Australian films win Berlin plaudits

[Shana A]

Australian films win Berlin plaudits

Stephanie Bunbury
February 23, 2010

http://www.theage.com.au/news/entertainment/film/articles/2010/02/22/1266687043307.html

AN AUSTRALIAN short film about a cross-dressing boy who wins a holiday resort beauty competition won the Crystal Bear for best short film in the Berlin Film Festival's children's section, Generation K-plus. A jury of children described Hannah Hilliard's Franswa Sharl as ''non-stop fun ... for a moment we forgot the world around us''.

Over on the Berlinale Talent Campus that offers support to new filmmakers, Australian Bryn Chainey won the campus' award for the best short film with Jonah and the Vicarious Nature of Homesickness. A jury of professional filmmakers praised the film, about a boy blasting away from his family in a home-made spaceship, for its ''truly creative inventiveness''.