How a local surfer’s miracle survival became an award-winning documentary

UP-and-coming Mullumbimby filmmaker Sam Clarke will share his award-winning documentary about local surfer Beau Devonshire’s near-death experience during the Chinny Charge at this weekend’s Byron All Shorts event.

The former Shearwater, Mullumbimby Steiner School student won the AFTRS FlickerUp Award for Best Youth Short Film for the 15-minute film Light in Dark Places at the Flickerfest International Short Film Festival in Bondi earlier this month.

Clarke began making mountain biking videos with friends in his early teens and took home the Byron All Shorts award last year for a film about local artist Suvira McDonald.

“I have just become so passionate about documentary over the years,” he said. “I just love telling impactful human stories.”

Devonshire, who Clarke knew as a surf teacher at Shearwater, was in a coma for five days after suffering a cardiac arrest and multiple seizures during the annual race up Mount Chincogan.

“Doctors said he had an extremely low chance of survival so it’s a miracle that he came back,” Clarke said.

“When he told me his story a year after it happened and was relating it to being in the depths of the ocean I saw the connection between him being a surfer and that out-of-body experience that he had.

“He’s such a good storyteller as well, so I thought it would make a compelling documentary for my major Year 12 project for film and photography.

“Eighty per cent of the film is shot under the water and I’d never filmed underwater before, so I made a decision at the start of the year to buy underwater housing for my camera. It was a steep, steep learning curve. Filming in the ocean is quite unpredictable and after the cyclone the water quality was quite bad.”

Clarke, who has been working on various paid film and editing projects since completing his HSC last year, said he enjoys sharing the story because it carries a message he believes will resonate with viewers.

“The core message is surrender and dealing with uncomfortable emotions from your past,” he said.

He is looking forward to screening the documentary to a hometown audience at Mullumbimby Civic Hall at the event, which runs alongside the Flickerfest tour.

“It’s such a great local event,” he said. “You get to meet lots of other local filmmakers and everyone can share what they’ve been working on.”

Light in Dark Places is screening at 4pm on Saturday, February 28.

Tickets are available via Humantix.