Odyssey Short Film Festival

Imagine slaving away for months on end, throwing in bits and pieces of your soul in the ultimate project as part of your VCE studies. Years of schooling leads up to the moment you’re to submit your final assignment, which could lead on to further study, or something else. But when the scores come out the project seems to disappear. For Media Studies students, that project takes shape in the form of a short film and the Odyssey Short Film Festival looks at ensuring those films don’t disappear by showcasing the best of the region from Year 11 and 12 students from high schools across Geelong, Bellarine and the Surf Coast.
But the festival is about so much more than that. It’s also a chance for friends and family members (and general film enthusiasts) to come out and support the budding filmmakers’ works, and to share a role in celebrating their works by voting for the audience favourite, Winning that title is something Joey Knox knows all too well about, who won the spot with his short film on downhill biking.
“Coming away with the audience favourite award felt amazing, finally all the effort and hard work had paid off,” he says.
While there are a few winners on the night, winning a title isn’t everything. As simply the experience of seeing your work on the big screen is vindication enough that what you’ve done is incredible. For Joey, seeing his film projected on the wall was both surreal and nerve racking, but undeniably an experience that has helped him to pursue what he loves doing.
“Odyssey film festival is really important for Geelong, it gives kids a chance to present their work to a big audience. It’s a motivation and a goal for them to work hard and create films,” Joey says.
Since taking out the audience favourite, Joey has gone on to study film and has worked on feature films, crewed on TVCs and shot videos for Cotton On and several other notable businesses.
It’s hard to know who will pursue the dream of becoming a filmmaker from those screened at Odyssey, but you could possibly be watching the next big filmmaker to come out of Australia, and with your vote, you could get them one step closer to achieving that.
The first 150 tickets purchased receive a choc top icecream or small popcorn to enjoy at the screening. To purchase your tickets or to find out more visit the website (http://odysseyfilmfestival.com/).
Written by Alexander Lightfoot
Image: Still from Motum Tardi by Indy Flexman
When & Where: Village Cinema, Geelong – December 5