Two young girls sitting and playing in a sugarcane field
https://www.nfsa.gov.au/sites/default/files/video/poster_image02-2019/shifting_sands_grace_2_0.jpg

Shifting Sands – from Sand to Celluloid Continued

Shifting Sands – from Sand to Celluloid Continued

Short film initiative with First Nations filmmakers

A continuation of the ground-breaking Sand to Celluloid initiative, which helped start the careers of filmmakers including Warwick Thornton and Darlene Johnson, the Shifting Sands initiative received 60 applications and 10 projects were selected for a Visual Storytelling workshop. From there, six projects were selected for production. 

These projects included Tears by Ivan Sen (Mystery Road, Goldstone), My colour, your kind directed by Danielle MacLean (Redfern Now, Little J & Big Cuz), and My Bed Your Bed by Erica Glynn (She Who Must Be Obeyed)

Shifting Sands - My Bed Your Bed: Promise husband
NFSA-ID:
NFSA ID
370994
Year:
Year

In a night-time ceremony around a fire, a small girl is told she is promised to a husband. In the present day, the girl now a young woman soon to be married, Della (Urshula Yovich) packs her gear and climbs into a truck and reverses a few hundred metres to her new homestead.

Summary by Romaine Moreton

WARNING: Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander viewers are advised that the following program may contain images and/or audio of deceased persons
Shifting Sands - My Bed Your Bed: Pretty song
NFSA-ID:
NFSA ID
370994
Year:
Year

Hearing music, Della (Urshula Yovich) gets up and finds Alvin (Trevor Jamieson) playing guitar. She watches him before returning to the bedroom. Alvin smiles shyly. No words are said.

Summary by Romaine Moreton

WARNING: Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander viewers are advised that the following program may contain images and/or audio of deceased persons
Shifting Sands - My Bed Your Bed: Startled away
NFSA-ID:
NFSA ID
370994
Year:
Year

Della (Ursula Yovich) sits on the floor next to a guitar. Alvin (Trevor Jamieson) comes home, and quietly attempts to get on the swag with his promise wife. He climbs onto the swag beside her ever so carefully. Della stirs, startling Alvin, who disappears from the room with his guitar.

Summary by Romaine Moreton

WARNING: Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander viewers are advised that the following program may contain images and/or audio of deceased persons
Shifting Sands - My Colour, Your Kind: Rugged cross
NFSA-ID:
NFSA ID
370994
Year:
Year

The clip opens with billowing curtains, a statuette of Christ and the close-up of a young albino girl (Melissa Middleton). In flashback the young albino girl closes her eyes as her mother (Christine Palmer) smears her with mud. A cross crashes through a pane of glass, and the young girl is running towards a security fence.

Summary by Romaine Moreton

WARNING: Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander viewers are advised that the following program may contain images and/or audio of deceased persons
Shifting Sands - My Colour, Your Kind: Born into light
NFSA-ID:
NFSA ID
370994
Year:
Year

A young albino girl (Melissa Middleton) is walking along a desert road and a truck pulls up beside her. The driver (Rob Wenske) asks if she wants a lift. In flashback, a nun (Sylvia Merrick) reads from the bible and in the background two dark-skinned Aboriginal girls (Amanda Nardoo, Deanne Willets) are sweeping. The girls pause to take in the scene of the albino girl who appears to be the captive audience of the nun.

Summary by Romaine Moreton.

WARNING: Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander viewers are advised that the following program may contain images and/or audio of deceased persons
Shifting Sands - Passing Through: Roadside stop
NFSA-ID:
NFSA ID
370994
Year:
Year

The family pull up at a gas station. The children are sent off to the toilet. Margie (Margaret Harvey) spies two elders Bert Nandy (Bruce Oliver) and Uncle Sam (Gnarnayarrahe Waitarie) sitting in a shed across the road. Flashback; a young Margie (Llania Pender) skipping a hoop across the road. Present; Margie gets out of the car. She tells Charlie (Luke Elliot) she’s going for a yarn. Margie approaches the elders who introduce themselves. Charlie enters the shop. The two children Janaya (Janaya Pender) and Shannon (Shannon Elliot) are in an old corrugated toilet. They run out screaming. They run to their father in the shop.

Summary by Romaine Moreton

WARNING: Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander viewers are advised that the following program may contain images and/or audio of deceased persons
Shifting Sands - Passing Through: Hip hop-pety stew
NFSA-ID:
NFSA ID
370994
Year:
Year

Aida (Justine Saunders) comes out of the house to greet Margie (Margaret Harvey) and family Charlie (Luke Elliot), Shannon (Shannon Elliot) and Janaya (Janaya Pender). The family are served ‘hip hop-pety stew’. Margie tells them that they met Bert and Sam. Aunty tells them that those old fellas are dead.

Summary by Romaine Moreton

WARNING: Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander viewers are advised that the following program may contain images and/or audio of deceased persons
Shifting Sands - Promise: Big woman things
NFSA-ID:
NFSA ID
507912
Year:
Year

A young woman is mixing flour. Voice-over narration by her grandmother Gilladi (Sylvia Clarke) says her granddaughter Ngyamia (Ali Torres) asked her for this story. Flashback; a young Gilladi (Sabrina Sabaan) is given to her aunty (Annie Watson), who did not have children, to prepare her for her promise marriage.

Summary by Romaine Moreton

WARNING: Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander viewers are advised that the following program may contain images and/or audio of deceased persons
Shifting Sands - Promise: Visits from a promise
NFSA-ID:
NFSA ID
507912
Year:
Year

Granny telling her story to Ngyamia (Ali Torres) in the kitchen is intercut with the story played out in flashback. We see the young Gilladi (Sabrina Sabaan) led by her Aunty (Annie Watson) to meet her promise husband Waamba (Robert Watson). Granny tells that she was shame (embarrassed), and ran away. We see the young Gilladi visited by her promise husband and watching him working with cattle in the stockyard.

Summary by Romaine Moreton

WARNING: Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander viewers are advised that the following program may contain images and/or audio of deceased persons
Shifting Sands - Tears: Mish
NFSA-ID:
NFSA ID
370994
Year:
Year

A long dirt road stretches ahead. A watch is held up. Lena (Jamilla Frail) is walking ahead of Vaughn (Luke Carroll). Vaughn on crutches wants to stop because it hurts. Lena doesn’t want to stop. Vaughn asks Lena what she is going to miss from the mission.

Summary by Romaine Moreton

WARNING: Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander viewers are advised that the following program may contain images and/or audio of deceased persons
Shifting Sands - Tears: Crying
NFSA-ID:
NFSA ID
370994
Year:
Year

Lena (Jamilla Frail) and Vaughn (Luke Carroll) walking on the road. A car pulls up. Vaughn talks to the driver, his friend (Allan Campbell). Lena stands a little distant, disinterested. She looks into the car to see a young mother (Anita Fernando) and a crying baby (Theresa Shields). The driver asks Vaughn if he wants a lift back to the mission – the mish. Vaughn rejects his offer.

Summary by Romaine Moreton

WARNING: Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander viewers are advised that the following program may contain images and/or audio of deceased persons
Shifting Sands - Grace: Sugar cane
NFSA-ID:
NFSA ID
507912
Year:
Year

Grace is walking through the sugar cane fields. In flashback the two sisters, playing in the cane fields, place necklaces around each other’s necks, laughing with glee. Grace walks back through the sugar cane. Thunder clouds roll overhead. Loretta strokes the top of her mother’s coffin.

Summary by Romaine Moreton

WARNING: Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander viewers are advised that the following program may contain images and/or audio of deceased persons