Nominees in all categories for Australia’s top screen awards, the 2019 AACTA Awards presented by Foxtel, have been announced and we’re thrilled to see so many Film Victoria supported productions in contention - a testament to the talent and achievements of the Victorian screen industry.
Honouring Australian screen excellence across feature film, television, documentary, short form and online, the winners will be announced at two major events held at The Star Event Centre in Sydney.
Competing for the highly coveted Best Film Award are Judy and Punch, which has earned an impressive nine nominations in total, including Best Direction, Best Lead Actor - Damon Herriman and Best Lead Actress - Mia Wasikowska, with Michelle Payne biopic Ride Like a Girl, helmed by Rachel Griffiths in her feature directorial debut, also nominated.
In the running for Best Indie Film are gripping Adam Cullen biopic Acute Misfortune and Rodd Rathjen’s powerful high seas drama Buoyancy. Luma Pictures and Method Studios were nominated for Best Visual Effects Or Animation for their work on Spider-Man: Far From Home and Aquaman respectively.
Richard Lowenstein’s Mystify: Michael Hutchence leads the nominations across documentary categories, recognised for Best Documentary, Best Editing in a Documentary and Best Sound in a Documentary, with The Australian Dream and The Eulogy also vying for Best Documentary.
Also recognised in the documentary categories were Damon Gameau's inspirational 2040 and The Leunig Fragments, both picking up nominations for Best Original Score in a Documentary; Finke: There and Back scoring a nomination for Best Cinematography and The Cult of the Family, nominated for Best Editing and Best Original Score.
In television, the multi-AACTA Award winning Wentworth will compete against Bloom for Best Drama Series, with Bryan Brown, Jacki Weaver and John Stanton all scoring nominations for their performances in the Stan Original drama series. In contention for Best Children’s Program is Gristmill’s The Inbestigators while in Television Comedy Miranda Tapsell has earned a nod for her performance in Get Krackin’.
Patrick Brammell was nominated for Best Lead Actor in a Television for Glitch, while Jenna Coleman was a first time nominee for her performance in The Cry, which was recognised with eight nominations including Best Lead Actor –Ewen Leslie, Best Telefeature or Mini Series, Best Screenplay in Television and Best Cinematography in Television.
For the full list of nominees visit the AACTA website.