Modern Australian Cinema--c/d?

sadly most are dud

neither C nor D: Goddess of 1967

I enjoyed that violent one wwhere the young man got involved in gang stuff, I can't remember what it was called - from about 4 years ago???

can't remember more at the moment

More duds: Sample People (I'm on the soundtrack, haha!!!).

I'm getting a bit worked up here, as Courtney Love's ex once memorably said in that Nick Broomfield film.

Dud: fsckin Muriels Wedding and Priscilla. Of everything country's made, those are the best known internationally. UUUUUGH.

Trayce, Bliss, the book, is worth reading, as are all the Peter Carey books.

Classic b-grade Aussie biker movie: Stone.

(what did people think of head on? I loved loaded to bits so it was a crashing crashing disappointment to me . . .)

I like: Romper Stomper, Walking on Water, Lantana, Soft Fruit, The Boys, Children of the Revolution, Two Hands, Looking for Alibrandi, heaps more that I'll have to remember to post later.

What's Metal Skin like - anyone seen that? I haven't, but it has had widely varying reviews.

Also, is no one going to vote for Mad Max? The first one at least, anyhow.

Lantana is indeed something special - the casting is just about perfect.

Two that didn't really deserve the attention they got at the time: Breaker Morant and Gallipoli.

i was hoping nobody on this thread was gonna say 'quirky' though :(

On the downside, He Died With a Felafel In His Hand was a crushing disappointment.

(as an aside, how much do folks miss the late show? and how fucking otm are those chaser boys?!)

OK here's a dud - did anyone else think the Craic was a crock of shit? I like Jimeoin but geez. A short sketch stretched into a movie does NOT work.

Yes. It's depressing as fuck.

The Castle is great in a small Ealing comedy kind of way.

I kinda liked Two Hands too, and I want to just reiterate the love for Proof (I'm sure I've mentioned it elsewhere on this board - I certainly go on about it enough to people if prompted, even if it does involve the odious twat that is Russell Crowe) and Muriel's Wedding which I love. Also The Year My Voice Broke (and Flirting to a lesser extent). I can't think of any that haven't been mentioned, except Strictly Ballroom, and that's not really worth mentioning, is it?

What the hell happened with 'Stiff'? Shoulda worked with Sam Neill, Mick Molloy etc. but was totally half-baked.

Didnt Mick Molloy look old?

So they reckon Samson and Delilah is the best thing since sliced bread..

I think Noise is prob the best Australian film I've seen in a while. And like every aust film ever, It is slow and depressing

Why is it we can allow US blockbusters to be made here but we can't get our shit together to make wizz bang action blockbusters ourselves?

Yr right about slow and depressing. WTF are all Aus films like that for. Ugh.

O right apparently Samson and Delilah won the "Camera d'Or" at Cannes

http://www.smh.com.au/news/entertainment/film/2009/05/25/1243103460161.html

I can't think of any that haven't been mentioned, except Strictly Ballroom, and that's not really worth mentioning, is it?

oh it is, i tripped over it while having a bit of a channel-surf recently and was transfixed. incredible that it led to a sort of spike in competition dancing interest over here because it makes that world look grotesquely terrifying!!

nothing that baz luhrman has done since holds a candle to it really.

i wanna see samson & delilah. my year without sex looks good too.

I have seen Australia btw :(

haw

i saw JAPANESE STORY and LANTANA in high school and liked them both!

Somersault?

i have very fond memories of Kiss or Kill but am wary about seeing it again and beling let down. frances o'connor was such a babe in it

love this pic
http://www.unl.edu/scarlet/v8n15/kiss.jpg

why has The Proposition not been mentioned yet?

FORBIDDEN LIE$!

I'm trying to think of the last Aus film I even saw :| Maybe Bad Boy Bubby? Thats so long ago, geez.

Oh wait no - the Castle. That was good in a gentle kinda way!

I think we do short-run miniseries and satire so much better than movies. I'm thinking of stuff like Frontline and Very Small Business and all those 80s mini-movies the names of which all escape me all of a sudden.

Return to Eden?

Will ANY kind Australian send me the DVDs to Chances, the bonkers 1990s soap that apparently bordered on art cinema? kthxbye

I don't want people look at me funny in the DVD store. That Chances DVD box has at least seventeen stars on it covering up rude bits.

By the way, I wonder if we can reevaluate Fat Pizza following The Rise and Fall of Chk-Chk-Claire.

LOVE The Proposition; also really liked Little Fish...oh, and The Dish. They play that on cable here every now and again, I never get tired of watching that one.

No props yet for Death In Brunswick or The Big Steal?

I used to like Idiot Box but I have a feeling that it's not aged well.

Yep loved Little Fish and the Proposition.

I remember liking the Big Steal and Idiot Box at the time but yeah they prob haven't aged well?

anybody want to rep for Wake In Fright aka Outback? found it on karagarga and it looks kind of interesting

I LOOOOVE Death in Brunswick. Sam Neill was great before he became a shill for meat. 'Little Fish' and 'Candy' also ace. Must see 'Noise'. 'The Magician' is also really good.

Wake In Fright is fantastic, have seen it twice in a rammed pub on 16mm. Years-in-the-making restored print and DVD coming out this year.

Also: I remember loving 'True Love and Chaos'. Esp Miranda Otto singing Union City Blue at the RSL club. They filmed some of it when I was at Uni (Monash)...I think the motel scene with her and Hugo Weaving was shot at The Monash Hotel.

i got gifted those chances DVDs, but i appear to have misplaced them somewhere :/

Also, 'Peaches'

Just saw 'The Proposition', inspired by this thread, as I bought it yonks ago but never yet watched it. Bloody hell!

Loved this exchange...

Samuel Stote: What's a misanthrope, Arthur?
Two Bob: Some bugger who fuckin' hates every other bugger.
Samuel Stote: Hey, I didn't ask you, you black bastard
Arthur Burns: He's right Samuel. A misanthrope is one who hates humanity.
Samuel Stote: Is that what we are, misanthropes?
Arthur Burns: Good lord no. We're a family.

Danny Huston was so great. Also loved John Hurt's rendition of 'Danny Boy'...the flies, the flies are crawling...

Yes, it was fantastic! And his dying, quoting the poem, which Huston's character knows.

That reminds me - whats The Bank like? It has Wenham in it and he is awesome. I meant to see it in the cinema and never got round to it.

(It seems to have a storyline vary vaguely similar to Pi, which sounds curious)

<3 Wenham, but iirc i think it was terrible

Ah thats a shame.

Wenham was fantastic in After the Deluge.

so... "wake in fright"? c/d?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=le78LmmI6Kc

This whole thread and no one mentioned Dogs in Space ;_;

jed see Wake In Fright immediately! for years before the restoration, the one known 16mm print used to get shown in a local band-venue pub at Christmas and the place would be rammed.

dogs in space more leik dogshit in richmond

more

i think this is meant to be great?
http://mubi.com/films/snowtown

forthcoming

How the fuck has Animal Kingdom not been mentioned?

Two that didn't really deserve the attention they got at the time: Breaker Morant and Gallipoli.

― colin s barrow (colin s barrow), Saturday, October 18, 2003 9:37 PM (7 years ago) Bookmark

pfft what a maroon

Wake in fright is sickkkkkk

^ truth

from the director of First Blood and Weekend At Bernies

i didnt find it as nightmarish and brutal as i'd been hearing, but that probably says as much about me as anything. still fascinating/funny/unsettling

its cool that in jack thompson's first role he just burst into the movie fully formed in his jack thompson-ness

haha yes

...and that Chips Raffery's last role epitomised his Chips... Rafferty...ness. um.

NYC retro

http://www.filmlinc.com/films/series/the-last-new-wave-celebrating-the-australian-film-revival

I know it's in alphabetical order but I like how it seems the pinnacle of Australian filmaking is... Alvin Purple.

Speaking of which, a friend's dad was an extra in the sequel to Alvin Purple. He received a hot dog for his work.

My dad was a fairly main character in Alvin purple!

This is from the sequel but he's the dude with the mo in the top left frame:

http://au.movieposter.com/posters/archive/main/123/MPW-61567

in America, we have never heard of Alvin Purple.

How many hot dogs did your dad get Tim?

he was a cowriter so I guess he was cooking the hotdogs

finally saw Wake In Fright

badass. loved it. H4A otm, didn't find it as 'horrifying' or 'brutal' as I had heard, so I'm probably a terrible person. The roo scenes were definitely pretty OTT. How great was Pleasence. Ha! Honestly I found 90% pretty funny/familiar, and it was kind of a nice trip down memory lane what with all the old men in hats sitting out front of the pub, two-up and ye olde Australian money. Loved how it revolved so much about the unspoken rules for strangers in small town, all that outsider stuff was really creepy and great.

gave me a thirst, what with them sinking the piss like there's no tomorrow.

it'd be a good movie to do drinking games with, jeez you'd get hammered

also: !!! @ Tim F's Dad being in Alvin Purple. That's awesome!

Saw a lovely screening of Clara Law's 1996 film Floating Life last night followed by a pre-recorded Zoom Q&A with her - new film on the way!

Bit of a tyranny-of-small-differences thing as a NZer making the time to prioritise Aussie film - trawled through the past few years of the local film festival and I think Sweet Country, Terror Nullius and The True History of the Kelly Gang were the only Aussie films I saw; friends who are into horror have been into all the post-Babadook stuff that's come out.

Despite my last post in this thread I'd never seen Dogs in Space til very recently and... I was suprised that it was nowhere near as good as I thought it'd be? I spent my early 20s coveting the soundtrack, and the film is a hot mess of nothing.

Yeah it's a film which tries hard to coast on vibes but doesn't really make it! Soundtrack is killer of course.

I happened to rewatch Law's Floating Life and Goddess of 1967 really recently, which was nice, even if the latter especially felt like it could use a tighter edit. At least one of them is on Kanopy IIRC. I find Aus films from late 90s a bit spooky really. Like there's a uncanny-valley-ish "seems much like today... but not quite" thing going on.

Did anyone happen to see Friends & Strangers (James Vaughan) from a couple of years ago? It keeps lingering in my mind such I found myself casually reading this review. (Whose writer evidently thought it worthwhile -- and these takes are surely more interesting than I anything I can cobble together here.)

https://www.slantmagazine.com/film/friends-and-strangers-review-james-vaughan

It really seems to strike a chord with some people. eg. I (very) flippantly described it as "faintly absurdist mumblecore" or something to pique my brother's interest and his eventual response suggested it was perhaps the greatest thing I'd ever recommended lol.