Erle Levey
Film director and actress Rachel Ward is heading to Noosa this month for screenings of her movie Rachel’s Farm.
In a first for Queensland, screenings at Pomona’s Majestic Theatre on Thursday, 24 August, at 6.30pm, then at BCC Cinema Noosa
at 6.30pm Friday, 25 August, will be followed by a panel discussion featuring the actress/director/farmer.
Slow Food Noosa is bringing Rachel Ward to the region in conjunction with Tarwyn Park Training, Kandanga Farm Store, and Noosa and District Land Care.
Slow Food Noosa’s Karyn Lees said that when it was announced Rachel Ward had just released the film on her journey with regenerative farming, the committee knew they had to ask to bring it up here.
“We feel so excited that Rachel said yes.
“It is also so exciting that we have the depth of talent and knowledge in our terrific discussion panels.”
Born in the UK and with an early career in modelling, Rachel Ward is not the first person you’d expect to join a farming revolution.
In 1984, she starred in the iconic TV series The Thorn Birds, which glamorised the rugged Australian Outback.
The whole world fell in love with it, and Rachel fell in love with her Australian co-star, Bryan Brown.
They married and moved to Australia and several years later they bought a farm in the Nambucca Valley, in the Mid North Coast of New South Wales.
There, they have raised cattle and their three children, endured droughts, and flooding rains and finally the catastrophic bush fires of 2019-20.
After the birth of her first grandchild, Rachel was confronted head-on by the impact of climate change as it threatened Rachel’s farm and devastated the country.
Faced with the realisation that she could no longer offset responsibility for such perils she discovers that across Australia, and around the world, a quiet revolution is under way.
In this feature film, she travels from her own wilful ignorance about the ecological impacts of conventional agriculture, to championing a movement to restore the health of Australia’s farmland, food and climate. In doing so, this regeneration of the land will restore the wellbeing of the farming communities that sustain the nation.
Neighbouring farmer and farm manager Mick Green shared her view that conventional farming was no longer working, and together they discovered that neither of their farms were ecologically or financially viable.
Rachel Ward will be part of the Q&A at both screenings: Pomona screening: Moderator, Amber Scott. Panel: Hamish Andrews, Forage Farms; Tim Scott, Kandanga Farm Store; Penny Kennedy, Sunshine Organics.
Noosa screening: Moderator, Dr Saskia De Klerk. Panel: Stuart Andrews, Tarwyn Park Training; Amber Scott, Kandanga Farm Store; Victoria Kane, Nutritionist.
BOOKINGS:
Pomona’s Majestic Theatre at 6.30pm on August 24 – www.trybooking.com/CKLXW
Noosa’s BCC Cinemas at 6:30pm on August 25 – www.stickytickets.com.au/514DB
