by FilmInk Staff
Brisbane actress and filmmaker Simona Varga has turned a deeply personal story into her directorial debut, with Queensland-made short film Marbles earning four nominations at the AFIN International Film Awards ahead of its Australian premiere on Tuesday, 15 September 2026.
Rather than waiting for the phone to ring, Queensland actress and emerging filmmaker Simona Varga decided to make her own opportunity.
The result is Marbles, a deeply personal short film about family, caregiving, grief and the quiet role reversal that occurs when a child becomes a carer for their own parent.
Varga’s directorial debut, co-directed with Owen Smith of Short Stack Productions, has been nominated for four awards at Brisbane’s AFIN International Film Awards: Best Australian Micro Short Film, Best Director, Best Australian Lead Performance and Best Australian Supporting Performance.
Varga and Smith are nominated for Best Director, Varga for Best Australian Lead Performance, while actor Luke O’Neill is nominated for Best Australian Supporting Performance for his role as Joe. The film itself is nominated for Best Australian Micro Short Film.
The nominations come ahead of Marbles’ first Australian screening on Tuesday, 15 September, with the AFIN International Film Awards red carpet ceremony taking place at SunPAC on Saturday, 19 September.
For Varga, the project represents more than a filmmaking debut. It is the result of deliberately creating work rather than waiting for the right opportunity to arrive. “I think there’s a real tendency, particularly when you’re starting out, to wait for someone to give you permission to make something,” Varga said.
“Marbles came from the opposite place. I had a story I wanted to tell, and rather than waiting for the phone to ring, we picked up a camera and made it ourselves. It is so surreal and I’m incredibly proud that this small, very personal Queensland made film is now being seen and recognised both here in Australia and internationally.”
Marbles follows Sophie, a 25-year-old lawyer whose life is upended when her father is diagnosed with dementia, Alzheimer’s and parkinsonism and suffers a fall. Forced to become a full-time carer while navigating her career and an increasingly difficult public health system, Sophie must choose between aged care and bringing her father home. She chooses home.
Through tender, turbulent and sometimes unexpectedly absurd moments, the film explores family, love, grief and identity as Sophie watches the man who raised her slowly fade away. At its heart is the role reversal between parent and child, once her father cared for her, and now she must care for him.
For Varga, the story began from a deeply personal place, her story with her own father.
“Marbles started somewhere I didn’t really plan to explore publicly. It was almost like therapy, a way of processing what it means to care for someone you love as they slowly change, and how that reshapes you as a person and as a daughter and your own life,” she said.
“I wasn’t interested in dramatising caregiving. I wanted audiences to feel transplanted into the middle of it, into those small, intimate and sometimes uncomfortable moments that often go unseen. It’s less about big plot points and more about emotional truth.”
That commitment to authenticity shaped the film’s restrained visual style and intimate approach, while the production also provided an opportunity to bring together Queensland based cast and crew.
“I think there is so much talent here, and Queensland has an incredible opportunity to keep telling stories that are made here, by people who live here,” Varga said.
“I wanted Marbles to be Queensland made in every sense. It didn’t need to be a huge production to have something meaningful to say.”
The film is already building momentum on the international festival circuit, with a nomination at the LA Independent Women in Film Awards 2026 and selection at Cinema Royale: Paris Edition 2026.
Now in its ninth year, Brisbane-based AFIN, the All-Inclusive Film International Network, is an internationally connected film festival established in 2018, with live screenings in Brisbane followed by its formal red carpet awards ceremony at SunPAC.
The AFIN nomination adds significant weight to the film’s early festival run. Now in its ninth year, the Brisbane based AFIN International Film Festival is an IMDb qualifying festival and ranked among FilmFreeway’s Top 100 Best Reviewed festivals, with its first eight years spanning 615 works, 447 nominations and 162 awards from filmmakers across 50 countries.
AFIN’s judging panel includes established international and Australian screen professionals, including Neil Marshall, director of episodes of Game of Thrones, The Descent, Hellboy and The Reckoning, alongside Bruce Hopkins (Lord of the Rings); and more filmmakers and industry professionals from Australia, America, the UK and New Zealand. The festival has also previously recognised international screen talent including Evangeline Lilly of Lost, Ant-Man and Avengers: Endgame, who won Best Actress at AFIN, and Laura Vandervoort, known for Smallville and The Handmaid’s Tale, who was recognised by the festival for her work as a director.
For Varga, receiving four nominations at home is particularly meaningful.
“To have a film recognised alongside the work of other Australian and international filmmakers is incredibly special,” she says.
“Making Marbles was a risk, but it was one I felt I had to take. I backed myself, found people who believed in the story and we made it happen.”
Marbles will screen in Brisbane for the first time in Australia on Tuesday, 15 September 2026, ahead of the AFIN International Film Awards at SunPAC on Saturday, 19 September 2026.
For more information, please visit: https://www.afinfestival.com/2026/
