Matthew Carson-Drever, 22, from Springwood Baptist Church has taken home the Gold Sparky award for best film for Enmity at the 2009 Ignite Film Festival.
Ignite is Australia's premier Christian Short Film Festival. More than 200 people came to the Independent Theatre in North Sydney on Saturday night for the festival screening and to support Christian film-making.
In addition to the Gold Sparky, Enmity also took home awards for Best Actor (Luke Bennett) and Best Director.
Over its six years, the competition has been based on bible passages around a particular theme. This year it was "animals."
Enmity is a visual interpretation of Genesis 3💯
Now the serpent was more crafty than any of the wild animals the LORD God had made.
When he's not making movies, Matt - who majored in cinema at university - works in before-and-after school care.
"They annoy me, but I love them," he says of the children he cares for.
So did this inspire the use of a child in Enmity then?
Matt says there was no intentional link between his work with kids and the film. Instead, he aimed to portray ideas about childhood innocence.
"I wanted to show how sin comes into the child's atmosphere," he explained.
Ignite funding boost
Run by Anglican Media Sydney, Ignite aims to develop young Christian film makers and encourage creativity in communicating the truth of the Bible.
This year the short film festival received a funding boost from Anglicare Sydney and it is the first time the community care organisation has come on board as one of its major sponsors.
"It is exciting to be apart of this prominent Christian event and help support young creative talent," says Candace Lamplough, Anglicare Sydney's Ignite sponsorship coordinator.
"It's important for Anglicare to acknowledge the many ways in which Christians are working to highlight the importance of Jesus in our communities, and it has also been encouraging to see so many young Christian film makers' heart for the lost and marginalised in society."
