The Last Tree (2019)
NARRATIVE | PREMIERE | IDENTITY
SATURDAY 1 MAY | 6:30PM
ACMI CINEMA 2
FEATURING PERFORMANCE BY WESTERN EDGE YOUTH ARTS
Australian Premiere
Director: Shola Amoo
Country: United Kingdom
Year: 2019
Duration: 99 mins
Language: English
Genre: Narrative
Awards: Nominee, Grand Jury Prize - World Cinema - Sundance Film Festival 2019 / Winner, Most Promising Newcomer (Samuel Adewunmi), Best Supporting Actress (Ruhtxjiaïh Bèllènéa) - British Independent Film Awards 2019
Screening Location: ACMI Cinema 2, Federation Square, Melbourne | Plan your visit to ACMI **Please enter through the Fed Square entrance
Synopsis
"Powerful performances, tactile visuals and an elegantly fluid score add to the impact of this impressively understated yet profoundly moving tale."
- Mark Kermode, The Guardian
Femi, a young British boy of Nigerian heritage, has to adapt to the new environment of inner-city London, in this outstanding, BIFA-winning drama from Shola Amoo.
Writer-director Shola Amoo follows his promising feature debut, 2016’s A Moving Image, with this heart-wrenching but uplifting 2019 story of a boy growing up in Lincolnshire and London, eventually finding his roots on a trip to Nigeria.
Stylish and moving, and featuring a superb soundtrack, The Last Tree is the work of a major talent.
Unclassified 15+
Festival Selection
pre-film performance by WESTERN EDGE YOUTH ARTS
Western Edge Youth Arts works across Melbourne’s western suburbs, providing space for young people to come together to tell their own stories, in their own way and with their own voice. By providing a safe space to explore creativity, learn new artistic practices, and develop leadership skills, WEYA constructs supportive pathways for young people to achieve their own creative agency.
ABOUT THE ARTISTS
Amarachi Okorom is a Nigerian-born Igbo actress and spoken word poet. She grew up in Auckland, New Zealand until moving to Melbourne in 2013, where she studied and graduated with a Bachelor of Technology. She spent most of her time pre-COVID working at the Wyndham City Libraries and being involved in Wyndham Edge sessions. Amarachi currently works with WEYA as a Support Artist and a member of our Leading Edge Ensemble. She is also a Writer in Residence with Lonely Company, developing a play about identity and pre-colonial Nigeria, and was featured in the Queen Victoria Women Centre’s Home Truths series. Outside of her commitments she is usually practicing and perfecting her spoken word skills and writing stories.
Leigh Lule is a Melbourne based actress, musician and aspiring documentarian. Her earliest memories of performing include forcing her parents to listen to pitchy renditions of Disney classics, whilst smashing the keys of a small Casio piano. To this day, it is no different, but she would like to think her artistry has improved. Leigh joined WEYA’s Wyndham Edge in 2018, and played the lead role in the ensemble’s original piece ‘TIG; a recontextualised version of the ancient Greek tragedy, Antigone. She now works for WEYA as a Support Artist at Manor Lakes College and hopes to continue creating theatrical work that focuses on fostering environmental, political and socio-economic change.
Michael Logo is a film and stage actor with diverse experience. He first became interested in acting when he was roped into a short film project as part of an after school program in 2007. Eli the Invincible, in which Michael stared alongside his younger brother Elijah, was an award winning short film featured on SBS, about a young wrestling fan trying to make sense of the racial violence surrounding him. Michael went on to work on several other short films, including Hiders (2013), and Burning of the Mekong (2016), before being cast as Tank in the feature film Is This The Real World in 2015. Michael’s training includes a year with Verve Studios culminating in a season of With You, Alone in 2014. Michael became involved in Western Edge Youth Arts in 2016 and played the role of Private Detective Fatu in TEK as part of the Phoenix Edge ensemble. Born in Auckland, raised in Broadmeadows, and proud of his Samoan cultural heritage, Michael worked on the script for Hamlet (2016), translating sections of this inter-cultural retelling of the classic text into Samoan language. Since then he has performed in Stand Out (2017) and Lele, Butterfly (2018), and has also worked as a Support Artist for WEYA at St Albans Edge and Victoria University Secondary College.
Rexson Pelman is a performer, sound designer, facilitator, rapper, music producer and wrestler, as well as a full-time labourer and father of five. He is a Lead Artist and Sound Designer for WEYA where his work has been incredibly diverse. In 2012 he worked on the Chronicles project, culminating in travelling to the remote Beagle Bay Aboriginal Community in Western Australia to create performance with young people. As a member of the Edge Ensemble, Rexson has performed in Fate (FCAC, 2013), Fate 2.0 (Arts Centre, 2014), Scheherazade (FCAC, 2014), Iago (Malthouse 2015) and Caliban (Malthouse 2016). He has performed in countless productions for WEYA since first joining as a participant at fourteen years of age, worked as a Support Artist with WEYA for St Albans Edge, Geelong Edge and Footscray Edge and is now a Sound Designer, Composer and Lead Artist for the company.
Rexson has worked as a sound designer, engineer and performer for a number of other arts organisations and events, including Backbone Youth Arts QLD, Uprising Theatre, Playback West, Platform Youth Theatre and Metanoia Theatre.
Community Impact Partner
For 16 years, AIME has been using imagination, mentoring and building bridges to transform education from the inside, to create equity, more access to opportunities, and a fairer world for young people ready to flip this idea that they are the problem - to being the solution!