely no sense when you live off-grid. Whatever you get, you have to work for. And that has an interesting effect: work's results are more pleasant, easier to enjoy. Anyone who grows their own food will tell you the same thing: vegetables and fruits taste better when you work hard to grow them yourself. Living off grid is not simple, at all, but it allows you to enjoy and cultivate the simple pleasures that your labour yields. 

Has experiencing such commitment to the cause changed your views on the sustainable, off-grid culture?

It has taught both Jon and I that everything has a cost. Before I began this project I would give no thought whatsoever to simple domestic acts such as using a toaster or a microwave. Now I know how many watts/hours those appliances draw. And I am aware of the sources of electricity that generate those watts. I can tell you the precise dams that feed my house. And I know what those dams do to the local ecology.

Some of your subjects are intellectuals, academic types, who have embraced sustainable living philosophies largely because they are financially able to do so. Is off-grid ever going to be an option for the layman?

I can only recall one academic we interviewed. The reality is that most of the 200 or so people we spoke with are carefully self-taught. They're DIY craftsmen and craftswomen who have taught themselves how to wire their house or collect water or build a compost toilet. Some of these people were financially stable. Others lived below the poverty line. Most were middle class. Off-grid living is an option for anyone who is willing to (learn), regardless of income. If you want 50 coastal acres in British Columbia and require a 4 KW/h system to answer your every domestic wish then you'll need a substantial amount of capital. (But) if you can live on a 10acre lot in the prairies and can get by with less than 1 KW/h, you can still live below the poverty line but have richer existence than most people who live on the grid.

Australia seems ideally suited to off-grid acceptance. What are the steps that government bodies and commercial interests can take to inspire action?

Having just visited Tasmania, I was impressed by the solar panels I saw everywhere. I know how much Australians have worked to make their water consumption sustainable. Like Canada, Australia has a densely concentrated population in a few regions and beyond that, there are massive rural and remote lands where the grid simply isn't an option. With the acceptance of a couple of provinces, Canada does little to encourage renewable energy generation, yet it still subsidizes and promotes fossil fuel harvesting. Australia could learn from Canada's bad example and invest more, much more than Canada can possibly do, in the biggest source of energy it has: the sun. Last time I checked on my travels, there was a lot of that.

Life Off Grid will be released in Australia via TUGG Distribution on simultaneous theatrical and VOD platforms on February 4.

OSCAR'S REVENGE: ANGRY MEN LEAD 2016 NOMINATIONS RACE

The Revenant and Mad Max Fury Road took boasting honours after the nominations for the 2016 Academy Awards were revealed at the Beverly Hilton Hotel in Los Angeles at 5.30am, PT.

Cheryl Boone, President of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, actor John Krasinki and directors Ang Lee and Guillermo del Toro announced contenders for the 88^th annual Oscar feting, to be hosted by Chris Rock on February 28.

Alejandro G. Inaritu’s survival epic led the congested field with 12 nominations, including Film, Director, Best Actor for Leonardo Di Caprio and Best Supporting Actor for Tom Hardy. Mad Max Fury Road, Australian director George Miller’s long-in-gestation reboot of his iconic ‘road warrior’ anti-hero, earned 10 nominations.

The wide-open race for industry top honours led to a Best Picture category of eight nominees, with The Revenant and Mad Max Fury Road duking it out with The Martian (7 nominations); Spotlight (6); Bridge of Spies (6); The Big Short (5); Room (4); and, Brooklyn (3). Despite earning 6 nominations in key creative categories, Todd Haynes’ Carol was a Best Picture no-show, as was the year’s biggest commercial success, JJ Abram’s Star Wars The Force Awakens, the space opera up for John Williams' score and 4 tech categories.

20^th Century Fox earned studio bragging rights, with a whopping 26 nominations across all categories; that figure includes 6 shared with Disney, who took second spot with 14 mentions. Warner Bros (11), new indie powerhouse A24 (7) and Oscar veterans The Weinstein Company (9) were next in line, although Carol’s failure to secure a Best Picture nomination does mean brothers Harvey and Bob don’t have a dog in that fight for the first time since 2007.

The most prominent no-show is director Ridley Scott, shut-out of the Best Director race despite across-the-board attention for The Martian. Also feeling unloved would be Fury Road's Best Actress hopeful Charlize Theron; Paul Dano (Supporting Actor sure thing a month ago for Love & Mercy); Michael Keaton (early Actor front-runner for Spotlight); Aaron Sorkin (a Golden Globe winner and WGA nominee for Steve Jobs); Kristen Stewart (Supporting Actress Cesar winner for Clouds of Sils Maria); Jacob Tremblay (the breakout star of Room); and, Johnny Depp (denied a sentimental Best Actor slot for Black Mass). Others long in the face this morning are Steven Spielberg and Tom Hanks (Bridge of Spies); director Alex Gibney (Scientology doco Going Clear); 99 Homes writer/director Ramin Bahrani and star Michael Shannon; Original Song hopeful ‘See You Again’, from Furious 7; the visual and sound effects supervisors on 2015's other survival epic, Baltasar Kormakur's Everest; and, the creative teams behind animated hits The Good Dinosaur and The Peanuts Movie.

The ‘Selma Snubbing’ of 2015 and the editorial outrage that followed did not seem to have any noticeable impact on Academy members; no African-American actors feature in any of the acting categories, despite the likes of Will Smith (Concussion), Michael B Jordan (Creed), Idris Elba (Beasts of No Nation) and Samuel L Jackson (The Hateful Eight) all in the running, as were urban-themed pics Straight Outta Compton (1 nod, for Original Screenplay) and Tangerine.

The full list of 2016 Oscars nominees:

Best motion picture of the year:
The Big Short - Producers: Brad Pitt, Dede Gardner and Jeremy Kleiner
Bridge of Spies- Producers: Steven Spielberg, Marc Platt and Kristie Macosko Krieger
Brooklyn - Producers: Finola Dwyer and Amanda Posey
Mad Max Fury Road - Producers: Doug Mitchell and George Miller
The Martian - Producers: Simon Kinberg, Ridley Scott, Michael Schaefer and MarkHuffam
The Revenant - Producers: Arnon Milchan, Steve Golin, Alejandro G. Inarritu, Mary Parent and Keith Redmon
Room - Producer: Ed Guiney
Spotlight: - Producers: Michael Sugar, Steve Golin, Nicole Rocklin and Blye Pagon Faust

Performance by an actor in a leading role:
Bryan Cranston in “Trumbo”
Matt Damon in “The Martian”
Leonardo DiCaprio in “The Revenant”
Michael Fassbender in “Steve Jobs”
Eddie Redmayne in “The Danish Girl” 

Performance by an actress in a leading role:
Cate Blanchett in “Carol”
Brie Larson in “Room”
Jennifer Lawrence in “Joy”
Charlotte Rampling in “45 Years”
Saoirse Ronan in “Brooklyn”

Performance by an actor in a supporting role:
Christian Bale in “The Big Short”
Tom Hardy in “The Revenant”
Mark Ruffalo in “Spotlight”
Mark Rylance in “Bridge of Spies”
Sylvester Stallone in “Creed” 

Performance by an actress in a supporting role:
Jennifer Jason Leigh in “The Hateful Eight”
Rooney Mara in “Carol”
Rachel McAdams in “Spotlight”
Alicia Vikander in “The Danish Girl”
Kate Winslet in “Steve Jobs” 

Achievement in directing:
“The Big Short” Adam McKay
“Mad Max: Fury Road” George Miller
“The Revenant” Alejandro G. Iñárritu
“Room” Lenny Abrahamson
“Spotlight” Tom McCarthy 

Adapted screenplay:
“The Big Short” Screenplay by Charles Randolph and Adam McKay
“Brooklyn” Screenplay by Nick Hornby
“Carol” Screenplay by Phyllis Nagy
“The Martian” Screenplay by Drew Goddard
“Room” Screenplay by Emma Donoghue

Original screenplay:
“Bridge of Spies” Written by Matt Charman and Ethan Coen & Joel Coen
“Ex Machina” Written by Alex Garland
“Inside Out” Screenplay by Pete Docter, Meg LeFauve, Josh Cooley; Original story by Pete Docter, Ronnie del Carmen
“Spotlight” Written by Josh Singer & Tom McCarthy
“Straight Outta Compton” Screenplay by Jonathan Herman and Andrea Berloff; Story by S. Leigh Savidge & Alan Wenkus and Andrea Berloff

Best animated feature film of the year:
“Anomalisa” Charlie Kaufman, Duke Johnson and Rosa Tran
“Boy and the World” Alê Abreu
“Inside Out” Pete Docter and Jonas Rivera
“Shaun the Sheep Movie” Mark Burton and Richard Starzak
“When Marnie Was There” Hiromasa Yonebayashi and Yoshiaki Nishimura 

Best documentary feature:
“Amy” Asif Kapadia and James Gay-Rees
“Cartel Land” Matthew Heineman and Tom Yellin
“The Look of Silence” Joshua Oppenheimer and Signe Byrge Sørensen
“What Happened, Miss Simone?” Liz Garbus, Amy Hobby and Justin Wilkes
“Winter on Fire: Ukraine’s Fight for Freedom” Evgeny Afineevsky and Den Tolmor

Best foreign language film of the year:
“Embrace of the Serpent” Colombia
“Mustang” France
“Son of Saul” Hungary
“Theeb” Jordan
“A War” Denmark

Achievement in cinematography:
“Carol” Ed Lachman
“The Hateful Eight” Robert Richardson
“Mad Max: Fury Road” John Seale
“The Revenant” Emmanuel Lubezki
“Sicario” Roger Deakins 

Achievement in costume design:
“Carol” Sandy Powell
“Cinderella” Sandy Powell
“The Danish Girl” Paco Delgado
“Mad Max: Fury Road” Jenny Beavan
“The Revenant” Jacqueline West

Best documentary short subject:
“Body Team 12” David Darg and Bryn Mooser
“Chau, beyond the Lines” Courtney Marsh and Jerry Franck
“Claude Lanzmann: Spectres of the Shoah” Adam Benzine
“A Girl in the River: The Price of Forgiveness” Sharmeen Obaid-Chinoy
“Last Day of Freedom” Dee Hibbert-Jones and Nomi Talisman

Achievement in film editing:
“The Big Short” Hank Corwin
“Mad Max: Fury Road” Margaret Sixel
“The Revenant” Stephen Mirrione
“Spotlight” Tom McArdle
“Star Wars: The Force Awakens” Maryann Brandon and Mary Jo Markey

Achievement in makeup and hairstyling:
“Mad Max: Fury Road” Lesley Vanderwalt, Elka Wardega and Damian Martin
“The 100-Year-Old Man Who Climbed out the Window and Disappeared” Love Larson and Eva von Bahr
“The Revenant” Siân Grigg, Duncan Jarman and Robert Pandini

Achievement in music written for motion pictures (Original score):
“Bridge of Spies” Thomas Newman
“Carol” Carter Burwell
“The Hateful Eight” Ennio Morricone
“Sicario” Jóhann Jóhannsson
“Star Wars: The Force Awakens” John Williams 

Achievement in music written for motion pictures (Original song):
“Earned It” from “Fifty Shades of Grey”
Music and Lyric by Abel Tesfaye, Ahmad Balshe, Jason Daheala Quenneville and Stephan Moccio
“Manta Ray” from “Racing Extinction”
Music by J. Ralph and Lyric by Antony Hegarty
“Simple Song #3” from “Youth”
Music and Lyric by David Lang
“Til It Happens To You” from “The Hunting Ground”
Music and Lyric by Diane Warren and Lady Gaga
“Writing’s On The Wall” from “Spectre”
Music and Lyric by Jimmy Napes and Sam Smith 

Achievement in production design:
“Bridge of Spies” Production Design: Adam Stockhausen; Set Decoration: Rena DeAngelo and Bernhard Henrich
“The Danish Girl” Production Design: Eve Stewart; Set Decoration: Michael Standish
“Mad Max: Fury Road” Production Design: Colin Gibson; Set Decoration: Lisa Thompson
“The Martian” Production Design: Arthur Max; Set Decoration: Celia Bobak
“The Revenant” Production Design: Jack Fisk; Set Decoration: Hamish Purdy 

Best animated short film:
“Bear Story” Gabriel Osorio and Pato Escala
“Prologue” Richard Williams and Imogen Sutton
“Sanjay’s Super Team” Sanjay Patel and Nicole Grindle
“We Can’t Live without Cosmos” Konstantin Bronzit
“World of Tomorrow” Don Hertzfeldt

Best live action short film:
“Ave Maria” Basil Khalil and Eric Dupont
“Day One” Henry Hughes
“Everything Will Be Okay (Alles Wird Gut)” Patrick Vollrath
“Shok” Jamie Donoughue
“Stutterer” Benjamin Cleary and Serena Armitage 

Achievement in sound editing:
“Mad Max: Fury Road” Mark Mangini and David White
“The Martian” Oliver Tarney
“The Revenant” Martin Hernandez and Lon Bender
“Sicario” Alan Robert Murray
“Star Wars: The Force Awakens” Matthew Wood and David Acord

Achievement in sound mixing:
“Bridge of Spies” Andy Nelson, Gary Rydstrom and Drew Kunin
“Mad Max: Fury Road” Chris Jenkins, Gregg Rudloff and Ben Osmo
“The Martian” Paul Massey, Mark Taylor and Mac Ruth
“The Revenant” Jon Taylor, Frank A. Montaño, Randy Thom and Chris Duesterdiek
“Star Wars: The Force Awakens” Andy Nelson, Christopher Scarabosio and Stuart Wilson 

Achievement in visual effects:
“Ex Machina” Andrew Whitehurst, Paul Norris, Mark Ardington and Sara Bennett
“Mad Max: Fury Road” Andrew Jackson, Tom Wood, Dan Oliver and Andy Williams
“The Martian” Richard Stammers, Anders Langlands, Chris Lawrence and Steven Warner
“The Revenant” Rich McBride, Matthew Shumway, Jason Smith and Cameron Waldbauer
“Star Wars: The Force Awakens” Roger Guyett, Patrick Tubach, Neal Scanlan and Chris Corbould

PREVIEW: 2016 BRISBANE UNDERGROUND FILM FESTIVAL

To inspire her 2016 programming choices, Brisbane Underground Film Festival (BUFF) director Nina Riddel has drawn upon the wisdom of alternative culture icon John Waters. “I like the word ‘underground’,” the legendary film maker once said, “’independent’ carries a stigma of whininess. ‘Underground’ means a good time.” And the 6^th edition of BUFF, launching February 5 at the New Farm Cinemas in Queensland's state capital, ensures all manner of ‘good times’, with films offering unique riffs on cannibalism, baby-making, white-trash auteur cinema, dismemberment and non-sequel sequels…

“You're likely to be challenged, be it viscerally or intellectually,” says Riddel, a Brisbane native who now calls New York City home. “Underground consists of both high-brow, (such as) experimental film and video art, and low-brow exploitation & amateur cinema, but avoids the palatable middle where most entertainment resides. I would say that most films (at BUFF) this year consist of a combination of both.”

Since the inaugural festival in 2010, the festival’s reputation has helped to secure such international counter-culture classics as Dogtooth, Hobo With a Shotgun, White Reindeer and You Are What You Eat. The line-up has most often reflected the modern definition of underground cinema as a decentralised force. “It's not just a scene in New York or Chicago, and digital technology has encouraged way more untrained, gung-ho people to make work which I find very exciting,” says Riddel. “I think the internet has changed which boundaries are still there to push, but people will always have something - often something truly odd - to say. BUFF is a place for that to be heard.” (Pictured, right; Nina Riddel)

Although her festival’s scope for admissions is borderless, Riddel is firm in her belief that the event reflects its origins. “BUFF's identity is defined by the film scene (of Brisbane),” she explains. Her programming ethos reflects, “what local filmmakers are doing, what features are missing from cinemas here that might be uniquely relevant to our political or artistic landscape, and my own personal taste.” She has established a strong network with the programmers of respected underground film events such as those in Boston, Sydney and Chicago (“We don't always play the same movies but we share the same interests”) and determinedly networks with key figures to ensure her sessions bring the latest in alternative film visions. “Underground film people are so approachable that you can see a legendary movie, idolize its creator, and very quickly be getting drunk with that person and seeing pictures of their baby on Facebook,” she points out.

The six features filling the bill over the 3-day 2016 edition represent the dark corners and individualistic artistry of independent cinema. Opening night honours go to Todd Rohal’s Uncle Kent 2, in which star Kent Osborne (as himself) desperately searches for someone to love his pitch for a sequel to Joe Swanberg’s little-seen 2011 film, while contemplating ‘The Singularity Apocalypse’. “It's silly, it’s fun,” enthuses Riddel, “the strangest, most exciting film I've seen in a long time, and you don't have to have seen Uncle Kent; I haven't!” Hollywood outcast Adam Rifkin (The Dark Backward; Detroit Rock City) directs the grimy, ‘Dogma’-esque trailer-park black comedy, Guiseppe Makes a Movie; Chilean auteur Sebastian Silva (The Maid; Magic Magic) helms an against-type Kristen Wiig in the NYC-set Nasty Baby; Onur Turkel’s Applesauce features Dylan Baker as the talkback jock being stalked by an unhinged fan (Says Riddel, “It feels like a smart New York comedy which happens to contain a lot of severed limbs.”)

Perhaps most confronting for Brisbane patrons will be writer/director Caroline Golum’s debut feature A Feast of Man, a searing social satire that asks ‘How far would you go to inherit a billionaire’s fortune?’ (hint: the answer is in the film’s title.) “It illustrates how utterly devious upper-class people can be,” says Riddel of the film, which has its Australian premiere at BUFF. Closing out the festival on Sunday 7^th will be Gabriel Ripstein’s 600 Miles, a tough two-hander starring Tim Roth as a captured ATF officer and Krystan Ferrer as the small-scale drug runner delivering the agent to his drug lord boss.

Australian talent comes to the fore in the short-film selections, with works from Matthew Victor Pastor (Valentine’s Day, 6 mins); Sam Sexton (Drack, 7 mins); Riley Maher (Your Summer Dream, 4 mins); and, co-directors Sam Rogers and Nick Harrold (Prey for Rain, 7 mins). The other short slots are filled by New Zealand director Natasha Cantwell’s Lauren (2 mins) and the VFX showcase Double Blind No 1 (2 mins; pictured, top) from the LA-based collective of Zenon Kohler, Jasper St Aubyn West, Ian Anderson, Ricky Marks and Raoul Teague.

By definition, ‘underground films’ rarely come with marketing budgets or high profiles attached. But Riddel is adamant that is precisely why such films need the theatrical exposure that BUFF offers. “I like undiscovered gems, movies that need help getting seen,” she says. “It's tempting to believe that the movies with huge marketing budgets and national releases are the only ones worth paying attention to. But there's a whole world of other stuff out there that's better, (made by) people excited to get their movies seen. It makes their work purer.”

Full ticket and venue information for the 2016 Brisbane Underground Film Festival can be found at the official website.