DIRECTOR: Joel Anderson
PRODUCERS: Georgie Neville, David Rapsey
PRODUCTION CO: SBS Independent, Screen Australia, Mungo Productions
SCREENPLAY: Joel Anderson
PHOTOGRAPHY: John Brawley
EDITOR: Bill Murphy
MUSIC: Dai Paterson
WITH: Talia Zucker (Alice Palmer), David Pledger (Russell Palmer), Rosie Traynor (June Palmer), Martin Sharpe (Mathew Palmer), Steve Jodrell (Ray Kemeney), Tania Lentini (Georgie Ritter)

REVIEWS

“One of the most creative, unexpected, and chilling paranormal thrillers of the twenty-first century, Lake Mungo, a singular one-off from Australian director Joel Anderson, was released in its home country to little fanfare in 2008 but has steadily grown in stature as a whispered-about, puzzled-over cult item in the years hence. Taking the form of a traditional documentary, evoking the Unsolved Mysteries model, Lake Mungo tells a story in testimonials and “found” footage of a young woman who drowned during a family vacation and whose parents and sibling believe has returned to haunt them. This is only the beginning of a twisting-turning, increasingly emotional, and wickedly intelligent inquiry into belief, the unreliability of photographic evidence, and the stories we tell ourselves and others.”

– Museum of the Moving Image

“Ghosts want only to be seen; Lake Mungo examines our compulsion to meet them face to face. Australian filmmaker Joel Anderson’s first and only feature, which deserves its cult reputation as a high-water mark of the found-footage genre, was considered “lost” following some disappointingly spotty theatrical distribution in 2008… Of all the mock-doc horror films put into circulation after 1999’s The Blair Witch Project, it does by far the most with the formal and ontological possibilities of the format, embedding several competing levels of authorship within its meticulously designed outer shape.”

– Adam Nayman, Reverse Shot

FILM SOCIETY SCREENINGS

Palmerston North     
Wednesday, 22 April, 6.00pm

Whanganui    
Monday, 07 September, 7.00pm

​Hamilton     
Monday, 19 October, 6.30pm

​Wellington    
Monday, 02 November, 6.00pm

Wellington    
Monday, 02 November, 8.30pm​
CULT FAVOURITES  >>