Discover Leila McDougall’s journey from farming to filmmaking this week on Australian Story, a tale of resilience and creativity.
Leila McDougall, a young farmer from Victoria, has crafted a life narrative filled with significant achievements and personal challenges.
Having faced dyslexia and cancer, she emerged victorious in the Mrs Australia competition and the reality TV show Farmer Wants a Wife. Beyond these personal victories, Leila has actively contributed to her community by initiating a charity event aimed at addressing mental health issues among farmers.
With a keen desire to spotlight the struggles and stories of her community, Leila embarked on an ambitious journey to enter the film industry. She cleverly secured a spot in an acting school by submitting a fabricated resume, a bold move that set the stage for her filmmaking venture. “I just made up a resume saying I’d done all these courses and sent it in and somehow they passed it and let me in,” Leila recalls.
Supporting her through this endeavour was her husband, Sean McDougall, who, alongside Leila, invested $500,000 in the production of the film. “When someone does die by suicide, we don’t talk about it, like it’s still a taboo subject,” Sean commented on the importance of the film’s theme.
Just a Farmer, directed by Simon Lyndon, a known figure in the industry who has faced his own mental health challenges, marked Leila‘s acting debut.
“One of the reasons why I connected so much with this film is because I had been having some pretty severe personal mental health struggles of my own,” the director shared.
The film’s impact was underscored by a commendation from Hugh Jackman, celebrating Leila’s significant leap from agriculture to cinema. Damian Walshe-Howling, an acting coach, remarked on the rarity of her achievement:
“The odds of someone who is not an actor or a writer getting a feature film off the ground are 1 in 7 trillion.”
Just a Farmer premiered earlier this year, highlighting Leila‘s remarkable journey from a farmer to a filmmaker against considerable odds.
