Wednesday, December 3, 2008

Movin pictures

I really like Australian film. That is important to preface what I’m about to say. I think that a lot of the Australia hype has pulled the Australian film industry back into the spotlight, which is a good thing but points out an underlying flaw – our inability to move outside what would appear to be one genre. Baz has tried something different and it will remain to be seen whether it is ultimately successful, but I think that an inability to move away from black comedy in the past decade has really affected the industry.

I was reminded of this from this article in the Australian today, which explored our best films. There are some great ones in there, but not necessarily many from the past decade. That’s because all of them are orientated around Brian Brown style characters, with twists and turns and the like. The problem is perhaps that films of these type, from the mid 90s, were successful & have been regurgitated to generate or mimic some of that success. We need to get back to the more innovative films that characterised the industry in the 70s & 80s, even films like Strictly Ballroom from the early 90s.

With that out of the way, there really are some good films in this list. A few of my favourites would be:

The Castle – still relevant and widely quoted today. A wonderful insight into bog standard Australian suburbia too, not much has changed

Shine – Such a powerful film, with such wonderful music

Kenny – had the power that The Castle had to infiltrate popular language, very funny

Rose Byrne – Well not really a film, but sill, enough said

Chopper – I love this film. I generally have one of those laugh cringes though when people get hurt, so that was me throughout most of this film

Getting Square – ‘Whose paying for my bus fare?’ Too funny

Don’s Party – A different perspective to a very yobbo period in Australian history

Gallipoli – Such a power film, but I guess this just recounts an event that shaped so much of Australia’s future & national identity

Ill leave it there. I like a lot more, like Malcolm and He died with a falafel in his hand, but Ill just go on too long and need to finish a powerpoint before I go home. Lovely.


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