OSCAR AND LUCINDA

Australian/ UK, 1998, 140 minutes, Colour.
Ralph Fiennes, Cate Blanchett, Ciaran Hinds, Richard Roxburgh, Tom Wilkinson,
Directed by Gillian Armstrong.

Oscar Hopkins belongs to a strict sect but runs away from home, gambling on which church he should go to. He becomes an Anglican and a priest but has an addiction to gambling. To try to overcome it, he migrates to New South Wales.

Lucinda Leplasterier has grown up poor in New South Wales but inherits a glass factory in Sydney. She also befriends the Reverend Hassett. He is sent to the country because of his relationship with her. She sails to England on business.

On the return home, she meets Oscar and asks to confess. He hears her but is enthralled with meeting another gambler. Together, they gamble on ship and continue in Sydney. This has such a devastating effect on Oscar, that the two pledge never to gamble again.

However, Oscar accepts a bet that he can transport Lucinda's glass church overland to Hassett's parish. The journey is arduous and Oscar confronts Jeffris, a bigoted member of the escort, over his treatment of aborigines and kills him. Arriving in Bellingen, he is seduced by a widow. Distraught at where his life has led him, he sits in the glass church, prays and confesses and loses his life when the church sinks.

Beautifully shot, with sequences in England and in 19th century Sydney as well as the bush and rivers around Grafton, it is a pleasure to watch.

The burden of the characterisation and plot fall to the two stars. Cate Blanchett's Lucinda will remind moviegoers of the strong, individual women of Gillian Armstrong's other period films (My Brilliant Career, Little Women). She is a determined woman who succeeds in business but discovers her flair and her love for gambling. She encounters Oscar, the idiosyncratic priest, whose gambling obsession is even stronger than hers. However, what might seem to be a set-up for a romantic and passionate love story moves in other directions. This seems to have disappointed expectations of some reviewers and, perhaps, some audiences. Ralph Fiennes has also irritated some critics. His Oscar is a bundle of nerves, desires, idealism. He looks eccentrically scruffy.

But it is the religious dimension to the film and characters that is fascinating in an Australian novel and film. There is considerable explicit talk about God. Oscar comes from a severe Plymouth Brethren but converts to the Church of England. Lucinda is also a believer. The gambling theme and its obsessions are woven through the story culminating in the journey to move a glass church from Sydney to Bellingen (and the theme of the brutal treatment of aborigines) - and a confession scene that captures the experience of repentance.

1. The writings of Peter Carey? The adaptation for the screen? The re-creation of the period? Themes?

2. Production values, the international cast, costumes and décor, the musical score, religious overtones, choral singing?


3. Australian/British Co production? The settings in Devon? The coast, the cliffs, the beaches? Life in the small town, the church, the rectory? Oxford, the university, the races? The sailing ship? The contrast with Australia, the prologue and the transporting of the ship, the country, the city, the wharves, the factory, the glass church, travelling through the countryside, the town of Bellingen?

4. The title, the focus on each character, the childhood and adulthood? The meeting, communicating, the pleasure of gambling, religious dimensions, love?


5. The role of the narrator, the great grandson, comments on the characters, behaviour, perspectives?

6. The character of Oscar? As a boy, the ages, his religious father? The sect? The meetings, stern? No celebration of Christmas? Anti-Roman? attitudes? The servants and the pudding, Oscar tasting it, his father’s reaction? Will Oscars prayer, his sense of vocation, leaving his father, going to Mr. Stratton? Meeting Mr. and Mrs. Stratton? Stratton and his ambitions? Four Oscar to go to Oxford, to study for holy orders? Oscar and Oxford, the loner, friendship with th cattle fish? Awkwardness, his clothes? The fish introducing him to the races, gambling, the visit to the track, his success, giving the money to the pool, his personal conscience? His fear of the seaC and water? The decision to go to New South Wales?

7. Lucinda, her relationship with her parents, the gift of the glass, breaking it, her fascination? The death of her father? The concern of her mother? Wanting her to return to England? The mother’s illness, death? The funeral, the lawyer? Her owning the properties? Getting the money? Growing up, her going to Sydney, Mr. Hassett? The discussions? Her wanting to buy the property, wanting him to help her? Her own gambling, playing cards in the night, her friends and lawyers? Mr. Hassett and his confrontation of her? Her going to London, buying the machinery? On the boat?

8. Oscar, his father coming to the boat, some reconciliation, kneeling in prayer? His later death? Lucinda overhearing Oscar? Her curiosity? Her wanting to go to confession, explaining and gambling, Oscar’s knowledge? The excitement? Their playing?

9. Oscar and his arrival in Sydney, the meeting with the bishop, the bishop and the clergy, his gambling? Some disapproval? The plan for the glass church? The decision to build it?

10. The captain, Percy, the planning of the expedition? Getting the parts together, the wagons, setting out, the countryside?

11. The aborigines, the contrast with Christian attitudes and aboriginal religion? The officer and his attack on the aborigines, callously killing them? Oscar’s reaction? Percy’s reaction? The officer, Oscar attacking him, his inhumane behaviour, Percy killing him?

12. The effect on Oscar, Percy as his friend? Supporting him? Continuing to sail? Arriving in Belingen? Oscar in the church?

13. Mr. Hassett, life in Bellingen? The widow, her advances, her attraction towards Hassett, towards Oscar?

14. The boat, the heat, the warnings about the heat? Oscar, within the Church, the donation to Mr. Hassett? His contemplation, enumerating his sins? His being trapped? The Church going down, his fear of water, acceptance of his death?

15. The funeral, Lucinda arrival and regrets? The attendance at the funeral?

16. The widow, her pregnancy, giving birth to the child, Lucinda caring for the child? Her devotion to Oscar? The narrator, the great grandson, and the visuals of Lucinda tending the child?

17. The achievement of the film, adaptation of the novel, recreation of an era? Themes of religion? The secular world of Sydney? The glass industry? The issue of gambling and integrity?