Clare Sawyer

Clare Sawyer is a producer and programmer, currently working at Adelaide and Byron Writers festivals.

As a producer, she has made six films, including Recorder Queen which screened at Hot Dox 2021 and on ABC TV. She also produced the ABC TV short feature The Forest which screened at Telluride Film Festival and won an AFI award.

Clare previously curated the Family Program for Sydney Film Festival and was the Head of Children’s and Young Adults Programs at Sydney Writers Festival. She has also programmed films for Flickerfest, Dungog and Cockatoo Island Film Festivals, as well as worked with the Youth Jury at Berlinale. For four years Clare was the Producer and General Manager of the IF Awards.

Clare Sawyer

2020: Recorder Queen

Recorder Queen is a hybrid documentary that invites audiences into the sensory world of Australian musician, Genevieve Lacey, as she explores what lies beyond becoming a virtuoso.

2003: The Forest

Helga has received one too many inappropriate gifts from her husband. In a fury she decides to visit the large shopping mall to return the present. Helga’s personality and the labyrinthine mall conspire to keep her for a few days until she accidentally stumbles on a way out.

2002: Helga

Helga has received one too many inappropriate gifts from her husband. In a fury she decides to visit the large shopping mall to return the present. Helga’s personality and the labyrinthine mall conspire to keep her for a few days until she accidentally stumbles on a way out.

2001: Vitalogy

Lissa’s new neighbours are freaks. They believe strongly in the power of lemons and their 16-year-old son Michael scrubs his feet every night before going to bed. He is definitely not the sort of boy a cool chick like Lissa should be hanging around with…but then again he is a real life Vitalogist and they don’t grow on trees.

2000: Lost

Three small children are found wandering a city beach. What begins as a seemingly routine case for the detectives in Missing Persons becomes a puzzle. Twenty-four hours later no one has reported them missing and the police start to worry. Why can’t they locate their parents and why won’t the children speak?

1999: The Tale of the Paper Hearts

A short, fanciful tale about family histories. When a curse against a sailor leads to a succession of women being born with hearts made of paper, one woman must dare to ask the question ‘can you survive a paper heart?’

1991: Xmas

Christmas Eve in Broadmeadows. Narelle is dumped, stranded on a dark street. She passes a house with Xmas lights on and sees a family sleeping. She takes a closer look.