Binawee
TFI Suppport
Tribeca All Access® 2009
Logline
An unlikely friendship forms between an adolescent aboriginal girl and the grandson of the matron she serves, despite the differences in class and race that starkly divides them.
Samantha Saunders
Director/ Screenwriter
Samantha Saunders was raised in the Aboriginal mission of Cherbourg, in the remote area of Queensland. With the support from the Indigenous Branch of the Australian Film Commission, Saunders made her first short film, Turnaround, which screened at the Clermont-Ferrand, Sundance, Festival de Cannes and Aspen Film Festivals. She also received funding assistance from AFC for her documentary, Home Away From Home, which is about a group of indigenous elders in their sixties, who attended Queensland’s Cherbourg Mission’s first primary school during the 1940’s. Prior to directing her films, Saunders was the first Manager of the Indigenous Branch at the Australian Film Commission in Australia, where she assisted in the development of the first films made by a number of Aboriginal film makers.