2021 MPA APSA Academy Film Fund Jury

Andrew Pike is a film distributor, historian and documentary filmmaker. His company, Ronin Films, began theatrical distribution in 1974, focusing on films from Asia Pacific and Europe including many Chinese Fifth Generation films in the 1980s, and Japanese classics. The company’s Australian releases include Baz Luhrmann’s BAFTA-winning Strictly Ballroom (1992) and Scott Hicks’ Academy Award®-winning Shine (1996).

His directorial debut was Angels of War (1983), a documentary about Papua New Guinea’s involvement in WWII that won an Australian Film Institute Award. In 2007, Andrew Pike received an Order of Australia Medal and an honorary doctorate from the University of Canberra. For ten years until 2012, he served on various iterations of the Board of the National Film and Sound Archive of Australia and since 2017 he has been Director of the Canberra International Film Festival.

Penny is a Member of the Maramanindji people, from the Northern Territory. She has completed a cadetship with the Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC) and has a Masters of Arts (Documentary Producing) from the Australian Film Television and Radio School (AFTRS) in Sydney. At AFTRS, Penny produced two documentaries – Roger and A Change of Heart. A Change of Heart was nominated for a Dendy Award and played at several International film festivals including IDFA. Between 2004 and 2005 Penny worked in the Indigenous Programs Unit at the ABC, where she produced and directed for series 6 and 7 of Message Sticks. Penny’s ABC stories Leila Murray and the Long Grassers were nominated for Human Rights awards. Penny also produced the ABC’s highly successful Yarning Up series 1 and 2 and was a part of the Screen Australia Indigenous Department’s Producers Initiative in 2011. She produced a series of shorts called The Forgotten Ones in 2010, directed by prisoners from the NT, and before beginning her role as Head of Indigenous at Screen Australia, Penny was working as a Senior Programmer for NITV, National Indigenous Television, a division of SBS. Penny is currently a producer at Bunya Media Group.

Producer Catherine Fitzgerald, ONZM, founded Blueskin Films in 2002. Her latest film, the thriller Coming Home in the Dark (dir James Ashcroft) premièred in the Midnight Section at Sundance this year. She currently has two films in post-production: Punch (dir Welby Ings) shot in New Zealand November – December 2020 and Returning Home, a Chinese/NZ feature documentary. Blueskin Films’ acclaimed features include One Thousand Ropes, The Orator (both NZ’s nominees for Best for Foreign Film) and Bellbird amongst its extensive international award-winning slate. Its features, shorts and documentaries have screened worldwide, and have been selected for the Berlinale, Venice, Cannes, Sundance, Toronto Film Festivals as well as the Academy Awards. Catherine has a strong slate of films by women, Māori and Polynesian and other under-represented voices. Recent releases include Bellbird and Helen Kelly. Short films The Meek and Coming Home in the Dark will be hitting the screens in 2021.

She also Chairs the NZ Film Festival Trust and Playmarket and is a founding Trust member of the Screen Women’s Action Group. Catherine has consulted for the Berlinale for the NATIVe strand, and served on Generation, NETPAC and Adelaide Festival Juries.  Her other governance roles include the founding Chair of WIFT NZ, NZ Film Commission Board, the Board of the Dunedin College of Education, and SPADA among others.