Dance of Death
For thrill-seeking young Sally, faced with a welter of variety, sports and news programmes, changing TV channels itself becomes a Dance of Death. As a reminder of our mortality, the human skeleton has long had a place in art, folklore and humour. This cartoon on television violence features the skeletal entertainer Don Death himself.
The Darra Dogs
When my brothers and I grew up in Darra in the 1950s, every house seemed to have a dog. They were friends who shared our lives and explorations, and roamed free. None of them lasted very long. The Darra Dogs remembers the mortal terrors of childhood, the sadness of death and loss, the not-knowing of so much – and the dogs themselves.
His Mother’s Voice
Originally a radio interview, Kathy Easdale’s monologue describes how she found out about the death of her son Matthew. Kathy builds a detailed and compelling account of hope, discovery and grief; breath by breath she declares her love for her son. His Mother's Voice uses the same voice twice, with two different narratives and different approaches to colour, cutting and sound, to present two views of love and death.
Into the Dark
In a hospital emergency, surrounded by frantic activity and noise, a man nears death. Spiked with hallucinations, his mind also goes back to the calm evenings of his childhood. Under the tree he would wait for the birds and shoot them with his air-rifle. In the bathroom – deaf, blind and naked – he would become airborne and feel nothing.
Chainsaw
Frank and Ava Gardner live out in the Australian countryside, amongst the kookaburras and the cattle. Their jobs are menial, but they are true romantics at heart. Moving between fact and fiction, Hollywood and Spain, past and present, Chainsaw is a chain of stories about romance and celebrity, machismo and chainsaws, fantasy and death. And how the natural world endures.