Natalia Stawyskyj. Photo by Veronica Evans.

Natalia Stawyskyj is an awarded writer, director and producer based in Sydney, Australia.

She is constantly interested in exploring her lived experience as a young woman with disability through the lens of genre. Natalia is best known for the film All Silent Dogs, which was funded by Screen NSW and premiered at Sydney Film Festival.

Her previous credits include the Willoughby City Council-funded short film, The Inaccurate Perception of Lara Grace (Two Shoes Films), and For Better, For Worse (Bus Stop Films). Natalia was nominated for Young Australian Filmmaker of the Year and selected as 1 of 100 Australians for the AICD’s Disability Leadership Program.

As an advocate for filmmakers with disability, she continuously seeks structural and cultural change to better serve this constituent.

All Silent Dogs, which premiered at Sydney Film Festival, is a magical-realist film that follows a teenage girl who is faced with a choice: give up her ability to transform into a dog or face the stigma and societal consequences of keeping it.

Here, Natalia writes about the making of the film.

Behind the scenes of All Silent Dogs. Photo by Henry Hu.

“Many of the negative experiences of disability are not inherent in it but born of society’s lack of education, misunderstanding, and prejudice. Through my work, I endeavour to bring to light these experiences in order to help alleviate and prevent harm. It was that drive that spawned All Silent Dogs.”

Article by Natalia Stawyskyj

There has been no great parade. No moment when I was inducted. I came to the film industry because I wanted to be here, and I have stayed for the same reason. I can’t say that the industry has returned that love. But this is my house, my home. With all that I have, I still try to build sculptures within it.

My journey to filmmaking was similar to many in the industry. It was a simmering love that was ignited by a particular film and turned into mad dashes to the closest cinema after school on Thursdays because films must be seen on the day they come out. But, at fifteen, my life hit an inflection point: chronic illness. An event that never ends. It has given my work a potency and purpose of which I am so proud, but it has also led to a raft of unnecessary suffering. Many of the negative experiences of disability are not inherent in it but born of society’s lack of education, misunderstanding, and prejudice. Through my work, I endeavour to bring to light these experiences in order to help alleviate and prevent harm. It was that drive that spawned All Silent Dogs.

It is hard to be an emerging filmmaker. Being an emerging filmmaker with a disability exponentially increases the difficulty of striving for a career within the film sector. As my disability left me unable to pursue traditional education and limited my ability to network, the only option left for me was to scrap. Scrap for every opportunity. Even to invent my own. I made my first short film with a small grant from The Willoughby City Council and a cobbled-together a group of enthusiastic cast and crew members. As the writer, director and unofficial producer, I called in all my favours and embarked on a steep learning curve. When the stairs are closed to you, the only option left is for you to vault to the top floor. It wasn’t a soft landing, but I’ve never regretted my choice because filmmaking has never been just a job to me. It’s something to which I feel called. I am compelled to be here and find a way through.

As time went on, I forged ahead with the same spirit. Scrapping. Seeking. With every ounce of love I had to give. But the opportunities weren’t there. The connections weren’t there. Nevertheless, I kept my eye on my pet project, All Silent Dogs. Even before I obtained funding for All Silent Dogs, I referred to it as my little disaster project. Anything that could go wrong did go wrong. Being a genre short with VFX elements, there was a common perspective from those to whom I took the project that it would be too expensive to make and thus not worth pursuing. It definitely wasn’t cheap, but between the generous donations to my crowd-funding campaign and the Screen NSW grant, which I won, I managed to get it off the ground after two years and many false starts.

Julia Savage in All Silent Dogs.

All Silent Dogs is a magical-realist short film that I wrote, directed, and co-produced about a teenage girl, Ylva, who must choose whether to give up her ability to transform into a dog or face the stigma and familial consequences of keeping it. It was the result of considering what I felt the world needed to hear about some of my experiences growing up with a disability, namely the exclusion and discrimination I faced in my youth. My ambition was that by using genre elements to remove these experiences from their real-world context, people would view these experiences without preconceptions. Also, I hoped that by grounding it in a first-person perspective, the audience would gain insight into the internal experience rather than just observing events. The film was an attempt to spotlight the magic of divergent experiences in an earnest pursuit of a more understanding society, in which people actively support those in their lives who live with disabilities. These factors continue to be the guiding beliefs for my artistic practice.

Through the making of All Silent Dogs, I was fortunate to work with a talented cast including Julia Savage, Jack Finsterer, and Liz Wheeler, as well as many dedicated crew members and volunteers. In particular, I want to honour the moments when everything sparkled. The reasons I was steadfast despite the storm of discrimination being inflicted by some behind the scenes. The reasons I came back for more:

For the gift of Meg White’s patience and incredible cinematography talents (she will win an Oscar one day. I am calling it now). When I first met Meg, she offered me a greater visuals for All Silent Dogs than my dreams. Every day beyond that point, not only was I astounded by her technical knowledge but also by the care she accorded her work. This allowed her to capture the necessary juxtapositions between Ylva’s sterile home life and the gorgeous forest calling her. A dance of light and colour;

In addition to her great aptitude, the kindness and humanity the editor Danielle Boesenberg showed me at a time I desperately needed it. I felt supported and backed through every beautiful edit, pulling us closer to a film that had a poetic patience for which we were both striving;

Julia Savage on the set of All Silent Dogs. Photo by Henry Hu.

The first Zoom call with the visionary composer Freya Berkhout, that made me cry tears of joy, and every other conversation that I had with her that left me feeling seen and understood on a project I so rarely did. When I received my first taste of the sonic palette, I was in awe. I couldn’t believe someone had written something so beautiful based on my script. The ethereal score of wind chimes, synths, and vocals helped return the magic, intention, and kinship to the film that it was always meant to own;

The sound designer Weronika Razna’s immense skill, passion, and willingness to reach greatness. At the outset, Weronika told me that she didn’t know how the film would sound but that we would explore. And explore we did, flirting with silence and cacophony. Creating a film with both space and texture in its audio landscape that reached the great heights of my love of sound design;

The expertise Daniel Pardy showed in grading the film and the joyful hour when the power went out at his studio and we chatted about nothing and everything. 

It was for them, and the moment I stood on set and time fell away, that I finished the film. To them, I feel such gratitude.

I think I had a particular dream going into the film’s production. I had held onto the project for so long and through so much that I started to see it as my salvation. My opportunity to overcome the barriers I faced throughout my career. My chance to showcase my skills. My way to respect. Sadly, I do not have a victorious story to tell. There is a particular irony to making a film in which one of the central themes is disability discrimination, while experiencing severe discrimination in its production. When I completed the project, I wasn’t sure I’d stay in the industry, but I decided to for the same reason I started; the gods of cinema may ask for too much, but, in exchange for my devotion, they fill my life with an unmatched level of beauty.

Despite everything that occurred, I still feel the film’s magic every time I listen to its majestic score on Spotify. I still hold a strong belief in the film’s original intention. I still remember the talent, dedication, and actions of the good people who worked on the project. I am proud of the fact that I not only finished the film on schedule but did the best work I could do under the circumstances. I cleaved off part of my soul, which will eternally reside in All Silent Dogs. Though its production was made extremely challenging for me, I cannot hate something that was born of my heart. My love. My little disaster project.

Kamil Ellis in All Silent Dogs.

There have been moments throughout the release of All Silent Dogs that have been particularly special to me. When I showed the film to Bob Morgan, the Academy Award-nominated costume designer for one of my favourite films, Dune, and he gushed about how much he loved it. When I was waiting for one of its Sydney Film Festival screenings, and I overheard a stranger say that they’d heard my film was beautiful. When members of the crew told me how much they loved working on the project. I hold those times close to my heart.

At the time I embarked on the film, I wanted the audience to engage with a tale of a teenage girl finding a quiet power within herself and coming to define herself and her future beyond the rigid mould society had given her. For those who see the film at its upcoming screenings, I hope you are left with a feeling of peace and empowerment. Two simple things that I feel everyone deserves.

Now it’s over a year since All Silent Dogs first screened, and its season in the sun is waning. I have found new waters in which to swim. A new passion. A new love. Dust in Our Eyes. A film that uses a post-apocalyptic landscape as a metaphor for chronic illness and characters drawn from my life who lived in and survived that tumult. A world of man-made abuse and the cruelty of vulnerability and circumstance. Amidst that grotesqueness, there is a human life to be acknowledged and the dream of a better future to pursue. A struggle I know all too well. A story I want to share. A film I believe you need to see.

All Silent Dogs will screen at The Other Film Festival commencing on 23 November and at the Canberra Short Film Festival on 26 November.

You can follow filmmaking journey via Instagram @nataliastawyskyj and @NStawyskyj on X.