All My Friends Are Back in Brisbane: The Little Film That Bet on This City — and Won

The Big Curious attended the Brisbane premiere of All My Friends Are Back in Brisbane at Five Star Cinemas, New Farm, on Friday May 29, 2026.

There is a particular kind of excitement in a sold-out cinema when the audience knows exactly what they're about to see — and why being there matters. That was Five Star Cinemas, New Farm, on Friday night. Every seat taken. The filmmakers in the room. The lead actors on the red carpet. And a film made for $13,000 that had already won Best Queensland Feature Film at the Gold Coast Film Festival, gone viral on YouTube, and was about to have its Brisbane premiere.

All My Friends Are Back in Brisbane is a romantic comedy about coming home. But it is also, quietly and deliberately, a film about this city — and about what it means to build a life somewhere you once couldn't wait to leave.

The Story

Cris (Nelle Lee) is a Brisbane lawyer who has spent a decade living in London. She is days away from moving back with her British fiancé Dom when he ends things without warning. Cris decides to come home anyway — not out of nostalgia, but because she has nowhere else to go.

Back in Brisbane, she reconnects with her best friend Michelle (Kym Jackson), married to Aram (Tim Ross) with two small children. Needing work, she accepts a job at Aram's firm — which means working alongside her ex, Scooter (Andrew Steel), the man who refused to follow her to London a decade ago. He has since married Ainsley (Brooke Lee) and has a child of his own.

Concerned about the proximity of Cris and Scooter, Michelle nudges Cris toward single life. She begins dating Toby (Julian Curtis), a barista and aspiring TV writer — easy, uncomplicated, entirely unlike anyone she's been with before. She also takes a job as in-house counsel with Hutcho (Daniel Ewing), a charismatic property developer with money, ego, and a complicated history with everyone in the room.

Then things begin to unravel. Scooter discovers Ainsley has been unfaithful. Cris and Toby develop fractures. And a serious ethical problem at Hutcho's firm forces Cris to a reckoning — professional, personal, and geographic. Can she build a life here, or is Brisbane simply not her city? It is, in the best sense, a very Brisbane question.

Brisbane as Character

One of the film's most deliberate pleasures is its sense of place. DP Chase Brockett — a Brisbane native making her first feature — spoke about this as a central creative goal: "We wanted to make the Brisbane skyline a character in itself, which I think we achieved. Keeping the film handheld allowed for quick setups so we could focus on performance, whilst also moving away from a formal look and keeping it in the indie realm."

Writer Stephen Vagg was specific about the milieu: "Brisbane professionals, private school people really — that's sort of my background. The sort of characters who would know each other." The familiarity is the point. This is a film about a particular stratum of Brisbane life — lawyers, property developers, theatre people, baristas with screenplays — and it holds the mirror up with both affection and honesty.

How a Neighbours Finale Funded a Feature Film

The origin story is as good as the film itself.

Vagg worked in the Neighbours script department for 15 years. When the series was cancelled for the second time in early 2025, he used the fee from his final two scripts to greenlight the film himself. "Louise was like, 'We could make this for $10,000,'" Vagg recalled with a laugh. "But this was filmable — it was a talkie piece. It didn't need stunts or scenes in cars or rain or special effects. And she did it."

Director Louise Alston — her 13th feature — brought forensic practicality to every decision. Every scene was set in daylight. Ten-hour days. A skeleton crew. Locations sourced from friends and colleagues. "The budget was a cash budget rather than the actual value of the work in the film," she explained. "Everybody reinvested. We gave everybody good coffee, we had a lot of respect and love for our cast and crew — and we did it as fast as we could in nine days."

The result doesn't look or feel like it was made for the price of a mid-range family holiday. It feels specific, considered, and alive.

A Sell-Out Night — and What It Means

Alston, speaking to The Big Curious in the foyer before the screening, was visibly glowing. "We've sold out, which is the real award. You get an award and it's very validating, yes, but you make the movie for an audience. Bums on seats — that's the biggest goal."

She drew a clear line between the two films. "The first one was like a quarter-life crisis — owing it to yourself to see what's out there. The coming back to Brisbane movie is about a midlife crisis. Coming home. Building your ideal life in the place that will be your forever home. The first one is about adventure. The second one's about living and growing in the spot that will be your forever home."

Hutcho: The Misunderstood Antagonist

In a film full of quietly observed performances, Dan Ewing is the wild card. As Hutcho — property developer, control freak, the most entertaining presence in any room he enters — Ewing brings something the film genuinely needs: a character who is complicated.

"Hutcho, for want of a better term, is our misunderstood antagonist," Ewing said on the red carpet. "People with egos — usually you're trying to control something. You're afraid of something."

He shot all of his scenes in a single day, the product of hours of preparation with Nelle Lee. And he was generous in his assessment of the film's ensemble: "A lot of these Hallmark rom-coms, it's cookie cutter — two leads, same formula. With this, every single character is great. Every single character, someone will know. The drunk mums are represented. The actor who works in a café. The property developer rich a-hole. The average Joe. There's so much nuance."

Nelle Lee: Coming Full Circle

Lee carries the film on her shoulders — and does so with an ease that only becomes remarkable when you remember the shoot was nine days. She auditioned for the original All My Friends Are Leaving Brisbane straight out of drama school — one of her first professional auditions.

"Stephen and Louise were really encouraging and nurturing for a young artist," she told us at the premiere. "They've been really pivotal in the way I conduct myself as an artist."

Stepping back into film after years in professional theatre, she said, was "exhilarating, a little bit terrifying — it is a totally different medium. But I still believe it's about the truth of the characters and connecting with your audience, regardless of whether they're behind the lens or in the auditorium."

The Bigger Picture

All My Friends Are Back in Brisbane is not trying to be a blockbuster. What it is trying to be — and succeeds at being — is a very honest, very funny, very Brisbane film about the specific experience of coming home to a city that has changed around you, and finding out whether you've changed too.

"The specificity is part of the joy," Alston said, recalling the long-running suggestion that she remove the city from the title. "What if it was a film called All My Friends Are Leaving Albuquerque? You'd still get the idea." The first film won a cinema release in Denmark. This one has already won a festival and sold out its premiere.

Brisbane is, it turns out, exactly the right place to set a story about people who left and came back. And the audience at Five Star Cinemas on Friday night knew it from the first frame.

All My Friends Are Back in Brisbane is currently screening at Five Star Cinemas, New Farm. Further screenings at Randwick Ritz (Sydney), Lido Cinemas (Melbourne) and Tower Cinemas (Newcastle, June 20). Directed by Louise Alston. Written by Stephen Vagg.

Image: Andrew Steel as Scooter and Nelle Lee as Cris. Production still courtesy of All My Friends Are Back in Brisbane.