DOCUMENTARIES

  • Poster for the documentary 'Aquarius' featuring a woman with white hair in a jacket and high-waisted pants standing in front of a geodesic dome with an audience seated in front. The poster includes text describing the documentary as about dreamers, tree-huggers, and radical ratbags.

    AQUARIUS

    Palace Byron Bay + Nimbin Bush Theatre

    In May 1973, 10,000 artists, activists, hippies, radical students, gurus and visionaries descended on a small dairy town for 10 days of social and cultural exploration that changed a generation. Those 10 days birthed an irrepressible movement that may have been the much-needed blueprint for sustainable change.

  • Promotional poster for the film "Agent of Happiness" featuring collage art of mountains, clouds, a yellow car, and a man in traditional clothing holding papers.

    AGENT OF HAPPINESS

    Brunswick Picture House

    An agent from Bhutan's Ministry of Gross National Happiness traverses the country annually to assess happiness levels, guiding government policy but also seeking his own contentment.

  • Cover of the book titled 'Art and Life: The Story of Jim Phillips', featuring a blue hand with an open mouth, surrounded by a dark background with faint illustrations.

    ART & LIFE: The Jim Phillips Story

    Lennox Head Cultural Centre

    A pioneer of graphic art, Jim Phillips, known for his bold and visceral imagery, has left an indelible mark on the world of rock posters, surf, and skateboard art. Drawing inspiration from his life in Santa Cruz, California,

    Jim's journey from publishing his first artwork in Surfer Quarterly in 1962 to becoming the art director for Santa Cruz Skateboards, shaped the golden era of skateboarding.

  • A shirtless man with dark hair, tattoos, and a goatee, standing against a graffiti-covered wall, giving a thumbs-up gesture over his chest. The poster reads 'Blak Douglas vs The Commonwealth.'

    BLAK DOUGLAS VS THE COMMONWEALTH

    Lennox Head Cultural Centre

    Before winning the coveted Archibald Prize in 2022, Dhungatti artist Blak Douglas collaborated with filmmakers to document the preparation of his most emotionally charged work, a portrait of his Indigenous grandmother, revealed at the National Gallery of Australia’s Indigenous Art Triennial: Defying Empire.

  • Cover of a book titled 'Fungi: Web of Life,' featuring a landscape of green mountains and forest, with large purple and blue mushrooms in the foreground.

    FUNGI: WEB OF LIFE

    Palace Byron Bay

    All life on Earth is connected by a great mystery we are only just beginning to unravel. Hidden between the world of plants and animals, another world exists…Fungi: Web of Life. We’ll begin in the mysterious world of the forest floor, where fungi are the central players in nature’s story of birth, death, and rebirth to discover that life as we know it simply would not exist without them.

  • Group of children and an adult sitting and standing on a yellow school bus in a forest setting, with text overlay about a film project and awards, titled "Future Council."

    FUTURE COUNCIL

    Palace Byron Bay + Lennox Head Cultural Centre

    Director Damon Gameau (2040, THAT SUGAR FILM) invites eight children on an epic adventure across Europe in a school bus powered by biofuel. Their mission is to better understand the planet’s predicament, explore solutions and, most importantly, take the conversation from the streets, into the boardrooms of some of the world’s largest polluters and most influential companies.

  • Two men with surfboards on the beach, smiling and talking, with trees and the ocean in the background. The poster features awards, film titles, and text promoting a documentary film called Impact.

    IMPACT

    Brunswick Picture House

    The powerful story of two skydivers, Mark Lucchiari and Ben Lucock, and their journey to recovery after a near-fatal accident.

    Both Mark and Ben were experienced jumpers, but their lives changed forever when they collided in freefall during a jump in Byron Bay.

  • A ceramic owl figurine with intricate, crackled patterns peeks through a broken concrete wall with rusted metal bars, against a backdrop of a colorful urban building, promoting the documentary 'Porcelain War' which won at Sundance 2024.

    PORCELAIN WAR

    Palace Byron Bay

    Amidst the chaos and destruction of the brutal Russian invasion of Ukraine, three artists defiantly find inspiration and beauty as they defend their culture and their country.

  • Movie poster for 'Soundtrack to a Coup d'Etat' featuring three women smiling inside a vintage car, with the title in large bold letters at the top and the director's name, Johan Grimonprez, at the bottom.

    SOUNDTRACK TO A COUP D'ETAT

    Palace Byron Bay

    Jazz and decolonization are entwined in this forgotten episode of the Cold War, where the greatest musicians stepped onto the political stage, and downtrodden politicians lent their voices as inadvertent lead singers.

  • Poster for a documentary titled 'The Life & Death of Westerly Winding' featuring a woman walking in the ocean water against a pastel sunset background.

    THE LIFE & DEATH OF WESTERLY WINDINA

    Palace Byron Bay + Brunswick Picture House

    In 2008, years after nearly drowning in a traumatic and life-changing surfing accident, Drouyn suddenly resurfaced by coming out as a trans woman on national television. Her new name, she said, was Westerly Windina. “It was a supernova,” Westerly said of her gender awakening. “It just kicked in one night, and suddenly Peter went; Westerly was there.”

  • Illustration of a band with three members, one with long hair and a beard, another with straight dark hair and a woman with curly hair, all smiling passionately. Text promotes a documentary about 80s underground legends, titled 'The Aussie Australian Band Ever!'

    THE MOST AUSTRALIAN BAND EVER

    Palace Byron Bay

    Three migrant school kids (Korean, Sri Lankan and Croatian) form a band in the '80s. They fight racism and the music industry to take their Aussie punk music to the world. The Hard-Ons become the biggest independent Australian band of their time and blaze a trail overseas for other bands to follow.

  • Swimmers in an outdoor pool with a sunset view over the ocean and waves crashing nearby, promotional text for the film "The Pool" at Bondi Icebergs.

    THE POOL

    Palace Byron Bay + Palace Ballina Fair

    Icebergs is at once a meeting place, a resting place, a workout place and a place of romance and ritual. We come to understand that for those who seek it out, and return, it is a symbol of inclusivity, healing and resilience. THE POOL is a stunning cinematic experience with a soundtrack that harks back to the 1960s and a cast of characters who each have a story to tell; breezy, heart-warming, funny and poignant.

  • Poster for the film "Unlikely Allies" depicting a man in the foreground with a serious expression, behind him are images of five individuals, divided with red and blue coloring, and illustrations of the Capitol building and prison bars, suggesting political themes.

    Unlikely Allies

    Palace Byron Bay

    In 2003, a low-level cannabis case would end Weldon Angelos’ budding and promising career in the music industry. But it would also give birth to a national movement to reform our country’s criminal justice system, uniting far right conservatives like billionaire Charles Koch and Senator Mike Lee (R-UT) with liberals such as Senator Corey Booker, Van Jones and musicians Alicia Keys, and Snoop Dogg.

  • A poster for the documentary film "Walkabout: The Songlines of Surfing" showing a silhouette of a surfer holding a surfboard standing on the beach with ocean waves in the background. The poster includes various film festival laurels and credits for the filmmakers.

    Walkabout: The Songlines of Surfing

    Palace Byron Bay

    Two decades after their original adventure together, Robbie and Arnaud are set to meet up again. Arnaud surprises Robbie at the National Aboriginal Surfing Championships at Bells Beach and together, they embark on a new road trip, in search of waves, community and connection to Country.

  • Black and white image of a woman with long hair holding a dog in her arms, looking away. The film title 'Washed Away' and tagline 'The beating heart behind Australia's worst flood' are displayed. The poster includes names of featured people, film details, and logos.

    Washed Away

    Lennox Head Cultural Centre

    The untold stories of Australia’s worst flood, focusing on the strength of communities left to rebuild on their own. Against overwhelming devastation, the film highlights how neighbours banded together, with no choice but to fight for survival and recovery.

  • Forest scene with a bison, a deer with antlers, and two smaller animals near a pond, with a castle in the background and birds flying in the sky. The poster promotes the documentary 'WILDING' based on Isabella Tree's book, highlighting nature revival.

    WILDING

    Palace Byron Bay, Palace Ballina Fair + Brunswick Picture House

    Based on Isabella Tree’s best-selling book by the same title, Wilding tells the story of a young couple that bets on nature for the future of their failing, four-hundred-year-old estate. It is the beginning of a grand experiment that will become one of the most significant rewilding experiments in Europe.

  • A skydiver in an orange wingsuit with arms extended, surrounded by numerous skydivers in colorful suits, flying in a blue sky with clouds, promoting Wingsuit Flyers documentary about human flight.

    WING SUIT FLYERS

    Brunswick Picture House

    The quest to fly like a bird, unaided by machine has captured the imagination of humankind as long as we have been gazing upon the world’s natural flyers. Wingsuit flight provides us with the chance to experience what it would be like to fly like a bird.

    Screens with Impact

  • Two people with surfboards standing on a grassy coastline near the ocean, with a partially cloudy sky overhead, and a motivational quote "You should have been here yesterday" overlaid on the image.

    YOU SHOULD HAVE BEEN HERE YESTERDAY

    Palace Byron Bay + Lennox Head Cultural Centre

    You Should Have Been Here Yesterday combines hundreds of hours of lovingly-restored 16mm footage – uncovered in the garages and dusty cupboards of our original surf filmmakers – with a salt-infused soundscape by Headland and wisdoms from Australian Surfing’s Gurus, Outsider Artists and Intuitives.