Australia

Two schizophrenics meet during therapy and fall passionately in love. Ahead of them lies the inevitable road to disaster – one they share to the end.Read More »

The wealthy Edward (Haywood) sparks to Anna (Mckenzie), the lead voice in a choir that’s raising money for an upcoming trip to China. He donates money to her choir, and she agrees to sit for him for a series of still-life drawings. As Anna is drawn more into Edward’s life, their relationship — quite platonic — nevertheless causes problems at home for Anna, who lives with David (Blabey), a frustrated artist.Read More »

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Set amidst the eerie desolation of the Australian outback, Kiss or Kill is a superior reworking of vintage film noir materials from the veteran director Bill Bennett. Its lovers-on-the-run story focuses on Nicole (Frances O’Connor) and Al (Matt Day), a pair of petty thieves running a scam targeting married businessmen; when one of their victims accidentally dies, they flee his hotel room, absconding with his briefcase. The case contains a videotape of Zipper Doyle (Barry Langrishe), a national soccer hero, molesting a young boy; Nicole and Al soon take off for Perth, intending to blackmail Doyle — never suspecting that he, as well as the police, are already in hot pursuit. As the two make their way across the country, they leave a trail of dead bodies in their wake; both Nicole and Al begin to suspect that the other is a murderer, and as their journey continues, their paranoia only grows. A similar feeling of mistrust and dread informs virtually every interpersonal relationship in the film, effectively gnawing at our own perceptions and expectations; a stylistically aggressive picture, brimming with jump cuts and inventive camera work, its distinctive take on the noir tradition is fresh and exciting.Read More »

Namatjira the Painter (1947)
Australian contemporary art has no more interesting tale to tell than that of Aboriginal watercolour artist, Albert Namatjira. Namatjira was thirty years old before his hand first held a paintbrush. In about 1934 Rex Battarbee, a well-known Australian artist, visited Hermannsberg mission near Alice Springs. He took with him into the field as cook and general assistant the Arunta tribesman, Namatjira. This film tells the story of Namatjira’s preoccupation with Battarbee’s work, how he was determined to learn to paint and how Battarbee, realising the talent of his friend and assistant, taught him the elements of his craft. Today Namatjira’s watercolours sell for high prices. Despite controversy, the power of Namatjira’s rendering of his beloved ancestral land is not denied. Throughout his life and despite his success, he remained in the bush with his people and his paints. In this film, we see Albert Namatjira at work in the glowing country that he knows so well.

This is the 1947 film re-edited by Lee RobinsonRead More »

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Set in Sydney, Australia. A (heterosexual) father and his gay son are trying to find Ms/Mr Right respectively. The film shows their relationships with one another and the objects of their affection as tradgedy strikes.Read More »

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A car crash and a few beers is enough to persuade gun shearer Foley (Jack Thompson) to sign up for a week’s work with novice contractor and old mate Tim King (Max Cullen). Once they’re at the station, however, King admits to selling him a pup: it’s not a six-day job, it’s six hard weeks.

Sharing a room with Old Garth (movingly played by Reg Lye), a pisspot drunk at death’s door, Foley has plenty of opportunity to ponder his future but his competitive nature gets the better of him when he’s drawn into a shearing competition by the taciturn Arthur Black (Peter Cummings).Read More »

Ever since he was a boy, Paul Morris (Paul Moder) has wanted to be a hitman like his hero The Snake (Frank Bren). There’s just one catch – he only wants to kill bad guys. Now married to Helen (Helen Hopkins) and with a young daughter to provide for, Paul is now struggling to succeed in his chosen career – unaware that his trusted partner George (Kevin Hopkins) is secretly a crazed pervert who wants to get Paul killed so he can marry Helen himself. Paul’s life is also complicated by his relationship with Matty (Carolyn Bock) a policewoman who has agreed not to arrest him in exchange for regular sex. Whatever setbacks he encounters, Paul remains optimistic, convinced that his career will take off if he can only score that ‘one big hit.’ With his dreams of scoring the big hit that will make his future secure Paul must negotiate personal entanglements and the rivalry of legendary hitman “The Snake” (Frank Bren) who also has his sights set on securing the bounty.Read More »

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A slickly made and occasionally creative action drama, of the thoughtful sort they seldom make anymore. The hero of Philip Noyce’s 1978 Australian film is a newsreel cameraman, a device that allows Noyce to cut between stock shots and new footage, black and white and color, and historical and personal events. The montage sometimes makes good drama and good sense, but at other points the intent is every bit as obscure as the Australian politicians the film constantly alludes to.Read More »

Filmed years after “At Uluru” (1978) in very different conditions, the film showcases the burnt landscape around a monolith in a land inhabited for millennia.
“As the camera moves gently from afar into the very heart of the monolith, the magic of the holiest site of the Aborigines unfolds in shimmering nuances of light.
Shot at different times of day, the close-up and panorama shots of this more than 500-million-year-old stone formation combine silence and acoustically altered birdsong to convey a feeling of timelessness into which a sense of loss is also inscribed. The somnambulistic moonrise in the great sky seems almost like an abstract painting and yet it is real. The areas of discolouration in the film material caused by problems in the developing process were deliberately left in the film as a metaphor for the looming threat to this natural environment through bushfires and tourism.Read More »