Victoria's Best Young Sustainability Filmmakers Announced

Last night 11-year-old Cara Thomas of Deepdane was announced the winner of the Sustainability Victoria Award for Best Film at Future Shots 2010, receiving a prize of $2000 for her hard work.

The Carey Baptist Grammar Junior School student created a claymation film called Control Your Carbon Dioxides, and it was named the best sustainability-themed film by a young Victorian at the Future Shots awards, held at ACMI Cinemas.

Thomas also picked up the best film in the under-12 category, giving her a $350 cash prize, and the Smart Energy Film Award, which includes an energy audit of her school.

In making her film, Thomas spent hours painstakingly moulding and filming her claymation tale of a green, beret-wearing EnviroMan who refuses to be devastated by people's overuse of carbon dioxide.

Other films featured a talking can who desperately wants to be recycled, a raindrop whose mission is to be treated preciously by the school it lands in, and a moving documentary about a man whose dying wish is to be buried naturally (not cremated), encouraging a return to sustainable burial.

Twenty-six of Victoria's best young filmmaking teams gathered at ACMI for youth environmental filmmaking's night of nights.

Among the awards presenters were Faustina "Fuzzy" Agolley from Video Hits, Chris Judd (Visy Environmental Ambassador and Carlton Football Club captain), and the CEO of Sustainability Victoria, Anita Roper.

"All of the entrants showed great passion and knowledge of sustainability. I was very inspired by the filmmakers' creativity in expressing their hopes about our future," Roper said. "It was a fantastic night."

This is the second year that Future Shots has challenged Victorians under 25 to make a three minute film of any genre or interpretation, as long as it addresses the theme of sustainability.

Winners received a total of over $10,000 in cash and prizes, with films received by young animators, documentary and fiction filmmakers from across the state.

Other winners include 13-year-old Andreas Stoffel of Halls Gap who received the Waste-Free Victoria Award of $1500 and other prizes, Bentley West Primary School who received the Water-Smart Cities Award, and 17-year-old Unal Yucal of Mill Park, who won the award for Sustainable Practices in Filmmaking.

A big congratulations to all the winners!