FUNDRAISING COMPLETION, and OUTREACH.
‘When our yearning for food became unbearable, we sang.’ Guta Goldstein is a 93 year old Polish born Australian Jewish survivor and educator of the Holocaust, who since 1949 has lived in Melbourne. 75 years after she learned and sang them, Guta has kept alive a repertoire of dozens of songs (in Yiddish and Polish) from the Łódź ghetto and from camps that she continues to perform in private. SINGING UP THE PAST charts the songs that sustained her through the ghetto, through Auschwitz and Bergen-Belsen, and Mehltheuer, from where she was liberated. Guta’s prodigious memory has preserved these songs, and in the absence of material traces of her loved ones, the act of singing these songs enables her to access them. Some of these songs are only known by Guta. In the film, the songs are performed by Guta, as well as by the Lodz Children’s Choir, in special new arrangements by Dr Joseph Toltz – thus preserving them for posterity. We believe there isn’t an existing Holocaust survivor narrative told in this manner. A film about memory, survival, and the power of music to sustain.
Tim’s films as a writer, director and producer have screened at over 70 international film festivals and have been broadcast in 40 countries. He has won best film and audience awards at film festivals for his documentary and narrative films. His feature documentary 4 was released theatrically, won a Gold Plaque at the Chicago HUGO Television Awards, and received nominations at the Banff World Television Festival, the International Documentary Association (IDA) Awards, as well as nominations for two AFI (Australian Film Institute) awards, including Best Documentary Feature. The Destruction of Memory, released in June 2016, has been broadcast in more than 35 territories, and has screened widely internationally including officially for the United Nations. To date it has garnered four film festival awards. Tim has written and directed the short dramas Weird Sisters, Every Other Weekend and I Was Robert Mitchum. He has written documentary, documentary series and narrative feature scripts, including those commissioned by Screen Australia, Screen NSW and Screen Tasmania, as well as a feature docudrama screenplay commissioned by French broadcaster Arte. His writing has been read and performed by actors including the Oscar®, BAFTA and Golden Globe nominated actress Sophie Okonedo, who narrated The Destruction of Memory, and AFI Best Actress winner Kerry Armstrong, who narrated Blank Canvas. His early films were produced by Kylie du Fresne of Goalpost Pictures. Tim works between the USA and Australia.
