22nd Festival 1975

The Festival presented a special ‘Salute to Australian Film’ and published a comprehensive illustrated booklet listing every feature film ever made in this country. Twenty-five famous Australian films – from The Sentimental Bloke to Wake in Fright – were presented in a special retrospective program.

The festival opened with the premiere of Ken Hannam’s Sunday Too Far Away – with a sheep-shearing demonstration in Market Street prior to the performance! In connection with the presentation of Miklos Jancso’s latest film Elektreia, two earlier Jancso films not previously seen here – Cantata and The Confrontation – were also shown; and there was a ‘midnight matinee’ of Mamoulian’s Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde.

Forty-four new features were included in the biggest-ever program to date: Robert Altman’s California Split, Hal Ashby’s Shampoo (with star/producer Warren Beatty in attendance) and John Schlesinger’s Day of the Locust (the Closing Night film) represented the USA; also screened were Luis Buñuel’s The Phantom of Liberty, Claude Chabrol’s Nada, George Franju’s Shadowman, Maurice Pialat’s The Mouth Agape, Yannick Bellon’s Jean’s Wife, Robert Enrico’s The Secret and Jacques Rivette’s Celina and Julie Go Boating (all France); Wim Wenders’ Alice in the Cities, Reinhard Hauff’s The Brutalisation of Franz Blum, Alexander Kluge’s Occasional Work of a Female Slave, Kluge’s and Edgar Reitz’ In Danger and Distress, Sinkel’s and Brustellin’s Lina Braake, Peter Lilienthal’s Professor Hofer (all West Germany); Jiri Tirl’s The Pistol (Sweden); Istvan Szabo’s 25 Fireman’s Street and Ferenc Kosa’s Snowfall (both Hungary); Ermanno Olmi’s The Circumstance, Marco Ferreri’s The Audience, the Taviani Brothers’ Allonsonfan and Michelangelo Antonioni’s The Passenger (all Italy); Dusan Makavejev’s international production Sweet Movie (Makavejev put in a characteristic appearance); Shahid Saless’ Still Life (Iran); Philippe Mora’s Brother Can You Spare A Dime? (Mora introduced it), Jack Hazan’s A Bigger Splash (UK) and Peter Smith’s A Private Enterprise (all UK); Frantisek Vlacil’s Lovers in the Year One (Czechoslovakia); Donald Brittain’s Dreamland and Michel Brault’s Les ordres (both Canada); Roland Verhavert’s The Conscript (Belgium); Masahiro Shinoda’s Himiko (Japan); Carlos Saura’s Cousin Angelica (Spain); Sergio Ricardo’s Night of the Scarecrow (Brazil); Eldar Shengelaya’s Romancers (USSR), Krsto Papic’s Village Performance of Hamlet (Yugoslavia); Wojiech Has’ The Sandglass (Poland); King Hu’s The Valiant Ones (Hong Kong – Hu attended the Festival); Arturo Ripstein’s The Holy Office (Mexico); Nikolai van der Heyde’s Help, the Doctor is Drowning (Netherlands); and Claude Gorretta’s Not as Bad as all That (Switzerland).

Shorts included: Sven Nykvist’s The Vocation; Alexander Ilie’s The Trap; Bruno Bozzetto’s Self-Service, Martha Coolidge’s Old-Fashioned Woman; Ben Lewin’s Dear Mr. Barber, I’d Like to Swim the Channel; Robin Lehman’s Sea Creatures, Don’t and Experimental; Kihachiro Kawamoto’s A Poet’s Life; Antoinette Starkiewicz’ Puttin’ on the Ritz; Zlatko Grgic’s Optimist Pessimist; Peter Pearson’s Along These Lines; Bruce Moir’s and Bob Kingsbury’s Mr. Symbol Man; Paul Driessen’s Cat’s Cradle; and Peter Foldes’ Hunger.