Exclusive! Your first-look at Taylor Broadley’s surreal dramedy She Came from the Moon!

In 2024, filmgoers were introduced to Taylor Broadley via his debut feature film, Stubbornly Here, when it premiered in Broadley’s hometown of Perth at the Revelation Film Festival.

Stubbornly Here is a surreal and touching journey told through the eyes of three teenagers in small-town Australia. Blending magical realism and coming-of-age drama, the film follows Sunny (Cleo Meinck), PJ (Nathan Di Giovanni) and Floyd (Jonathan Maddocks), who band together to escape a mysterious crisis and their vanishing classmates. (Read our interview with Taylor about the film here.)

At the time, there was plenty of buzz among film media and audiences, with much of the talk centred around this exciting new talent and his impressive debut. But, as is often the case with independent Australian films, and despite being one of the best Australian films of that year, Stubbornly Here was denied an extensive festival run and cinema release, instead landing directly on streaming service Kinema, where it has since rated highly on review platform Letterboxd. (You can watch it here.)

Thankfully, there’s no artist more tenacious than a filmmaker, and Broadley quickly moved on to his next film, the excellent, frightening horror short Exercise Me. The surreal and psychologically terrifying narrative follows a hapless priest (played by Angelo Torres) who begins to think he has become possessed following a botched exorcism.

Angelo Torres as Norman in *Exorcise Me*.

Broadley’s future is now looking even brighter, with his sophomore feature film, She Came from the Moon, currently in post-production.

Written and directed by Broadley, and starring Zoe Smith, Henry Freeman-Dick, Jesse Lambert, Joseph Haworth and Jordan D’Arcy, She Came from the Moon follows a hesitant thief who is haunted by visions of aliens after being pressured to rob her new friend, the local conspiracy theorist.

“She Came from the Moon is a surreal dramedy about learning that tomorrow still exists, no matter what you’ve been through,” Broadley tells Cinema Australia.

“It follows Adi, a down-on-her-luck kitchen hand running scams, stuck in the cycle of bad relationships and struggling to get sober. The film sits somewhere between Donnie Darko and Garden State.

“It’s that melancholy movie you’d discover in 2001 on a well-worn VHS copy in the back of your local video store. A coming-of-age film for fans of The Cure. An existential hangout movie for anyone feeling lost or irreparable.”

While screening and release details are yet to be revealed, Cinema Australia readers have been treated to an exclusive first look at She Came from the Moon which you can see below.

Keep an eye on Cinema Australia for future announcements. In the meantime, you can follow the film’s progress via @HoneyBombfilm on Instagram.

Zoe Smith and Joseph Haworth in *She Came from the Moon*

Henry Freeman-Dick, Jesse Lambert and Zoe Smith in *She Came from the Moon*

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