The documentary that started a movement to screen at Far South Film Festival

What started as a two-minute video to alert locals to a zombie development has turned into a 21-minute documentary. It has been screened at NSW Parliament and started an unstoppable movement among South Coast youth for sustainable and environmentally safe housing.

It is one of 16 films from regional and remote filmmakers across Australia that has been selected for the Far South Film Festival in Merimbula on 18 August.

Crunch Time: Protecting Tura’s Biodiversity was made by two young filmmakers who met at Lumen Christi College. It is a product of Jacob Shields’ passion to protect the Tura wildlife corridor on the NSW Far South Coast from development and the technical and artistic talent of Jordan Mundey.

Zombie developments are an issue around NSW. They refer to planned developments that were approved years earlier but have sat dormant. The developments can be revived at any time the developer sees fit regardless of the native flora and fauna on the site and may not comply with current development regulations.

News of the development at Tura Beach emerged in 2022. Mr Shields, who has always been interested in community issues and worked as a social worker in the Bega Valley, was swept up in the movement to protect Tura Corridor. It is the last remaining avenue for wildlife to traverse from the forest to access the coastal waterways.

“I was active on social media and Jordan saw some of what I had posted,” Mr Shields says. “We met by chance on the street and that is how it got started.”

Mr Mundey says they had never intended for the production to be so big.

“One thing led to another and we made a whole film about it,” he says. “The goal of the documentary was to raise awareness and to put forward a case in a more emotive way than dot points.”

Mr Shields is the voice of the documentary which also features interviews with two ecologists, a First Nations community leader, a wildlife photographer and a local solicitor.

It took nine months from the first shoot to its premiere in March 2023.

Mr Mundey says the film highlights the endangered species on the site, its importance to local people and its spiritual significance to First Nations people in the area.

It was hard work but they were very motivated because it is for such a good cause. They see it as a vessel to convey a cause.

“At the end of the nine months a whole movement had formed around it,” Mr Mundey says.

As a result, the film’s premiere in Merimbula was sold out. “It was such a rush showing it at a crowded cinema to get the story out on behalf of the forest,” Mr Shields says.

“It really galvanised a bit of a movement,” he says. “The youth of the South Coast were particularly inspired by the pushback on outdated housing and focus on a sustainable and more environmentally safe housing future.”

In October 2023 he collected a group of passionate youth in a bus and drove to Parliament House in Sydney where they screened the documentary in front of politicians including the ministers responsible for the environment, youth and housing.

“We asked them questions and now the issue is front and centre,” Mr Shields says. “It will be really interesting to see where it goes but now it is an unstoppable movement that has started with the Tura Corridor.”

Mr Shields is studying micro-housing in Norway. “I want to be educated on the solutions to the problem,” he says.

“It is critical to me that we protect this ecological gem. I am studying micro-housing so I can present a viable solution while preserving the beautiful Tura Corridor.”

Mr Shields says he is so grateful to his friend “because Jordan is a gifted filmmaker and a brilliant artist so it was a joy to collaborate with him on this project”.

The Far South Film Festival at The Twyford in Merimbula will screen the 16 finalist film entries and a special non-competition film. The festival includes a Q and A panel with guest filmmakers, an awards ceremony and a networking and social event.