Steve Thomas
Lecturer
Documentary
Steve Thomas began his working life with an Honours Degree in Science. He taught in England and Jamaica before turning to formal investigative work with the Commission for Racial Equality in the UK. Here his interest in documentary film developed but it was through coming to Australia and studying/working at Open Channel in Melbourne that his documentary making career began.
Steve has written, directed and produced numerous independent documentaries over the last fifteen years for television and festival release. Several of these have found their way onto educational curricula. He has been lecturing in documentary at the VCA since 1998 and now combines teaching with practice and research.
Steve's Filmography includes:
Black Man's Houses (1992, ABC), a re-examination of Tasmanian Aboriginal history through a search for lost graves on Flinders Island. Winner of the Rouben Mammoulian and Short Film Awards at the Sydney and Melbourne Film Festivals;
Harold (1994, ABC), a profile of Harold Blair, Australia's first Aboriginal opera singer. Nominated for an AFI Award.
The Hillmen - A Soccer Fable (1996, SBS), about the misadventures of a junior soccer team and winner of the AFI award for Best TV Documentary ;
Errands of Mercy (1998, SBSI), about the effects of socio-economic reform on the Melbourne Metropolitan Ambulance Service;
Least Said, Soonest Mended (2000, SBSI), based on Steve's own sister's experience of giving up a baby for adoption in secrecy in the 1960s and winner of a United Nations Association Media Peace Award;
Welcome to Woomera (2004, Film Australia & ABC), explores Australia's famous Rocket Town and its various reincarnations, most recently as an immigration detention centre. This documentary was made under FA's National Interest Program. (See http://www.filmaust.com.au)
In 2001 Steve produced Family Foibles, a series of half-hour documentaries for ABC TV which gave five emerging directors (four of them graduates of the VCA Film School) the chance to make a film for TV.
(See http://www.roninfilms.com.au)