This year is the 18th year of the Sydney Underground Film Festival (SUFF), a film festival that started in Factory Theatre in Marrickville and has since moved from Event Cinemas George St to Dendy’s Newtown providing otherwise underrepresented people a chance to have their films, documentaries, shorts screened in a cinema for everyone – not just film fanatics to enjoy.
Honi Soit sat down with SUFF director Nathan Senn to discuss what goes into creating the festival and why it is so important to play underground or low-budget films in big cinemas across Sydney.
Madison Burland: Can you tell me a bit about yourself? Who you are and what you do. I know you’ve been head of Programming for the Environmental Film Festival as well, so I’m going to assume you have a passion for film?
Nathan Senn: I love film. I studied film for a long time. I did a Bachelor of Arts with a major in Film, then a PHD In Cinema Studiesmany moons ago. Film and film-making and film theory has always been an interest. I initially wanted to get into academia and become a lecturer, but by the time I got to the end of my studies my interest in that waned. I’d seen behind the curtain and the way that the arts were going within the university landscape, and it was no longer appealing to me. I had a bit of an existential crisis and I thought well, I love watching films and going to film festivals when I was younger. I was one of those people who would buy a pass and go to film after film.
It wasn’t so much an escape but I think there’s something really beautiful about being able to sit in a dark cinema with a group of people and have a shared experience that can transport you to other worlds and give you a bit of an insight into what’s happening in the world and society. To hear someone’s deepest feelings articulated into images and be put up on screen, it’s quite magical.
If I can turn that into a job, if someone can pay me money for watching films and doing something I love, that would be a dream right? I did a lot of interning, years of unpaid internships, just really getting a taste of the film festival landscape and what it was like. SUFF was actually one of the first festivals to really take me on, so I started with SUFF in 2015. That was my first festival, this is my 10th year with them now. A lot of the directors with SUFF really took me under their wing, taught me a lot about what I know now with programming.
Then I took on some significant roles with smaller niche festivals, I tried to get a lot of experience in different landscapes, then COVID happened, and that really changed things for festivals. It went from being this really beautiful joyous buoyant thing, to having to quickly pivot to online because people couldn’t get into the cinema.
MB: So you had a lot of experience working with them prior to COVID — then having to transition during COVID – what was that like?
NS: Yeah, it was positive and negative. For me it was a little heartbreaking, part of the reason I do it is for the community. There’s nothing like being able to bring people together in the cinema to have a shared experience. I think when you present something online, on a computer or on a TV screen it’s still meaningful but not quite the same.
When I look back, it still did a lot of good. During lockdown, there were a lot of people who lost their sense of meaning and purpose, and attended live interactive screenings from their computer but trying to plan events like that – there are a lot of logistical challenges, and the whole landscape changed.
It was a really challenging period, I’m really proud of SUFF for getting through it, because I know a lot of other organisations didn’t fare as well and make it out the other side. I’m very thankful that we’re able to get back to the way that things were and try and rebuild that sense of community, get back in the cinema and do what we do best.
MB: What do you think makes SUFF different from, for example – the typical Sydney Film Festival? What about it being underground makes it so important?
NS: That’s a great question – and I say this with no disrespect, we’re great friends with the people that run the Sydney Film Festival, and the Festival environment in Sydney is amazing. Everyone is really friendly and really collaborative and we all work together in a really good spirit. I’m originally from Melbourne, well currently in Melbourne, but it’s something that Sydney does so well, but – I don’t say this antagonistically, more philosophically, about our mission and motivation. We’re set up directly in opposition to festivals like the Sydney Film Festival.
They’re remit is to show the best in World Cinema, to get the big films and the big titles, and you know they have a lot of funding, they get big name directors out and create experiences that are super important, cinematic experiences. They do what we do, bring the film community in Sydney together and on a really large scale. Where we stand apart from them is that we really champion alternative filmmaking models, and alternative filmmakers that maybe don’t get the same level of funding or support, they work outside of that mainstream network. These are independent artists that put all of themselves to make a film, so we really try to prioritise their voice and platform their work.
Those voices that sometimes don’t have the same level of support and struggle to be heard are equally deserving of a platform. They have so much to say, and often what they have to say runs counter to the mainstream narrative. So we’re concerned with supporting multiple perspectives, and marginalised perspectives, whether that be filmmakers from underrepresented nations, or queer filmmakers who don’t get support, or filmmakers that are differently abled. It can be for those purposes, or it can just be a subversive and transgressive messaging, films that are a bit more left field, confrontational, and experimental, pushing against mainstream filmmaking standards and norms.
We think that carving out a space for that is really important, especially as society and culture gets more and more homogenised. A lot of people are feeling a little bit more malaise about how monotone and lacking in diversity that is. So if we can come along once a year and provide a space where we show films that are kinda pushing back against that, or doing a little bit more, that wouldn’t be seen otherwise, I think that that plays a really important role in building richness into the film culture in Sydney.
MB: Speaking of films getting selected, how do you guys select films for the festival? Can you tell me about the process?
NS: It’s a really robust process. Like I was saying earlier, my background isn’t in events management or anything, I started out programming, and even though I’m directing now, I come to festivals with the programming being the priority for me. I think that the programming, the films you’re selecting, that’s your product. That’s what you put out into the world, and that’s something you need to stand behind. Even though I directed this year, the previous directors are still a big part of the festival, still engaged with the festival on a management level. Stefan Popescu, Katherine Berger, and myself are the main curatorial forces behind the festival. We collaborate together every year, we spend about 6-9 months of the year researching and watching films, or receive films by submission.We basically watch films around the festival circuit, or that already have distribution or are about to get an imminent release.
Over the 18 years we’ve been running the festival we’ve established a really robust network of contacts, so every year we check in with them and get a sense of what’s out there, what’s coming up and what might be available to us. It sounds crazy but we end up getting through about 2000 films a year between the three of us. We dig really deeply, because quality is important to us. When you’re specialising in underrepresented artists and voices, you do need to dig really deep to find them. That discussion is built around two or three main tenets for us. The first is usually is it a good film? Is it a film that warrants getting screened? We want our audience to come to the festival to have an amazing experience, to feel like their minds have been blown. Does it fit our remit? Is it transgressive? Is it underground? Is there something about it that is in line with the festival’s spirit and ethos? That’s really important to us because it has to make sense. We want everything we’re showing to be inclusive and very safe. Is what we’re screening? Is it hard in the right places? Does it have the right values, is the messaging it’s putting out into the world something we can stand behind?.
The other thing is really taking into account our audience.We’ve developed a really loyal and rich audience over our 18 years, there are people that come to see the festival that were there when I started. Those people keep coming back and we want to do them the honour and respect they deserve by listening to what they want.
MB: So many people may be wanting to get into underground or indie films but that can definitely be a bit intimidating. Are there any specific starter movies or places you recommend people check out?
NS: That’s a good question, obviously I’d recommend checking out the festival. We play a really wide range of films we think will suit everyone. I think you’re right, the term underground, it can sound scary and it’s abrasive. Like do I have to be a really cool alternative person who knows all the films to fit in? Certainly not. It’s not like everything we play is hardcore and experimental, and grungy and going to blow your mind. We have a whole bunch of films, one has Michael Cera and Kristen Stewart in it.
MB: Yes I saw that! I had fallen victim to the idea that all underground films have to be really experimental and then I was like Michael Cera..?
NS: And that’s a fair question in itself, people will say, “What are you guys doing playing a Michael Cera and Kristen Stewart film in an Underground Film Festival, have you lost your mind?” That’s the world that we live in, the film’s called Sacramento (2024), it was made on a 2 million dollar budget, which by Hollywood standards is basically for free.
The filmmaker who made it, he’s also in it, and he’s happened to know those actors and they’ve done it free of charge as a bit of a favour to a friend. Even though it does have some commercial actors and it’s marketable in that way, it is an independently made, low-budget piece of cinema, and in a lot of ways it defies convention. It looks like a buddy road trip film on the surface, and if anyone reading this does come see it, it’s not generic in the least. It’s very sweet and it’s surprising. That being said, it’s not like we don’t show things that are edgy and challenging – there’s plenty of that, if you love that, come see it, but there’s also stuff that’s just fun. This year with our programming, [because] the world’s a dark place, we’ve thought a lot about that and really tried to program a festival that‘s oriented towards joys and celebration. So if you are going to spend the money you do have on a ticket to come see a film with us, you will walk away feeling good.
The other thing I will say is, you mentioned making underground films. We run the Take48 film festival, it has already passed this year but basically it’s a 48-hour filmmaking challenge. The people that we collaborate with that run it, I think they set an object and a line of dialogue and give filmmakers 48 hours to make a 3-minute film that utilises those two things. The best films get screened at the festival, and all the filmmakers come along and it’s just a blast.
MB: Wow, that sounds amazing.
NS: Being able to make a film over such a short period of time, using nothing but a camera and what you have at your disposal, that’s what’s at the height of underground film-making, and where underground filmmaking comes from.
If you want to get into it, come along to the screening and see what the filmmakers have done, or next year even enter yourself and having a go at making something, bringing your friends and being able to revel in the joy of creativity.
That’s one of the beautiful things about the Underground, you don’t need production companies and big budgets and lots of money. You just need an idea.
MB: Is there a specific movie you’re looking forward to most this year?
NS: It’s like asking whose my favourite child. There are two that I really love. One is called The Hyperboreans (2024), which would be on the more challenging, experimental end of the spectrum. It’s made by two Chilean filmmakers, who we’ve screened in the past, Joaquin Cociña, Cristóbal León. They made a film called The Wolfhouse (2018) which we played in 2018. I also thoroughly recommend that one if you can hunt it down anywhere. It’s a combination of life action and animation, but it utilises all different forms of animations, from puppetry to collage to claymation, mixed in with life action. It’s really kalescopic.
The other one is called Vulcanizadora (2024) by a filmmaker named Joel Potrykus, who we’ve screened before. He does these really dark, meditative, kind of slacker, stoner narratives and this one reprises two of his characters from one of his older films called Relaxer (2018). They set off on a camping trip together and you don’t really know the purpose of the trip until late in the film. It takes a twist about three quarters of the way through that you don’t see coming that’s really profound, and I think touches on some really deep important cultural things.
It’s one of the heavier ones we’re showing, I was a bit blown away by the nuanced filmmaking. It’s doing a lot, with not very much which is a sort of hallmark of underground filmmaking. You don’t have a big budget, but still manage to do something that’s emotional and profound. When you find out where it is going, it stays with you a bit, and gives you a lot of food for thought. If I was a patron and was going to use my money to go to a film, those two are the two I’d pay to see.
The Sydney Underground Film Festival is running from September 12-15 at the Dendy Newtown.
