Rohan Spong

Rohan Spong (born September 15, 1981) is an Australian film director and photographer. He is best known for his feature documentaries.

Rohan studied film theory and practice at the University of Melbourne. Whilst living in Los Angeles in 2008, Rohan assembled his first feature length documentary T is for Teacher (2009), about the experiences of four transgendered school teachers in American schools. The film screened at a number of international festivals alongside Oscar contenders later that year.^[1] It was named by two Australian reviewers as amongst the best films to screen in Australian cinemas in 2009.^[2]

In late 2011, Rohan completed another feature documentary All The Way Through Evening, about the music composed in New York's East Village amidst the early years of the HIV/AIDS pandemic. The film premiered in New York's East Village on December 1, 2011 (World AIDS Day). Rohan and the film's main subject (elderly concert pianist Mimi Stern-Wolfe) were invited as guests of New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg on World AIDS Day 2011 as part of an annual event held at Gracie Mansion.^[3] In June 2012, Rohan indicated via his Twitter account that there were plans for a series of charity screenings of the film in different cities worldwide on December 1, 2012 (World AIDS Day).^[4]

All The Way Through Evening opened to critical acclaim and four star reviews in Australia on November 29, 2012. Phillipa Hawker of The Age newspaper described the film as: "A graceful story of music and memory", rating the film four stars.^[5] Don Groves of SBS marvelled at Spong's ability to single handedly bring the story to cinema: "Multi-tasking as director, producer, cinematographer and editor, Spong has crafted a handsome-looking production despite working on a frugal budget. It’s an impressive effort"^[6] and also gave the film four stars. Richard Watts of Artshub also gave the film four stars and named it amongst his most favourate films of the year, describing it as: "an important film, and a beautiful one.".^[7] Australian magazine FilmInk surmised the film as "an incredibly affecting and important piece of cinema".^[8]

All The Way Through Evening was nominated for the Australian Film Critic's Association Award for Best Documentary of 2012, but ultimately lost to the Best Documentary Oscar Winner Searching For Sugar Man.

Despite only expecting to run for a week in each city, the film ran for a total of thirteen weeks at Melbourne's Cinema Nova, outlasting a number of big budget films including The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey, Celeste And Jesse Forever and Perks of Being a Wallflower, closing in late February 2013.

All The Way Through Evening finally opened theatrically in New York City at the Village East Cinema, on December 6, 2013.

Rohan is currently working on the follow up to All The Way Through Evening, also set in New York City, and provisionally entitled Winter At Westbeth.^[9]

References