THE FURNACE
Australia / 2020 / 116 min / DCP / Adventure

Director : Roderick MacKay

Script : Roderick MacKay
Cinematography : Bonnie Elliott, Michael McDermott
Editing : Merlin Eden
Music : Mark Bradshaw
Production : Tenille Kennedy, Timothy White, Georgia White

Cast : Ahmed Malek (Hanif), David Wenham (Mal), Baykali Ganambarr (Woorak), Kaushik Das (Jundah), Samson Coulter (Trooper Sam)

 Venice Festival 2020

1897 Western Australia. To escape a harsh existence and return home, a young Afghan cameleer partners with a mysterious bushman on the run with two 400oz Crown-marked gold bars. Together the unlikely pair must outwit a zealous police sergeant and his troopers in a race to reach a secret furnace—the one place where they can safely reset the bars to remove the mark of the Crown. The film illuminates the forgotten history of Australia’s “Ghan” cameleers, predominantly Muslim and Sikh men from India, Afghanistan and Persia, who opened up the Nation’s desert interior, thereby forming unique bonds with local Aboriginal people.

Roderick MacKay

Roderick MacKay is a writer/director from Perth, Western Australia. With a formal training in visual arts, Roderick is a highly visual storyteller. In 2020, Roderick's debut feature film, The Furnace, premiered as part of the official selection for the 77th Venice Film Festival. Roderick's short films include Trigger and Factory 293.