Documentary Award-Winner Songs Inside comes to Araluen – Shalom Almond
8CCC Big Brekky Content
Director, Shooter and Producer, Shalom Almond spoke with Big Brekky's Kate Lyons-Dawson about her documentary Songs Inside, the 2025 winner of the Documentary Australia Award for Best Australian Documentary at the Sydney Film Festival. The award is supported by Documentary Australia with a $20,000 cash prize acknowledging excellence in Australian documentary production, and makes the winning film Academy Award eligible. SONGS INSIDE follows nine women in Adelaide Women's Prison who participate in a music program led by Barkindji singer-songwriter Nancy Bates. Together, they learn to write songs about their experiences of incarceration, culminating in a performance with the Adelaide Symphony Orchestra inside the prison. Shalom Almond, producer Lauren Drewery, and four film participants, are travelling to Alice Springs for a panel discussion on Wednesday June 25 as part of the 2025 Reintegration Puzzle Conference program, and to present the film at Araluen 7pm on Thursday June 26 to both conference attendees and the general public, with a Q&A session to follow. Shalom is an AACTA-nominated and award-winning filmmaker whose trademark lies in her natural ability to form strong and trusting rapport and relationships with her subjects and their environments, which translates directly to the screen.