Perth Words… exploring possibilities.

What a year 2015 was for Australian cinema. Box office records were smashed thanks to Mad Max: Fury Road, George Miller’s contemporary interpretation of his 1979 classic, and Jocelyn Moorhouse’s The Dressmaker. Each film was headlined by international heavyweights including Tom Hardy, Charlize Theron and Kate Winslet respectively.

It was a massive year for indi-filmaking in Australia too and that’s what the Cinema Australia team is most proud of. We watched from the front row as director Nicole Ma and her collaborators collected the $100,000 CinéfestOz Film Prize – one of Australian cinema’s most prestigious awards – for their passionately raw documentary Putuparri and the Rainmakers. What a true feat for our industry. They were up against worthy contenders including Simon Stone’s The Daughter and Paul Ireland’s incredible Pawno.

But that was last year, and from the look of things this year is going to be even better. It took us a…

2015 was the year I submitted my PhD and the year I intended to read ‘differently.’ I wanted to step out of my comfort zone by reading writers I had never read, or had not read for a long time. For several years now, my focus, while reading fiction and memoir, has been to read Australian women, followed closely by Indian and Iranian women. I thought I should make an extra effort to read more books by men, especially men of colour. I decided to make 2015 the year of reading more of the world, particularly because I knew I would be attending the Edinburgh Writers Festival in August.

I started the year by reading four American and one Canadian writer. Teju Cole’s Open Cityis about a Nigerian doctor who walks the streets of Manhattan, seemingly aimlessly, and encounters his past and present lives. A meditation on identity, race…

Wishing Stones

New Year’s Eve is one of the most significant days of the year and I can remember practically of them from when I was very young. That New Year’s Eve party that we had when I was twelve ~ I’ll never know if the midnight kiss was a ‘real’ kiss ~ I’m sure it was. It has to have been. Neil Diamond was big that year but it was posters of  Jimi Hendrix that adorned the walls and looked great through the dim light of the bulbs my brother painted dark red.

Starting work as a Pantry Girl in a Dublin Hospital on a freeeeezing cold New Year’s Eve in 1979 and being ticked off severely for parking my bike in the Reception area ~ what else was I to do with it??

The New Year’s Eve in 1980 which marked the last day that my beloved boyfriend…

I don’t really do New Year Resolutions but one etched its way into my consciousness the other day. I was out at the beach with hard rain belting off my cheeks in the mad wind. I had my head down battling along and when I looked up I saw a parting in the clouds and all of a sudden the whole place lit up for a few moments to reveal a blue sea, golden sand, green fields, coppery cliffs …..

Nature was smiling warmly; that’s the only way I can describe it and it made me feel so good to be there to witness it.

Nature smiles warmly lots of the time. I know I don’t smile half enough BUT I’m determined to try and change that from here on in.

A Warm Smile from Co. Waterford.

I’ve been thinking about all this for a few days now and these…