Movies: Indigenous australians

Taking us through Bangarra Dance Theatre’s spectacular growth, we follow the story of how three young Aboriginal brothers — Stephen, David and Russell Page — turned the newly born dance group into a First Nations cultural powerhouse....

An hour-long documentary on the life and career of actor David Gulpilil....

With a national vote approaching to enshrine Indigenous peoples voice in the constitution, a dynamic Indigenous youth group travel on a pilgrimage across Australia to commemorate a historic civil rights victory. Buoyed by the imminent referendum, th...

Kate is on a plane taking Warren, her 18 year old Torres Strait Islander foster son, to meet Flo, his birth mother, who is gravely ill in hospital in Brisbane. Flo hasn't seen Warren since she took him to the hospital on Thursday Island when he was a...

Drawing on original footage from National Geographic, Etched in Bone explores the impact of one notorious bone theft by a member of the 1948 American-Australian Scientific Expedition to Arnhem Land. Hundred of bones were stolen and deposited in the S...

Filmmaker Warwick Thornton investigates our relationship to the Southern Cross, in this fun and thought provoking ride through Australia's cultural and political landscape....

A portrait of an albino Aboriginal teenager, her feelings of alienation while at a convent boarding school, and her dreams of escape....

The story of a Warlpiri woman, Audrey, and her Sicilian partner Santo as they navigate through colonial systems to keep the children they care for together. Audrey Napanangka was born at a time when the world was changing for the people in the Centr...

In the winter of 1991 an ABC film crew spent six weeks following Sydney's Redfern police. The inner city patrol of Redfern is predominantly working class with a large aboriginal and migrant population. The police in this film are general duties off...

Ella Havelka made history in 2013 by becoming the first Indigenous dancer at the 50-year-old Australian Ballet. In this engaging, MIFF Premiere Fund-supported world premiere, Ella – a descendant of the Wiradjuri people – charts her inspiring journey ...

An indigenous mine site worker is transported to the spirit world, where he meets the spirits and custodians of the land and learns about how they are connected to humankind, even as their sacred sites are under threat by the modern human world....

In the estuaries and lagoons of the Northern Territory, freshwater and saltwater crocodile are hunted for their hides by both Indigenous and non-Indigenous hunters. This film shows Aboriginal people using age-old hunting techniques to land crocs eith...

The epic David vs Goliath battle for justice waged by the families of three Aboriginal children murdered in a small rural town 30 years ago, the system that failed them, and what it reveals about racism in Australia today....

A century ago the Torres Strait Island were the subjects of the famous Cambridge Anthropological Expedition - the resulting depletion of their cultural artifacts left them with nothing but a history of remembered loss. The only people in the Pacific ...

The Ripple Effect is a powerful documentary primarily centred around St Kilda legend and proud Noongar Nicky Winmar's generation-defining stand against racism at Victoria Park in 1993....

In 1945, at the age of seven, a young Joe Eggmolesse was diagnosed with Leprosy. He was immediately removed from his family and home and transported under police escort over a thousand kilometres to be confined on an island for the treatment of the d...

The raw, heartfelt and often funny journey of adult Aboriginal students and their teachers as they discover the transformative power of reading and writing for the first time....

Are eligible Indigenous bachelors an endangered demographic in the 21st century? That’s the question cheekily posed by Tracey Rigney’s debut documentary short, which invites First Nations individuals to confide what they desire, what holds them back,...

From the remote Australian desert to the opulence of Buckingham Palace - Namatjira Project is the iconic story of the Namatjira family, tracing their quest for justice....

Powerful and poignant, Her Name is Nanny Nellie offers us the rare privilege of bearing witness to a family reclaiming their history. In 1925, the Australian Museum commissioned three statues of ‘full blood ’Aboriginal people: a child, a man and a wo...