2024 Adelaide Film Festival Announces First Lineup Of Films
The annual festival returns in October with the world premiere of The Correspondent.
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Ahead of the Adelaide Film Festival’s (AFF) return, organisers have announced the first six films to feature at the annual event, including the world premiere of The Correspondent.
Held from Wednesday, October 23 to Sunday, November 3, the opening night kicks off with director Kriv Stenders’ The Correspondent, a film based on the true story of Australian war correspondent Peter Greste, who was arrested and jailed in Cairo, Egypt while working for broadcaster Al Jazeera in 2013. The flick stars Australian great Richard Roxburgh as Greste alongside Julian Maroun, Rahel Romahn, Mojean Aria and Yael Stone.
Stenders, Roxburgh, Greste and producer Carmel Travers will all be in town for the premiere on opening night at Piccadilly Cinemas, with the afterparty taking place at Hindley Street Music Hall.
“AFF is immensely proud to be presenting the World Premiere of The Correspondent. This is an important film about one of the most urgent issues of our time – freedom of the press – from some of Australia’s finest screen creatives. We look forward to warmly welcoming them to AFF,” Mat Kesting, AFF CEO & Creative Director said in a statement.
“We are also thrilled to be announcing a further five films in the 2024 program from the exciting new voices platformed at Cannes to new Australian feature films and documentaries, including the AFFIF film Songs Inside. The musical presentation at the Songs Inside screening promises to be a very special moment for all who attend. We are also looking forward to announcing our full program on September 17.”
Along with The Correspondent, five other films have been announced as part of the festival’s initial lineup.
All We Imagine as Light, which won the Grand Prix at this year’s Cannes Film Festival, is a romantic drama about two nurses living in Mumbai. The movie is directed by Payal Kapadia, who is being touted as a major new voice in world cinema.
Director Marielle Heller returns to the AFF with Nightbitch, a comedy horror starring Amy Adams as a stay-at-home mum whose life suddenly gets flipped upside down. It’s adapted from the highly successful novel of the same name by Rachel Yoder.
The first feature from director Shalom Almond, Songs Inside, will also make its world premiere at the AFF. The film follows First Nations singer and songwriter Nancy Bates as she leads a music program in prison as the group she is working with aims to perform with the Adelaide Symphony Orchestra.
Horror fans will be keen as mustard to catch Zak Hilditch’s We Bury the Dead, an apocalyptic thriller set in Tasmania. Daisy Ridley stars as a woman tasked with retrieving the bodies of the dead who is also looking for her missing husband. When she discovers many of the corpses they are burying aren’t dead, things take a turn for the weird.
The final film revealed as part of the first announcement is Steve McQueen’s much anticipated Blitz. The story follows the adventure of nine-year-old George (Elliott Heffernan) who is sent away by his mother Riat (Saoirse Ronan) to the English countryside during the bombing of London in World War II. Missing his mother and grandfather (Paul Weller), George attempts to make his way back to London, only to find himself in danger as his mother and grandfather frantically search for him.
The Adelaide Film Festival runs from Wednesday, October 23 – Sunday, November 3. The full program will be released on Tuesday, September 17. For more details regarding films, times and tickets, visit adelaidefilmfestival.org.
