NIDA alumnus Justin Kurzel wins with Nitram
Photo: Caleb Jones (left) as Martin, and Justin Kurzel on set (courtesy Madman Films).
Director and NIDA alumnus Justin Kurzel's (Design, 1995) latest feature film Nitram world premiered in official selection at Cannes Film Festival in July, received a seven-minute standing ovation and scored Best Actor for Caleb Landry Jones.
Based around the Port Arthur gunman, Nitram was the first Australian film in official competition in Cannes in a decade. Kurzel's previous 2011 film, Snowtown, the account of the eleven murders which culminated in the discovery of their bodies in barrels in a bank vault, went to Cannes and won a special mention in Critics Week.
Nitram also features several NIDA alumni including Judy Davis (Acting 1977) as Martin's mother, Essie Davis (Acting, 1992) playing a close friend and reclusive heiress, and Charlotte Friels (Acting, 2019).
Written by Shaun Grant, the film producers are Nick Batzias, Virginia Whitwell, Justin Kurzel and Shaun Grant.
Costume and Production Design is by Alice Babidge (Design, 2004), who was recently nominated for a BAFTA award for The Dig, with Ara Steel (Design for Performance, 2016) as on-set dresser and Jenny Kent (Voice Studies, 2002) as dialect coach.
Nitram premiered in Australia at the Melbourne International Film Festival in August and won Australia's richest feature film prize at CineFestOz. CinefestOZ jury chair Nadia Tass, said in IF that the compelling thriller was found to have presented a unique perspective of this story, with 'great use of cinematic language' and 'depth of detail, particularly in performance and many layers of nuance'.
It will stream as a Stan Original by the end of the year.
