Airdate: The Tall Man

Documentary film The Tall Man will screen on SBS early next month.

It looks at look at an indigenous death in custody that dominated headlines in Queensland for several years.

This won the 2011 Walkley Award for documentary, the AWG Award for best documentary and best documentary at the ImagineNative Film Festival in Toronto.

It is also nominated for four AACTAs.

Margaret Pomeranz even called it “One of the most explosive stories of our time.”

The Tall Man is the much-anticipated multi-award winning documentary about the events on Palm Island that follow the death of local Indigenous man Cameron Doomadgee.

One morning in 2004, Cameron Doomadgee a resident of the tropical paradise was arrested for swearing at a police officer. 45 minutes later he lay dead in a watch-house cell. The documentary interviews the family, friends and residents of the community on the island as they struggle to understand what happened to Cameron and the tragic events that subsequently followed his death.

AFI Award winning director of Jewboy, Tony Krawitz delves into the gruesome accounts of Doomadgee’s death and the trial of Senior Sergeant Chris Hurley.

“His injuries were so severe they were described as those of someone who’d been in a fatal car crash”, said Krawitz.

The police claimed that he had tripped on a step but when word reached the local community, Palm Islanders rioted and burnt down the police station.

The subsequent trial of Hurley who had been previously been decorated for his work in Aboriginal communities made headlines day after day, shadowed by Queensland police threatening to strike.

Based on the same titled book by previous Walkley Award winning author Chloe Hooper, The Tall Man tells the gripping tale of two worlds clashing and a haunting moral puzzle few could forget.

The Tall Man is a Blackfella Films documentary for SBS.

Sunday, 5 February at 8:30pm on SBS ONE