Movie Club cleans up

This month the Phillip Island Movie Club presents the Australian documentary “Clean”, on Thursday July 27 at St Philip’s in Cowes.

Directed by Lachlan McLeod, the film is based on a non-fiction book written by Sarah Krasnostein, about Sandra Pankhurst who started a trauma cleaning business in Frankston.

“The Trauma Cleaner” was published in 2017. Krasnostein spent four years researching the book, and was awarded the Victorian Prize for Literature and the Prize for Non-Fiction at the 2018 Victorian Premier's Literary Awards. She also won the Dobbie Literary Award and the Douglas Stewart Prize for Non-Fiction at the NSW Premier’s Literary Awards. Krasnostein was a finalist for the Melbourne Prize for Literature, the Walkley Book Award, the National Biography Award, and the Wellcome Book Prize (UK).

McLeod, the director, didn’t know Pankhurst’s story when he first saw her interviewed on SBS for a short piece about hoarders.

“I hadn’t read the book, but I knew there were other sides to that work, and it seemed the people who worked in that world were really interesting in themselves – and that proved to be the case.”

He spent three years filming Pankhurst and although he tried to distance himself from the story, it became evident that Pankhurst was a very special person and his story grew from the work orientation of the book, to the personal story of Pankhurst’s unusual life.

The first scene he and his crew shot with her turned out to be her last clean. Soon afterwards she became so sick she had to be hospitalised.

“She wouldn’t admit that the end was near but everyone around her could see it,” says McLeod.

“Clean” helps bring a character’s story to the public eye in a way that is as unsensational as it is intuitive.

Doors open at 7.30pm and the film starts at 8pm. It runs for 92-minutes and is rated MA for language.

Entrance is by membership only, as this is a requirement of Film Societies for buying the rights to show the film.

The Movie Club has a 2024 waiting list and any queries or applications for a membership form can be made at phillipislandmovieclub@gmail.com.

The next film will be on Thursday August 31.