Lithium - Short Film

LITHIUM

Anxiety, depression, body dysmorphia and self-doubt. What causes a person to experience these, how do they deteriorate someone’s personality and one’s relationship with another person? 

Lithium is a short Swinburne Graduate drama film, following Ox. A young Australian living through life trying to find happiness with living with Ellie. Their relationship begins to sour as Ox pushes themself further and further away. 

Ellie becomes more controlling, and dismissive, as Ox slowly cripples into their own personal issues. Letting their mind and emotions from past events take control, Ox realises how lonely they are, and understands Ellie only cares about herself. 

As Ellie leaves one night after a fight. Ox realises their loneliness might take a hold of them before it’s too late.

WHY THIS FILM?

Lithium as a personal story, is something the writer/director Erin wanted to create to raise awareness on the issues of depression, body and eating issues, anxiety and panic, without having any clear protagonist or antagonist within the film. Enhancing this film to be naturalistic and heavily reliant on sound, it allows the dynamic between the two characters to show an emotional story. Erin wanted to create a realistic, non-Hollywoodized version of an emotional breakdown on-screen, to allow audiences to relate or feel for these characters.

ABOUT THE CREW

Erin McMahon | Director/Writer/Co-Producer | (she/her)

Erin McMahon is a first time director; mainly based as a Soundie and DoP. She has worked on short films, documentaries, web series' and music videos in both roles, as well as TV shows such as Aunty Donna's Coffee Cafe for ABC.

By creating Lithium it allows a personal story on toxic relationships, body image, depression, as well as the feeling of always being alone come into light. Having dealt with these issues, Erin wanted to create a story around one’s mind during an relationship as well as creating it to be relatable to some people and to gain awareness and a personal story through the character; Ox. 

“I’ve never felt that film and tv represented a true naturalistic panic attack on screen. I wanted to shed light on what it’s like to feel panic, what it’s like to feel like you can’t breathe, what it’s truly like to emotionally breakdown, with your thoughts spiralling.”

James Robinson | Co-Producer | (he/him)

James is a graduate from the Masters of Producing course at VCA. He has been working in the film industry since 2015. Starting working in the Art Departments of various productions, he has also produced several short films. He is excited to work with Erin and the team in order help bring together a tender and naturalistic depiction of a young relationship.

Harry Bell | Director of Photography | (he/him)

Harry Bell has gained a variety of skills through his several years of film making. His strong passion for cinematography and keen eye for visual storytelling can be attributed to his many years focused on photography. Gaining rudimentary abilities in camera work through being introduced to photography through film. Going on to find his place within the camera crews of short films and documentaries. As the Director of Photography, Harry will employ a unique vision style contributing to Lithium’s raw themes.

Cinnamon Barnes | Production Designer | (they/them)

Having a love of Production Design from an early age, Cinnamon has been fascinated with how effects can be achieved practically, propmaking and how set design can impact a film's imagery and enhance its story. They started out working on personal side projects during high school, building an operational 1:1 scale Dalek from Doctor Who. From there they continued to train their skills by working as a Production Design Assistant for the 2018 short film Before I Go before going on to work on short films for their study in the Swinburne Diploma and Advanced Diploma of Film and Television. Cinnamon looks forward to putting their skills to use on Lithium and designing sets to enhance the subtle underlying aspects of the characters and their relationship.

Jennifer Ling | Editor | (she/her)

Jenny is the editor of Lithium. She is looking forward to editing this emotional story between two characters navigating their relationship and their own personal struggles. From editing short films at Swinburne in the past, Jenny has a keen eye for colour and unique editing styles. This is Jenny's first time editing a drama but is excited for the challenge. She can’t wait for you all to see how this story come to life!

Wilson Dixon | Sound | (he/him)

Wilson is the sound recordist and part of the sound editing team for Lithium. He has worked on a number of films, such as Swinburne shorts as well as SAE shorts, designing sound, with a love of bringing rich atmospheres and unique sounds to people’s ears. He's a massive fan of diegetic music in film (music playing within the world in the film) and synthy music like in Bladerunner. Sound inspirations for Lithium will be films such as Aftersun, Of an Age, Moonlight, Close and You Won't Be Alone. We’ve got a great team for this project and Wilson is over the moon that we get to bring it to your eyes and ears!

MEET THE CAST

Charli Wookey | Ox

Charli Wookey made her debut in Television as Sheridan in the Netflix TV series ‘Surviving Summer’ (2021). Most recently, Charli performed on ABC3’s ‘Crazy Fun Park’ as Siobhan in early 2022. Charli is proudly represented by Ian White Management and trained full time in 2019 at the Acting Performance Studio, before then Charli studied theatre and acting techniques through her VCE schooling and community drama classes. 

In 2018 to 2020 Charli was crowned as Miss Tourism Australia and got the chance to represent Australia on the international stage held in Malaysia late 2019. She is very excited to be working with Grace and the Lithium team to bring the charatcer of Ox and their story to life! 

Grace Jackson | Ellie

Grace Jackson is a freelance actor who will be portraying Ellie in Lithium. She is currently training as an actor at Lisa Robertson Studio and her experience lies predominantly in short and student films as well as school productions in 2018-present day. She is eager to bring truth and depth to Lithium's compelling story and bring humanity to Ellie's complex and somewhat toxic demeanour. Grace is very excited to work with Charli, Erin, and the lovely production team to bring Lithium to life!

Lithium is aiming to reach a minimum budget of $3000 to help fund this project.  

With your support, we would be able to achieve our goals in budgeting for:

• Casting
• Locations 
• Set Design
• Costumes
• Catering
• Renting extra gear
• Distribution(Festivals)
• Transportation

Donating and sharing is much appreciated and will allow this film to be achieved and be made with the highest quality to successfully achieve such a personal and emotional story much needed in the world.

Thank you from the Lithium team!