None of my family would see Snowtown for fear of its truth and no woman I know wants to see it, but it’s a great work that like King Lear transcends its violence and like our coming forth and our going hence must be endured.
In a dusty fibro suburb offering few choices – the world is five backyards wide, with a rusty bike or two, a wobbly TV, mum’s latest fancyman, ghastly spag-and-snag dinners, glutinous breakfasts, quarrels, noise and sleeplessness, a happy-clappy church that no-one much enjoys – a tempter, John Bunting, arrives with a plan to kill perverts, and proselytising among the damaged, the idle, the womanless and the daft, secures enough disciples to carry out his plan. Kiddy-fiddlers are tortured and killed, one agreeing in a bloodied bathtub that he deserves it, kill me, I deserve it, and a kind of puritan blood-cult grows up around this practice. Bunting has the charisma of a good shoe salesman, no more, yet he finds among these idle hands great quantities of devil’s work to do. If you doubted before this the existence of evil – and I certainly did – you will come away from this film a true believer in it, almost a fellow-traveller.
With a method like Mike Leigh’s of group rehearsal Justin Kurzel has winkled out of his inexperienced cast (Daniel Henshall who played Bunting was the lone professional in it) work of such lacerating intuitive credibility that you think it has really happened, and you were in the room when it did.
Should it have been made? Well, the arguments against Titus Andronicus are better (‘Why, there they both are, baked in that pie’), and No Country For Old Men, and The Road. The comparison is with Lord of the Flies, I think, a work on many school courses, about, like this, the unleashing of humankind’s inner savagery by what Iago called ‘a permission of the will’. Wars are connived in just this way by false allegations of adversaries’ diabolic deeds – the Belgian babies on German bayonets, the WMD, the beheading of young women for wearing lipstick in Afghanistan – and cities bombed and young men tortured because our side is morally superior to those we widow and kill. In Snowtown the same thing happens close up and face to face.
If ever there was an argument for tax-funded useless jobs it is this one. Idleness, idleness, idleness and grubby demeaning poverty are what stir these glum inconsummate also-rans to slaughter and cover-up and awkward obedience to a Leader, a petty Hitler with a vision of Decency restored. With jobs and the price of a night at the flicks and some popcorn with a girl they knew from school it would not have happened. If the job was painting rocks white, then painting them brown, then painting them white again (as in the Workfair schemes of the 1930s) the result would have been the same: a life, rather than a Godot-wait for mysterious, instructions with knives and twine and corkscrews.
Kurzel found his cast by hanging around a shopping mall in an adjacent suburb and looking for faces that resembled the faces of the originals, and going up to those who did, and asking them to audition. Louise Harris, who eventually won an AFI for Best Supporting Female, told him repeatedly to fuck off or she’d call the police, and Lucas Pittaway, as the moody near-wordless fifteen-year-old victim/antihero Jamie, who is torpidly hypnotised into abetting the serial slaughters against his anguished but paralysed better judgment, is as good as the young Heath Ledger.
The script by Luke Buckmaster is excellent and the music, especially the music, by Jed Kurzel, the director’s brother, as good as Morricone; and the result is a film that rivals the best of Polanski, and a lesson for us all in economy, persistence, passion and vision.
It stands with Samson and Delilah and Beneath Hill 60 among the best three Australian films and should, really should, be seen.
Name:
Daughter saw Snowtown and found it as good No Country for Old Men, which I enjoyed bar the mumbling dialogue that made it hard to understand at times, the Spanish actor,whose name eludes me, was almost TOO good.
I still haven’t forgotten the excellent Oz movie, The Boys, saw it by myself, and I was so scared afterwards, I had to run to the bus stop…
Samsom and Delilah’s ending was a tad too sweet or unbelievable, otherwise perfetto…
None of these recommended to Mary Ellen.
El nombre del actor es Jarvier Bardem.
He was great in Perdita Durango, and in Carne Trémula, also The Dancer Upstairs, John Malkovich’s directorial debut based on the Sendero Luminoso Maoist guerrilla group in Peru, as well as Mar adentro (The Sea Inside, based on the story of a euthanasia campaigner in Spain), and Woody Allen’s Vicky Cristina Barcelona. Agree, he’s a very good actor, solid presence.
You forgot “Biutiful” Canguro.
A most…tender…movie, where melancholy and guilt wrestle determination and love.
A Night Journey without end?
I found it simply beautiful.
Inarritu is a wonderful story teller.
Inarritu’s Amores Perros is also a very interesting movie, a kind raw and real, as is Cuaron’s Y Tu Mama Tambien… who is also Mexican.
“Inarritu is a wonderful story teller
He is. Senor Iñárritu is a master at weaving individual dramas together, connecting them by thin threads of coincidence and causality, as in Babel.
Helvi, good to see Almodovar’s movies find favour with you. Maybe it was SBS TV who brought him to my attention back in the 1980′s with The Law of Desire (or Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown). I’ve enjoyed his work ever since.
Sounds compelling – I’ll look for it on Amazon.
Don’t by any chance have a sister in Oz called Annie, do you? You’re in the UK, right?
There’s an old mate of mine looking to reconnect with her after many years, he lost track after she moved from Coraki.
Muchas Gracias, how could I forget the name of suc an impressive actor as Bardem
Pedro Almovodar’s movies are also high on my list, weird and wonderful, they have something of the old Fassbinder in them…
Like Woody Allen’s worst movies are still better than most, so are Amovodar’s. His Hable Con Ella is one of my very favourites
this was meant as a reply to canguro…
also such, not suc.
Tie Me Up! Tie Me Down! and High Heels did it for me, but perhaps its just my lust for Victoria Abril . . .
Snowtown – all should see this film, on a very big screen?
I’ll give it a miss.
In your first paragraph, Mr. Ellis, no mention do I see of averseness=insanity.
“Anyone who won’t see any film on a big screen is insane – please seek help”.
If you’ve forgotten, then I’m here to remind you.
Also …. amateur film critics can repeat admiration of the omgtotallyawesome scariness of ‘The Boys’ – unable to comprehend that a film can be a ‘good film’, without being a must-see-for-all on the big screen. Bigger shocks? Bigger thrills? Okay, hand over your money. Go again.
Some young women ran; but didn’t make it safely onto the bus. Watch these ‘boys’ on the very big screen, for an insight? No thanks.
“But tastes vary” (my favourite B.E.comment re Mel)
‘scary’ is a kindergarten word – and these films aren’t fairytales.
I’ve read the review.
Won’t see the film.
Next?
You must not judge a film you have not seen. That is prejudgment, or, a better word, prejudice.
If you do it again, I will ban you for eighteen months.
I may I suppose be prejudging you, but you seem to me a fool.
Bob Carr wrote – “Waste not your time ..” seeing “Incendies”. I had already seen it and it wasn’t a waste of time.
Was it Craven who dismissed “Tinker, Tailor..”? I say, that’s foolish. Anyone who swallowed that heapawords missed a really good film – so what if we all would’ve chosen a different actor to play Smiley.
So why read a review?
Are you saying “don’t read my reviews, anyone’s reviews; just go and see all films”? Or stay silent. Okay.
But I say, Commonsense Intuition (courtesy Reader 1)
Prejudiced? re chilling/violent, yes.
Prejudging? maybe.
I’ll add them to “insane”, “illiterate”, “less witty” and “seemingly foolish”.
I accept the ban. I take away with me:
One ‘Bless you’ – yes, you did!
One 24hr ban for a less-witty joke.
I’ve been angling for the Thrill of Deletion long enough.
This might just do it.
Delete me
Happy Birthday-Coming-Up
I did not say go to every film. Go to no films if you like. But do not speak of any film you have not seen, in these columns, ever.
It is a rule of engagement.
You are banned till May 25.
Bob Ellis Dec 16 2011 6.52am
“Sorry, I can’t get through White…..
But I wouldn’t know. I managed half of Eye Of The Storm, fifty pages of Voss, a lot of short stories and his autobiography.
But I wouldn’t know.”
So Bob, a man, self confessed that he has read but an 1/8th the narrative output of an author, is fit to pass judgement on that authors worth, merit or value?!?!
Do not speak of any novel/writer you have not read, in these columns, ever.
It is a rule of engagement.
For your wanton hypocrisy you are charged with reinstating M-E, apologising to Terrance,and finding my lost green argyle sock.
You have till 2pm today – Sunday 6 May.
If you read what I said carefully, you will find that the operative phrase is, ‘I wouldn’t know’.
Go bag your head.
I am guiltless as charged and you, like Frank, are telling lies about me.
You are warned.
The question and response in full:
[Ellis regarding White] “Better than Kate Grenville? Peter Carey? Anna Funder? David Malouf? Really?
Why do you say that?”
[Ellis] “Sorry, I can’t get through White. The seventeenth draft of any sentence has its head under the armpit of the eighth which has its nose in the crutch of the third which is scratching the tinia of the eleventh which is picking the nise of the seventh and his people are sometimes lofty caricatures of the working classes I grew up with and know, I suggest, a bit better.
But I wouldn’t know. I managed half of Eye Of The Storm, fifty pages of Voss, a lot of short stories and his autobiography.
But I wouldn’t know.”
Ah Bob, the irony of what you call your “operative phrase”, whilst not inconsiderable, is still unable to contain your…obese Hubris,
Or your mannerist tendency toward self-dramatisation, or for having a Bob each way, argumentatively I mean.
Nice try Old Man.
You care to go another round?
Double or nothing?
This time I want World Peace, long walks on a beach, to sing “Mercy Seat” in a Hong Kong Karaoke bar, 4 shots of Gin and a love letter from a stranger penned in the backseat of a ’69 Ford Talladega.
You have till noon.
Sorry, just read this at 3.30. I did not presume to have a judgment of a writer I had read none of. I had read two and three quareter books of his in toto, a short story collection, a memoir and bits of three novels. I said I didn’t know but this was my impression. I would not presume to judge a writer I’d read none of, even this tentatively. Mar Ellen presumes to judge films she has not seen, not even ten minutes of, and she is an idiot.
What quarrel do you have with this?
You sound a bit like a kindergarten teacher, and like Reader ,with your “next”, rather rude, or general like../
Helvi, can you and Reader1 try to coexist? Please?
DQ, I have tried in the past, I have tried humouring, ignoring etc. etc…
Now the only way is avoidance.
How are you going with your nemesis, I have noticed that you are trying to have a peaceful relationship…
It takes two for that to be sccessful.
Terrible hypocrisy Helvi.
I can thank Bob for recommending this film. It has an extraordinary impact, due in part to its restraint. So much is implied that the air becomes thick with malevolence.
I felt it an unsettling masterpiece.
One sock, racing green, has been located.
“Lay your sleeping head, my love,
Human on my faithless arm;
Time and fevers burn away
Individual beauty from
Thoughtful children, and the grave
Proves the child ephemeral:
But in my arms till break of day
Let the living creature lie,
Mortal, guilty, but to me
The entirely beautiful….racing green sock.”
With apologies to Auden.
Are you quite well? Are you in your perfect mind?
You have but 4 minutes to address a wrong Old Man.
Stop your dilly-dallying and set your mind to the task at hand!
You critique White without having read his novels!!
How Utterly Extraordinary!
You then drop the guillotine on those you suppose are doing the same!
How Utterly….in Character!
Move man, Move!!
“in time of all sweet things beyond
whatever mind may comprehend,
remember seek(forgetting find)…that Hypocrisy has but the Rubric Ellis!!”
with apologies to Cummings
See above.
Be very, very careful.
See above.
Careful?
I change my underwear daily.
You just never know.
The girl has come to me for advice.
Films.
Wake in Fright/The Boys, Snowtown
Different age
Evil doubled
And poetry. That lullaby is said to be On Old Age and Impotence, I said. Yes, I’ve been told, she said.
There’s something about Mary – and she’s on the right track! Left Pandora’s blog. And high time.
Leave you a
“Bushy Bill with whiskers long, Hit Sydney town and strode around …………..”
The last line, the finish – across the border to yzall.
‘Take you riding in my car car’??
The girl said – a baby boomer song for U’66
Wait!
I must dash…and prepare!
I leave tomorrow morn,
But shall leave a quick note.
Look for it.
Quickly,
The lullaby: M-E was told…wrong
Now to Tokyo. 2 nights 3 days.
Almost “Lost in Translation”.
But it’s hard to repeat oneself, isn’t it?
I shall sneak out on the second day and take a quick jaunt up to Kanazawa.
To step once more into the…Sublime. The gallery by SANAA is a wonder.
Glass and walls and floors…when did Material get so…..Delicate?
The Return of Minimal Modernism…and I stand as its Champion!
And if we all cross our fingers long enough I should lay eyes on my pseudonym!!!
What a treat that shall be! I shall have to contain my exuberance…lest they throw me out prematurely!
Again!!!
Otherwise I may linger….
But lingering often gets me into Trouble,
ruminations, meditations, subjugations
wordplay, horseplay, foreplay
Of Miesian Space and Grand Bunk,
…a memory,
a broken amp of omnopon…a tiny puddle…on a pale blue workbench – RPA 1984 – and a youngerns wonder at the glory of a few mL.
Drag a finger.
Suck.
Hard.
As if it were the soft BrownPink Nipple of Josephine.
She lived 2 floors up. It wasn’t far to walk.
…Or the police chase on Koningstraat.
I was the better driver
…Or drinking whiskey in a strangers car on Carrer d’Aribau…
A retinal fix – electric light lit labia lips!
My bag is packed.
Within are my two favourite ribbed black turtlenecks.
Identical.
Both named “Trouble”.
I will return on the weekend.
With gifts.
Wish me…health and happiness, wish me the pomposities of some La-Di-Doo-Dah and the light step twinkle toe dash twirl of a Mr. Grand Poo-Bah!
Untitled, 1966
x.
The Champion.
Quis est? Quis est?
H oratius C ocles?
Hierocles?
Hiero?
eureka! …………… voila!
mais oui, mais oui
hai, hai