Made in the West Film Festival has a lot to be thankful for. We feel so privileged to be surrounded by such talented local filmmakers that it is a real joy to share their stories on the big screen every year.
The community of filmmakers that we celebrate are dedicated, creative and very ambitious. Both audiences on Saturday at the festival were just electric, and for SSP, having hundreds of filmmakers in the house cheering for each other’s work was, without a doubt, the best part of the night (and a very large part of WHY we do what we do).
We can’t wait to screen the 28 finalist films one more time for our fans and friends at home and across the country. Reserve your tickets now for the Online Film Festival this Saturday 28 November and settle in on the couch with your mates for a huge 3-hour marathon of 28 finalist films and highlights from the red carpet streamed directly to you at home! Tickets are $5 + booking fee.
We think this year’s festival films showed exactly what Western Sydney is made of! We were blown away by the bold, unique and heartfelt stories being made in the West by our community of filmmakers.
Still Searchin’ Productions would like to thank the people who helped us make Made in the West 2020 the success it was. Many moving parts come into play on the night and we rely on the generous help, time and talent of our festival crew and contributors. This year, we worked with our biggest crew ever to bring the event to life, alongside the superstar team at Event Cinemas (Liverpool) who support our community event.
Thanks to these legends for their help at this year’s film festival!
The team at Event Cinemas (Amy, Victoria, Val and Sharrie, as well as all your staff on the night who worked hard to help us put on a great night) thank you for ongoing support and encouragement of the filmmaking community in Western Sydney. We love our festival home and we love the support you show to our community. We can’t wait to come back next year to Event Cinemas once again to celebrate our10th birthday!
Kylie, Carly, Regina, Charu, Ennis, Regina, Nataly, Amy, Jumana, and Sunshine our spectacular volunteers who assisted us all night long with ticket check-in, allocating wristbands and seating bubbles, assisting the SSP team or helping to with the vote at the end of the night - we thank you all for your contribution to this year’s festival.
Dan Thornton, Lexy Potts and Laura Caldwell our red carpet photographers who spent the night snapping photos of our filmmakers throughout intermissions and in the cinemas. We can’t wait to release our gallery of photos online in the coming days! You can check out more of Dan’s work here and Lexy’s work here.
Chiara Marshall our graphic designer extraordinaire - your design for this year’s Made in the West poster was out of this world. It was exciting, it was electrica and it propelled us into the best festival we’ve ever hosted. Thank you for your incredible work. Check out Chiara’s work here.
To Holly, Vuk and Daragh our red carpet highlights reel host, camera operator and producer - we can’t wait to see this year’s finalists shine on screen. Thank you for capturing all the emotion on Western Sydney film’s biggest night of the year. You can check out Dr Holly online here.
To Jess and Dan our Online Festival host and camera operator - thank you for capturing the night for our viewers at home. We’re looking forward to bringing the red carpet to our festival fans around the world this Saturday! You can follow Jess online here.
To Laura B our wonderful MC for the Awards Night - our biggest thanks for the energy you brought to our VIP crowd in cinema 12. You put everyone at ease and helped the house to sit back, relax and enjoy some of the best short films we’ve ever screened! Follow Laura online here.
To Luke from Luke Walker Productions, thank you for helping us capture footage of the night for our highlights reel and online festival. There was a huge amount of effort that went into setting up on the day and we’re so thankful you could be with us to help make this year our best yet. Check out Luke’s showreel here.
And last, but certainly not least, thanks to the entire team of contributors at Still Searchin’ Productions including Ross, Misty, Jay, Casey, Nat, Emily, Steve, Hayden and Carissa. Your ongoing commitment to Made in the West over the years has meant hundreds of local filmmakers now have a dedicated space to share their stories on the big screen.
In fact, this year, the SSP team curated our 250th production -- an amazing feat for our team and we couldn’t be more pleased.
Made in the West Film Festival is incredibly grateful for the support offered by our contributors and we can’t wait to return in 2021 with even more amazing supporters on our side – we’ll be celebrating our 10th birthday next year so it’s going to be our biggest year yet, we’re sure of it!
And by the way, if you’re reading this and you think you’d like to work with us next year at Made in the West and contribute your time or talent to the event, get in touch and tell us what you think you can do to help! We’re always happy to hear from new collaborators.
Thanks everyone!