Miranda July's The Future

To celebrate the visit to Melbourne of filmmaker, artist and writer Miranda July, the Australian Centre for the Moving Image (ACMI) presents two films that showcase her distinctive cinematic voice. From 26 February to 5 March, ACMI Cinemas will screen July's most recent feature The Future (2011), together with her short film Getting Stronger Every Day (2001).

ACMI has partnered with the Wheeler Centre to bring July to Melbourne for a special, one-off live event, LOST CHILD! Miranda July on Sunday 7 March at the Melbourne Town Hall. Screenings of The Future provide an opportunity to see her most recent film prior to the talk, where she will discuss the making of books, shoes, friends, movies, performances and personal protection devices; from her earliest work as a fledgling artist in Portland to her current successes and tribulations as an award-winning filmmaker and bestselling author.

The Future is July's sophomore feature film. Brimming with absurdity, abstraction and revelation, The Future tells the tale of 30-something couple Jason (Hamish Linklater) and Sophie (Miranda July). Their lives are set on an (un)easy cruise control when they decide to adopt a wounded cat, Paw-Paw (playfully voiced by July), but when the adoption process is delayed Jason and Sophie are plunged into a seemingly new world full of action, doubt, contemplation and reckless abandon. 

The Future screens with Miranda July's 2001 short film, Getting Stronger Every Day starring Richard Greiling and Carrie Brownstein (Portlandia, Sleater-Kinney).

July cuts a singular figure in the creative world; a true polymath whose work is often moving, unsettling and astonishing. With a body of work that sprawls several disciplines, she's received accolades at the highest levels in film, art and literature. Her first feature film, Me and You and Everyone We Know (2005), for which July wrote, directed and starred, received four awards at the 2005 Cannes Film Festival including the Caméra D'or as well as the Special Jury Prize at the Sundance Film Festival. In 2007 July was awarded the prestigious Frank O'Connor International Short Story Award for her collection No One Belongs Here More than You (Text Publishing). Her videos, performances, and web-based projects have been presented at New York's Museum of Modern Art, the Guggenheim Museum and in two Whitney Biennials.