THE POPE MUST DIE

UK, 1991, 91 minutes, Colour.
Robbie Coltrane, Beverly D'Angelo, Herbert Lom, Alex Rocco, Paul Bartel, Annette Crosbie, Balthazar Getty, Robert Stephens.
Directed by Peter Richardson.

The Pope Must Die is a humorous speculation about what might happen if the wrong person was elected pope. (The Pope Must Die seemed a terrible title for the American audiences and so it was given the alternate title in the United States as The Pope Must Diet, appropriate for the large bulk of Robbie Coltrane!).

The film shows the Vatican infiltrated by the Mafia. Herbert Lom is the Mafia chief who is plagued by his rebellious daughter who wants to run off with the leader of a musical group. Alex Rocco and Paul Bartel are corrupt cardinals in the Vatican. Alex Rocco had appeared in The Godfather and other Mafia-type films and lends a credible sinister presence to the proceedings.

However, it is Robbie Coltrane (Cracker, Harry Potter films) who is the genial presence, a simple priest who loves working with children, who clashes with a severe mother superior (Annette Crosbie) but whose name coincides with the Mafia's candidate for the papacy, and through a computer error becomes pope. The film then shows what it might be like with a simple character who has no political agenda except charity in the seat of Peter. Needless to say, there are comic clashes with the Mafia and a parody of gangster films. Direction is by Peter Richardson, a member of the sometimes anarchic British comedy group, The Young Ones.

1.Comedy, spoof, blend of the serious and the comic? Sentiment and sweetness?

2.The Italian locations, the Vatican - and the reproduction of Vatican offices, chapels? The musical score? The newsreel and stock footage of St Peter's Square?

3.The background of the television series The Young Ones, the tone, reality/farce? Sweetness? The blend of these ingredients - and the "moral" tone?

4.Robbie Coltrane's portrait of Dave: at the monastery, outside the monastery with the orphans, his relationship with the children, with the little boy, with the Mother Superior and her strictness? His awkwardness, the playing of the guitar and singing "Speedy Gonzales" with the children? The superior's reaction, ousting him? The sudden reverencing by everyone, by the monks, his return to the monastery, the abbot - angry, his analysis of the situation? The confreres? The farewell as he went to the Vatican? His being simpatico?

5.The Pope dying in the Vatican, the cardinal playing cards, the monsignor and his impatience for the Pope to die? The cardinals, the impact of the death and its announcement? The reproduction of the Vatican rituals? The conclave, the television commentators in St Peter's Square, the people? The satire on the cardinals and their manner, 25 days of conclave, the factions, the growing desperation, the cardinal in the chair? The black smoke? Disappointment?

6.Carellie and the gangster type, gunrunning? His using of Cardinal Rocco? The monsignor? His having the priest ready to stand by as elected Pope? Rocco's speech to the cardinals to persuade them to elect his candidate? The acclaim? The mishap with the deaf priest and the wrong name? Rocco dominating the monsignor, searching for the name in the computer? The result, Rocco and the monsignor handling the situation, Dave's arrival, the protocol, the rituals?

7.Dave and his personality, the simple priest, the monastery? The farewell, the ride with the police, his being knocked out in St Peter's Square, coming to, being hungry, the showing of the rooms, the coronation, the crowds, their expressions of loyalty and his being hungry? The press conferences and his being cut off on controversial issues? His meeting with Bish and becoming friendly with him? The papal routines, the Popemobile and the assassination attempt? His wanting to go home? The question of money, the letters and the pleas for money for orphanages? His changing his mind, the signing of the cheques for Cardinal Rocco? His examining all the books, going to the bank and closing it down? His standover tactics with the security guard and the officials? His going with Bish and overhearing Rocco ridiculing him with the gunrunner? His firing Rocco? His treatment in a kindly way - the victim wanting money from the bank and his giving it to him?

8.Carellie, his reaction to the election mistake? The gunrunning, the Latin-American? tyrants? Rocco and his being ousted, his decision to spy on the Pope with the monsignor? Eavesdropping and hearing the news about Dave and his son? Using the media, making up fake interviews? The effect on Dave, his being ousted? His return to the Vatican, the new conclave and the election of Albini, his wanting to thwart the plans of Carellie?

9.Luccia Carellie and her relationship with her father, seeming exemplary, avoiding her birthday party, going to Joe Don Dante, the sexual relationship, the concert? The return home and the party, Carellie ordering the assassination of the singer? The two hired assassins, their references - and the photos of their victims? Their awkwardness, comedy routines? Setting up the explosion - killing the daughter? And Joe surviving? Their excusing themselves to Carellie - and bringing the pies, allegedly with the hearts of the assassins?

10.Joe's mother coming to the hospital, his pleading to tell him the story of his father before he died? Her care for him, telling the story? His joy at having the Pope as father? Disguised as a nun, going to the papal apartments, going into the shower, Dave and his shock discovering what had happened? The story of their relationship, the mechanic, her being pregnant, going to Paris and not telling him? Dave's reaction - and the cardinal listening in? The disguise and the visit to the hospital, the reconciliation with his son, his son's death? Hearing that Carellie was behind the assassination? The papers, his reaction to such news, his leaving the Vatican?

11.Dave being ousted, Rocco returning and assuming all his privileges? A drink in the bar and his being thrown out? Busking in the streets, meeting the orphan, their collecting money together? Meeting Joe's mother again and her scorning them? Her taking pity, reacting against the newspaper stories, believing Dave, cooking the meal - and their sleeping? Dave's decision to thwart Carellie's plans? Going into the Vatican, the encounter with Rocco, Rocco shot, the confession and the absolution - despite Rocco's mobile phone? The Swiss Guard, getting into the costume, exposing Albini, exposing Carellie? The confrontation with Carellie, his going berserk, the cardinals in amazement, his shooting the roof of the Sistine Chapel - and Carellie crushed by the image of God falling on him?

12.Rocco, the American cardinal, wheeler-dealing, money and banking, the mistress? The complete scandal? The monsignor and his prim and proper manner, in collusion with Rocco? Handling the Vatican situation, spying on the Pope?

13.The exaggeration of the plot with Carellie disguising himself to become Pope and so get control of the Vatican banks!

14.The background of Morris West stories like The Shoes of the Fisherman, Salamander with Vatican politics, corruption?

15.The happy ending, Dave, getting married, Bish doing the wedding ceremony? With the orphans? The nun who had smiled in attendance on him in the Vatican - the first female Pope?

16.The response of audiences - to the serious issues about the church and corruption, to the humane issues? To the parody and spoof.

POLICE

France, 1983, 113 minutes, Colour.
Gerard Depardieu, Sophie Marceau, Sandrine Bonnaire.
Directed by Maurice Pialat.

Police is a straightforward study of police on a case, drug-dealing in Paris and Marseilles. It was written and directed by Maurice Pialat, best known internationally for such films as Loulou, Under Satan's Sky, Van Gogh.

Gerard Depardieu portrays a hardworking policeman, tough in his investigations. He is investigating drug-dealers with North African and Marseilles connections. We see him in interrogations, working with partners, infatuated by a drug dealer, prepared to lose everything for her, only to be betrayed by her.

The film is straightforward in its presentation, the early sequences merely a range of interviews. However, as the film becomes more complex, we are drawn into the interactions of criminals, lawyers, police. There are betrayals and individuals having to decide their values and what they stood for. While the plot is reminiscent of so many British and American thrillers, the film emphasises the personal dramas.

1.The title of the film? The status of police in the '80s? The public and their response to police, the administration of the law, detection, justice? The police as ordinary citizens involved for protecting society? The pressures on the police? How well were these issues dramatised in the characters, the plot?

2.Paris settings, Marseilles? Police precincts, apartments, restaurants, prison? Musical score?

3.The stark style of the film? Television influence? The early sequences and the interviews? The strong focus on individuals, close-ups? The close-ups on people's lives and values?

4.Mangin and Gerard Depardieu's screen presence? Interrogating suspects? His stances, skills at investigation? The use of violence? Pressures? His own personal life? Marie as his partner and her mellowing him? His contacts with the lawyer, the visits with him, accusing him of going over to the criminals? The investigations, the visits to the restaurants? Prison? The meeting with Noria, questions, in prison - her release, the infatuation, the affair? His being deceived and used by her? The lawyer discovering the relationship? His final decisions, the money, the drugs, the criminals? The final deal? His future?

5.The picture of the police precinct, the officials, the collaboration, detection and clues, information? The interrogations and imprisonment? Moral standards? Drugs, violence?

6.The world of the criminals, families, connections, not giving information, betrayals? Meetings and pressure? Drugs, North Africa, Marseilles? The young man imprisoned? The rest of the family supporting him?

7.Noria, her relationship with the arrested man? Her lies, in prison? Her release, the money? Her protecting herself, the lies, the liaison with the policeman? Her telling the truth?

8.The contacts on the street, the prostitute and her information? The links with the lawyer?

9.The lawyer, his background, connections with criminals? Contacts with the police, being tainted by the criminals? His shock at the liaison between the officer and Noria?

10.Popular police themes? Plot, characters? The focus on issues - and the exploration, French style?

POLICE STORY: THE FREEWAY KILLINGS

US, 1987, 138 minutes, Colour.
Richard Crenna, Angie Dickenson, Ben Gazzara, Tony Lo Bianco.
Directed by William A. Graham.

Police Story: The Freeway Killings is a mid-'80s pilot, an attempt to rejuvenate the 1970s successful series, Police Story. William A. Graham, the director of the original pilot movie, is director here. There are a lot of technical staff from the original series which was based on ideas by Joseph Wambaugh, with his insight into LA police and the pressures on them (New Centurions, Choirboys, Black Marble).

The film focuses on a series of killings in Los Angeles, the investigations and interdepartmental rivalries, touches on the family backgrounds of some of its characters - with the influence of the successful series LA Law and Hill Street Blues from the '80s.

The film is well acted by a number of movie and TV veterans led by Richard Crenna, Ben Gazzara, Tony Lo Bianco and Angie Dickinson.

The material is familiar - but quite effectively done, even if at some length.

1.Enjoyable police story? Background of the original series? The attempt to bring the series to life, '80s style?

2.Los Angeles settings, the skyline of the city, the freeways, the precincts, the neighbourhoods? Offices, homes? Stunts and special effects? Chases, crimes? Musical score?

3.The title, the original series, the focus on the killings and investigations? Serial killers?

4.The focus on the police force, the memory of the '60s and difficulties against police, their holding the line? Investigations in the '70s? The veterans with their experience? What happened to them over 25 years? Police investigations, computers, subservience to computers, human element? On the streets, detective work? Crime, crime on the streets, organised crime, crazies, drugs, civic corruption? Administration of police forces, relationship with mayors' offices etc?

5.The focus on the police work, the squads in action, pursuits, stakeouts? Detective work and interrogations? Following leads? Interdepartmental rivalry? Authority? Egos and ambitions? The tensions? Personal lives, effect on work? The portrait of police at work, pressures? The media, public officials wanting results?

6.Bob Danvers, his relationship with his wife, clashes with her, her support? 25 years? Memories of Fred? His career, no nonsense, relationship with Tom Wright, with his staff? Computerisation? The exams, the written, the oral - and his views on the police force? Interviews with the mayor and with Harris? Too independent for the mayor? Meeting his rivals, friendliness? Tension, the false arrest, the corrupt cops and the stakeout and pursuit? The serial killer, the investigations, his congratulations? His success? The optimism of delineating this character with his aims for reform?

7.Tom Wright, head of his office, his staff? Tensions with his wife, clashes? The broken marriage? Protecting his family from his work, his daughter's reaction against him, her drug-taking, de Angelo and his partner finding her, the drugs, her physical condition, hospital, animosity towards her father? His reaching out, hard attitudes, her change of heart? Rehabilitation? His inability to relate to his wife, the decisions with Anne, going back to his wife, the reasons? His love for Anne, the burnt-out policeman, coming to life again with her? Collaborating with her at work?

8.Anne Cavanaugh, her work, the relationship with Tom, give and take, the break, the emotional effect? Her skill at her work, the interrogation, confrontations with the killer, quick thinking, her gun and shooting?

9.De Angelo and his partner, on the beat, their skill in tracking down criminals, the pursuits? The case, departmental rivalry? The search for the car, finding it? To the capture, supporting Anne? Their work with Tom Wright's daughter?

10.The crooked cops, their plan, the woman from San Francisco, the ransom, the kidnapping, change of plan? The police officer involved and his reporting to the authorities? Eluding the pursuit, caught, the woman saved?

11.The killers, their picking up the prostitutes, pretending to be police, sadistic? The number of murders? Lack of conscience? Being watched by the police? The investigation, addresses, contacts with the dead women? Tracking down Kerr James, Anne Cavanaugh reaching him, the shoot-out? James and his fear when arrested? The victims, their backgrounds, age, prostitution, drugs?

12.The mayor, busy, wanting finance to come into the city, wanting to control the police? Harris, subservient to the mayor? Warnings to Bob? Interviews with him?

13.The range of criminals, downtown crime, arrests in the street? The drug runner and his being captured, information about the dead girl? The two robbers pursued by Fred, his drinking, downbeat, Kim? The report exonerating him from being drunk? His pride in being a policeman?

14.The popularity of police stories, expectations of the police? Pressures? Crime in the US in the '80s?

POINT BREAK

US, 1991, 122 minutes, Colour.
Patrick Swayze, Keanu Reeves, Gary Busey, Lori Petty, John C.McGinley, James Le Gros.
Directed by Kathryn Bigelow.

Point Break is an action thriller, FBI investigation of bank robberies, but with a surfie ethos. The film was directed by Kathryn Bigelow (Near Dead, Blue Steel).

The film captures the atmosphere of the California surfies, the beaches, the waves, the activity. It also focuses on the close-knit community of surfers, their philosophy of life (with phrases like "a hundred percent adrenalin", "to the limit", "over the edge" ...).

Keanu Reeves is an FBI agent who is ordered to become a surfie in order to investigate bank robberies allegedly committed by surfies (disguised with masks of ex-presidents). Patrick Swayze is the lead surfer. Gary Busey is the veteran FBI man.

The film has strong action sequences, good surfing sequences, skydiving - especially with Keanu Reeves diving out of the plane at the end without benefit of parachute (and landing with Swayze). The robbery sequences and chases are also well staged and filmed.

However, the film is quite long, might have ended in several places. As it is, the climax is at Bells Beach, Australia - with Hawaii standing in for Victoria and Peter Phelps around with an Australian accent to make it authentic!

1.Entertaining action thriller? Surfing thriller? Police investigation and FBI? The blend of surfing thriller and action?

2.California settings, the beaches, the town? The sea and the waves, the surfing? The skydiving stunts? The desert? The climax and the huge wave? Musical score?

3.The title, surfing jargon, limits, adrenalin, hundred percent...?

4.Johnny Utah and his background, sport? His success in training? His pride, arrogance? Los Angeles appointment? Partnering Angelo? His resentment, seeing him in action, tough stances? The robberies of the ex-presidents? The job, infiltrating the surfies? The backing of Angelo? The decisions, the authority and their criticism of his stances? His infiltration, the surfboard in the office, the comeuppance of his superior? His mingling on the beach, going surfing, the encounter with Tyler and her rescuing him? Her teaching him surfing? Reporting in? Angelo and his advice? The meeting with Bodhi, admiring him, listening to him, his philosophy? Bodhi rescuing him from the Razorheads?

5.Johnny and his surfing with Bodhi, mixing with the group, the friends, the individual personalities, way of life, parties, drugs, philosophy? Money?

6.The suspicion of the Razorhead gang, the build-up to the raid, the tension, the violence, the reaction of the gang, the mower? The raid going wrong? The realisation of the FBI surveillance and the stakeout for months? Ruining the plan? The reaction of the authorities?

7.The authorities and their attitude towards Johnny and Angelo?

8.Tyler, her background, surfing, relating to Johnny, her ethos, the love affair? The impact on her, on him? His concealing the truth, her finding out the truth and her reaction?

9.Johnny's realisation that Bodhi and his friends were the ex-presidents? The robberies, the confrontation? The chase? The robbery going wrong, the shooting, the man wounded and dying? Unmasked? Bodhi and the confrontation with Johnny, his not shooting him?

10.Their taking Johnny, Tyler as hostage? Making him participate in the robbery? Their making mistakes? The skydiving and the experience?

11.The build-up to the confrontation, in the plane, going to the rendezvous, the communication with the guard for Tyler? The parachute finale? Johnny and his diving without parachute? The surviving with Bodhi? Rescuing Tyler? Bodhi going off into the desert?

12.The Australian sequences, the waves, Johnny Utah arriving, the confrontation with Bodhi? The enormous last wave? Bodhi's death, Johnny tossing in his badge?

13.The film as a successful robbery thriller, FBI investigation? The film as a successful surfing and skydiving action story? The film as a successful presentation of young adults, their philosophy of life? The film blending all these ingredients?

THE PLEDGE

US, 2002, 124 minutes, Colour.
Jack Nicholson, Robin Wright Penn, Aaron Eckhart, Benicio del Toro, Helen Mirren, Vanessa Redgrave, Patricia Clarkson, Mickey Rourke, Harry Dean Stanton, Sam Shepard.
Directed by Sean Penn.

This is a powerful and disturbing film.

Sean Penn has proven to be one of Hollywood's most talented actors. Many will remember his convict helped by Sister Helen Prejean in Dead Man Walking. He is also a talented director with an eye to very serious and 'uncommercial' stories. A previous film was The Crossing Guard about a minder of children's school crossings whose daughter is killed by a hit-run driver whose marriage collapses and who becomes obsessed with revenge when the driver is released from prison. It was a sombre and powerful film starring Jack Nicholson.

Penn uses Jack Nicholson in The Pledge. It is almost a one-man show so strongly does Nicholson dominate the film. (Many predicted that he would win the Best Actor award at the 2001 Cannes Film Festival - but he didn't.) The cast has a star list of cameo roles including an unrecognisable Benicio del Toro as an Indian charged with murder, Vanessa Redgrave as the grandmother of a victim and Helen Mirren as a psychologist.

While the film is a police investigation into a series of child abuse murders, it is also a drama of a man obsessed with bringing a criminal to justice, a personal pledge made to a distraught mother. Nicholson plays a detective who, on the day of his retirement, helps with the investigation and makes the pledge. In his retirement, he devotes himself completely to fulfilling his pledge. It leads him to tracking suspicious characters, making mistakes in identifying the killer. He buys a store to stay near the assumed killer, gives refuge to a young woman and her son but exposes them to danger.

One of the difficulties for audiences watching the film is the them of child abuse and violence. This is a topic in the headlines every second day and the media inundate readers with horrifying stories. Emotional responses have led to riots on British estates, campaigns to name and shame perpetrators, pleas for stronger legislation to punish offenders. But, in watching a film like The Pledge, audiences are given the opportunity to go a little deeper into the theme. The film opens with a brutal assault and murder which may be too difficult for some audiences to look at. But this is a serious portrayal of a horrific subject.

The film is based on a play by German Swiss author, Frederick Durrenmatt. This grim Germanic story is adapted from the Alps to the Rockies. But it also transfers a German pessimistic tone to the characters and events. This is especially true of the ending (which is actually shown to us at the beginning though we do not realise it until the end). American films are usually upbeat with a neat solution to everything. Penn has decided to stay with the pessimism and the uncertainty. Perhaps this is the reason why the film is admired by critics but did not do great business with the public. It is a film for those who want something meaty, well written, acted and directed.

1. The impact of the film as drama? Portrait of character? The skill and work of Sean Penn as director?

2. The Germanic origins of the story, their being transplanted to a Nevada setting? European sensibility in an American context? The themes of the village, people and interactions, violence and abuse?

3. The structure of the film: the opening with Jerry madly talking to himself, the birds? The reprisal of this sequence at the end and all that had happened to Jerry in between? Jerry as a good man, wanting to do his best, giving a pledge, yet fate depriving him of knowing the truth and achieving the fulfilment of the pledge? The pessimism of the ending?

4. The title, Jerry's promise, the dead girl's mother and her oath, the cross made by her daughter, Jerry swearing on his own salvation - and the irony of achieving some salvation but not knowing it and condemning himself?

5. The range of locations, the snow-clad mountains, the fishing lake, cities and towns, the roads, the gas stations? The range of the seasons? The musical score and its moods?

6. Jerry and his skills as a policeman, his retirement and farewell party, Stan and his support, Eric and the affirmation? The party, the ticket to go fishing? The information coming in about the murder, Jerry wanting to go? Observing the murder site, helping Stan, advising about saving the buttons? The issue of who would tell the parents? The police unwilling? Jerry going, meeting the parents surrounded by so many turkeys? At the table, his breaking the news, the anger of the father and wanting to see his daughter, Jerry's advising that it was hard for him to look at her and so for the father to wait? The intensity of the mother, her making Jerry pronounce the promise on his own salvation and on the cross?

7. The intercutting of the mountain scene, the boy on the snow bike, breaking down, watching the Indian running away, getting into his truck, going through the snow, discovering the body? His later being a witness? Jerry seeing him a year later at the Fourth of July parade?

8. Stan and his role in the police force, his ambitions? Admiration for Jerry? His plan for a confession, taking the Indian? The interrogation and its being videoed? Acting as a friend, getting the Indian to rely on him, suggesting what had happened, persuading him that he had done the crime and for him to confess? The Indian, his criminal background, his being in jail, his mental deficiency? His not understanding the questions? His thinking about the previous crime? Stan persuading him to confess? Stan's boasting at getting the confession, Jerry suspicious that this was not a confession? The Indian being taken out, the gunshot, getting the policeman's gun, killing himself? The dramatic impact at this stage of the film with the crime, the mystery, Jerry's retirement, the pledge?

9. Jerry at the airport, his watching the plane, not going? Seeing Stan, asking for the information? His superiors thinking that he was being affected by retirement crisis and advising him to go to a psychiatrist? His establishing the pattern of where the killings happened, interviewing various people, especially Mickey Rourke as the father of the girl who disappeared? The information that he was building up, the pattern of the crimes, the psychology? Eric not persuaded?

10. The visit to the first victim's grandmother, discussing the little girl with her, getting a feeling for the children, the Hans Christian Andersen fairy story about the angel (and the aerial shot over the location of the death)? The irony of the shop-owner below, the chocolates - and her son being the killer?

11. Betsy Pike and the little girl's drawing, the porcupines, the giant, the car? These themes recurring later with Jenny, the magician and her keeping secrets from her mother - but not from Jerry because he was not her parent?

12. Jerry going on holidays, fishing, discovering the service station, making an offer to buy it? The owner and his daughter, their reluctance, change of heart, going to Arizona? Buying, setting it up, going fishing? Going to the hotel, the friendship with Lori? Playing darts, snooker? Looking for furniture? Settling into his new life, serving the customers? Trouble with the credit cards? The humane touch - and yet his being perennially on the lookout for signs of the killer?

13. His watching? Cars and suspicions? Going to see the woman with the son who was the driver and yet the minister at the chapel? His seeming to fit the picture of the killer? Driving the truck? The friendship with Jenny, inviting her to go to church? Jerry's return and finding that she had gone? His driving madly to get there? His imagining the worst - and then seeing the minister and being welcomed into the church?

14. His visit to the psychiatrist, wanting her opinion on the drawings? Her making a hypothesis about the significance of the giant and the gifts? Her turning the tables and asking him about his own psyche, retirement, sexual activity, drinking? The effect of the interview?

15. The growing friendship with Lori? Love for her daughter? The audience seeing the potential of the abuser and killer in Jerry himself because of the psychiatrist's suggestions? The outings together, the balloon, the sail (? or sale?) and Jenny disappearing for a moment? Lori's upset? Lori and discussions, friendship? Her husband beating her, taking refuge with Jerry? His inviting them in? Reading the stories and being a father to Jenny? The affair with Lori?

16. The build-up to the climax: Jenny and her stories, the magician and the secret confided in Jerry? Allowing her to go by herself - and Lori's later anger, feeling that she had been used and abused, leaving him? His persuading Stan to send a troop to watch? Their finally giving up, warning Lori? The irony of their passing the accident on the way back? Their dismissal of Jerry and his hypotheses, condemning him as a person, as a drunk?

17. The build-up to Jenny's meeting the magician: the car, speeding along the road, the trucks? Audience reaction to the ambush being called off? The irony of the accident and the death of the killer? The scene with his mother worrying about the chocolates and his taking them? The man killed in the car crash - and the visual inferno with his skeleton and its hellish overtones?

18. The pathos and irony of the ending with Jerry having deteriorated, a sense of failure - and yet he was absolutely correct? The strength and power of Jack Nicholson's performance as Jerry?

A PLACE TO CALL HOME

US, 1986, 100 minutes, Colour.
Linda Lavin, Lane Smith, Maggie Fitzgibbon, Paul Cronin.
Directed by Russ Mayberry

A Place to Call Home is an entertaining telemovie from the team of Linda Lavin, executive producer, actress, and Russ Mayberry, director, A Matter of Life and Death. It is about an American family from Houston who decide to go to Australia in the late '60s to start a new life, to get away from American society and its pressures. The film is based on a true story - which was also the basis for the mini-series, The Last Frontier, with Linda Evans, Jason Robards and Jack Thompson.

The Australian sequences are set beyond Sydney, in an area of drought, a small country town and a sheep station. Linda Lavin is good as the mother. Blaine Smith is also good as the weak father who ultimately does not want to stay with his family. American stars Lori Lachlan and Robert Mc Naughton lead the cast of children. The Australian contingent is led by Paul Cronin, in one of his best performances, and Maggie Fitzgibbon.

The film is designed for the American audience so takes broad sweeps in presenting Australia and Australians. It also invents some aboriginal mythology about Dreaming and the breaking of droughts. The screenplay and story are from Carol Sobieski, writer of many films and telemovies including Annie, The Women's Room.

1.The pleasing American telemovie? For Australian audiences? World-wide? The picture of American and Australian society? Lifestyles? Opportunities?

2.The sequences in Houston, the way of life? The presentation of Australia, the Outback, the town and its way of life?

3.Australian images: the desert, drought, the home, sheep, the town, the dust, ugliness and ruggedness, the animals?

4.Australian people: Bob Jakes, Alva, the townspeople, Mr Yates, Father O 'Leary, the shearers?

5.The picture of the family in Houston, Sam and his job, his edginess, the birthday party? His wanting discipline for the children? Liz, the 11 kids, changing from their way of life, Liz playing golf with Joan and regretting the move, the hopes? On the plane?

6.The sketch of Sam, his deceit, not going with the family, the bonds and care, his visit, going back to America, the phone calls, Liz weeping, not sending any money, suddenly turning up, intervening with the sheep and the flood, Liz's strong speech saying that she could do without him, his being turned away?

7.Liz and the going to Australia, trying to persuade the children, the lift from Father O'Leary, the drought, the ugliness of the property, the clash with Bob, taking the children to school, Mr Yates and his severity, Alva and her disapproval, the advice about the sheep? Her relationship with the children, Jenny cycling away, their going to school, the ugliness of the house, the pact with them all, Jenny's support?

8.Their attempts to settle: improving the house, the garden, buying the sheep, bringing them home as a group, the cow and the milk, the chickens, gradually settling, studying, making friends, managing? The importance of the sheep, Olivia as the pet, its lamb stillborn, selling Olivia, buying it back?

9.Bob and his first appearance, drunk and mad? His staying to help, Sam employing him, his advice about the merinos, having to take orders from Liz despite his objections, protecting her, bringing the sheep home, fighting the shearer who insulted her? His talking about aboriginal lore, the myths about the drought and the rain, telling Owen, Sharon?

10.The drought, the Dreaming stories, the myths about Biami and the frogs, the fringe dwellers and Bob being with them, taking Owen? A magic place? Sharon and her going through the ritual with the stone? The flood, her accident and rescue?

11.Liz, dependent, weeping, phone calls to Joan? Standing up to Alva? The sheep, the good results with the shearing, the wool, the sales, the prospects for the following year? Her plain speaking to Sam, self-reliance?

12.Jenny, the pact and staying, Michael and his eye for business? Sharon and the river? Matt as a loner? The younger children?

13.Alva, wisdom, her help? Friendship?

14.Australia as a new frontier, for work, hard self-reliance?

15.The postscript about the various children and their work? Liz and her joining the contemplative order in New South Wales?

A PLACE OF ONE'S OWN

UK, 1944, 92 minutes, Black and white.
James Mason, Barbara Mullen, Margaret Lockwood, Dennis Price, Helen Haye, Michael Shepley, Dulcie Gray, Moore Marriott.
Directed by Bernard Knowles.

A Place of One's Own is a small-budget British movie of the mid-'40s. It is from the Gainsborough Studios with stars James Mason and Margaret Lockwood. However, it is a far cry from the high-passioned melodramas such as The Wicked Lady, The Man in Grey, Fanny by Gaslight.

This is a pleasant ghost story from a novel by Osbert Sitwell (who collaborated with the screenplay). Mason acts out of type as an elderly Leeds gentleman. Barbara Mullen is his wife. They buy an old house which has the reputation of being haunted. Margaret Lockwood is the companion who is taken over by the ghost of the house. Dennis Price is the sympathetic doctor.

The film is familiar material - but done with an elegant touch and very British restraint. Light and attractive entertainment - but a film of its period.

1.Entertaining ghost story? Human drama? The elegant touch with turn of the century style?

2.Black and white photography, atmosphere of the period, the house and the town? The strong cast and their performances?

3.The title, the Smedhursts' retirement, the ironies of the ghost, Smedhurst being willing to destroy the house in order to save Annette?

4.Harry and his wife, their working life, their retirement? Buying the house - and getting it cheaply? The love of each other, the memories of their dead children? Hopes for retirement? The house, settling in, the mysterious voice on the communication pipe? The wife and her suspicions of ghosts? Harry and his scepticism? Annette and her arrival, the happy household? The sending out of invitations, the military man and his wife, Robert as visitor? Discussions about the history of the house? Annette and her playing the piano, her taking ill? Harry and his puzzle, his wife looking after Annette? Advice from doctors? From the estate agents? Harry getting the police to track down the doctor who was the lover of the ghost? His arrival, healing Annette? The information that he had died the night before? The happy resolution - Annette as the daughter they did not have, announcing her engagement, the prospect of the happy marriage - and a place of their own? The pleasant portrait of an elderly British couple?

5.Annette, her charm, coming to be the companion, fitting into the household? The mystery of her orders to the gardener - and the indication of the ghost? The finding of the gold locket? Her attraction towards Robert? Her nervousness, playing the piano, being taken over, taken ill, her delirium, the ghost of Elizabeth and her memories? Her recovery - and the happy ending?

6.Robert, a proper doctor, his aunt and uncle and their society attitudes, disdain of the Smedhursts? Attracted to Annette? His concern about her illness, treating her? The cure? The prospect of marriage?

7.The atmosphere of the period - the aristocracy, visiting, snobbery? The local police, the estate agent? Doctors?

8.The ghost story and its plausibility - other worlds, atoning for sins in life, part of the energy remaining, conflicts having to be resolved? A pleasant ghost story - with no special effects but strong acting, atmosphere and humour and sentiment?

P.I. PRIVATE INVESTIGATION

US, 1987, 91 minutes, Colour.
Martin Balsam, Anthony Zerbe, Ray Sharkey, Clayton Rohner, Talia Balsam.
Directed by Nigel Dick.

P.I. Private Investigation is an interesting and enjoyable police thriller. However, it plays like an episode from a television series. It has a good cast led by Clayton Rohner as the bewildered son. Anthony Zerbe is the editor of the paper, Martin Balsam his adviser. Ray Sharkey is the rogue policeman. Effective of its kind.

1.Interesting thriller? Plausible?

2.Los Angeles locations, special effects and stunts? The musical score?

3.The title, the investigation by papers, the police? The consequent dangers - for innocent bystanders?

4.The basic situation: the corrupt police, the drug-stealing and dealing? Ryan as the murderer? Wexler as the co-ordinator? The surveillance, spying? Murders? The deal with the newspapers and the expose? The build-up to the meeting?

5.Jerry, his work, going home, the dead man in his apartment, the pursuit by Ryan, the shooting of the car? The attempt in the house? His trying to escape, the help of the police? Meeting Jenny and the crash, her help? The message from his father? The dawn meeting, the rogue police and their murdering his father's assistant? The pursuit, the arrest for the stolen car? His friend and his help? Ryan's pursuit? The interpretation of the number, going to the meeting, the dangers, the fight, his helping his father? The return with Jenny?

6.Jenny, knocking Jerry down, helping him at the apartment - the irony of her being sinister in his nightmare? His return, her helping him with the code, going and helping at the meeting?

7.Sharkey, his brutality? Wexler and his co-ordination, the meeting, the snakebite and his death? The ugly police and their violence?

8.Bradley, the responsibility of his paper, the advice of his friend? The deal with Kim? The meeting, the shoot-out, the rescue?

9.The background of drug-dealings of the '80s? Corrupt police? Newspapers and their responsibilities? Innocent bystanders?

SOPHIA TURKEWICZ



Your background is Polish?

I was not born in Poland. In fact I was born in Africa. I came to Australia as a child with my mother, and grew up in Adelaide.

What drew you into film-making?

I was actually a teacher before I became a film-maker. I was teaching at Loreto in Adelaide for a few years - I was a very bad teacher because I was interested in learning myself rather than giving at that stage. I was studying part-time at Adelaide University, completing a BA and I discovered that I could count a film unit from Flinders University towards my Adelaide BA degree. So I started the film course there and that set me off in that direction towards film.

I was basically hooked from that point on. I then continued teaching but was trying to get into something more interesting. I realised that teaching was not the way I wanted to go, and I was very lucky with timing, being around at the right time when things were happening. While I was teaching, I started doing various school broadcasts for radio and, then, in the early '70s the South Australian Film Corporation was just starting up and they were looking for local writers to train and, because I had done some of these school broadcasts - while it was radio, not film or television, at least it was a little bit of drama - they advertised and I got into a course, a two-week course where they trained locals.

The people who were running the course happened to be Penny Chapman and Joan Long. There were about 13 or 14 people and the idea was to develop a story concept and, if any of them were interesting, they were going to be produced. I was one of the lucky two people who ended up getting our story ideas actually made. They were little training films that the SAFC were doing. So that was one turning point and that was in 1974. And again, timing just was perfect for me because in 1974 the Film School was advertising for their first full-time course students for 1975 and, because I had done this workshop with the SAFC, I could submit that to the Film School, and I got in.

So I was at the right place at the right time, basically, and got into the Film School - at that time as a writer. I did the three-year course, left the family in Adelaide, came to live in Sydney and in the course of that three years I discovered directing as well, discovered that that's what I wanted to do, combine writing and directing. That's what I graduated from the Film School as, a director, but I still saw myself very much as a writer-director. And again luck - I can't believe what incredible luck I've had - one of the assessors for our final year student films happened to be Joan Long, quite coincidentally, I had nothing to do with this. I walked in and there she was. I don't know whether you've seen my graduation film, Letters from Poland, but it started to explore the theme that I later developed more fully in Silver City, it was a starting point.

Way back at the course in Adelaide, I had talked about this idea to Joan, just as an idea because my family had come to Australia as immigrants. They had gone through the migrant hostels.

Your father was Polish?

No - well, my real father is actually Italian. My mother is Polish. My mother ended up coming to Australia as a single mother from Africa and then married my stepfather, who's Polish, and that's where the name Turkewicz came from.

So I had talked to Joan about this idea that I had, this film I wanted to make back there in 1974, and there we were graduating then in 1978 and she was there assessing Letters from Poland. And I said, "I haven't forgotten that idea. This is just a little starting point and I want to, when I graduate, go out there and develop it," and she got very interested and involved. And again I was one of the most incredibly lucky students graduating, to actually have a producer interested in one of my films once I was out in the big wide world.

I remember Professor Terpewicz. saying, when we were graduating, that it would take something like five years before we made any sort of a mark, made our first movie, and I remember thinking it's not going to take me that long. But sure enough, that's how long it took to actually develop the idea, get the money and finally we went into production in 1983.

You collaborated in the writing with Frank Moorehouse. Is that right?

No, not for that. Thomas Kennealy came in and got involved in draft 5, because at that stage we had just were hitting obstacles with funding. It was a hard project to get funding for. There was a lot of interest but we were having problems, and Joan's idea was to break this obstacle we just needed to get another name writer involved to open doors, and indeed it did, so Thomas Kennealy came on board at draft 5. He had just come back from Poland, researching Schindler's List, so he had a whole lot of things in his head to do with the Polish mentality. He had three weeks between jobs. He came in and did a sort of quick draft and then I took over, and that was enough to kick it into the next level of funding. I think I went on to do about another four drafts or whatever and finally it got up.

It's interesting, the Polish mentality is an interesting thing to explore, but also you have dramatised there very interesting aspects of the Australian so-called mentality as well. It's an interesting reflection, I suppose, from the '80s back those twenty or thirty years of the experience of the migrants. Where did you draw your understanding of the Polish mentality?

Very much from my family. That's what I was drawing on for the social and historical context of my story. I had been imbued with that, just growing up in my Polish family. My mother came out, her first job was in various Catholic convents as a domestic in Western Australia in little country towns called Three Springs and Donga - you probably haven't even heard of them - and she was very isolated at the time, but then she met Polish people and eventually moved to Adelaide and married my father, and from just growing up with her friends and the family, those early days I remember as a kid, the Polish community was still very much a cohesive community.

I can remember the social events like parties and lots of vodka and lots of singing. It was just a really happy time. Well, it wasn't all happy, not in the wider context, but certainly within the community there was just a lot of community feeling that gradually, very sadly, dissipated. All that group has just become more and more isolated as they've become integrated into the wider Australian community and it's all just vanished now. But certainly that period of my growing up, my sort of childhood up to about the age of 15, 16, was very much imbued with that Polish community mentality. That's what I lived and breathed.

Just thinking about the Polish mentality - so people are coming after the war, so it's a refugee kind of mentality, is it, or just a migrant one or both?

Probably both, because all of that group, like my family and their immediate circle, have been through the war, the dislocation of the war. My mother's story is absolutely incredible. She ended up being caught up as a prisoner in Siberia, aged 16. Both her parents had died and she was orphaned by the age of five, then the war broke out. She came from a tiny little village just on the border of Russia and Poland at the time, and as soon as the war broke out, she and a lot of civilians were just taken off to Siberia to work, basically, in the gulags, and that's where she spent the war years until eventually the release of civilians was negotiated and she ended up in various refugee camps in what was then Persia, like Tashkant and Esfahan, and gradually - like in what were British army camps that had been converted into refugee camps - and then eventually, as they overflowed and people got moved, she ended up in Africa in a camp there in Lusaka in what was then Northern Rhodesia and met my Italian father, who was a prisoner of war from Libya. An incredible story.

Her closest friends had also been through that experience in Siberia, where the husband of one of her close friends died of starvation and she came out with two little kids. They're the people that I grew up with. So it was probably very much that war experience, that refugee experience, was probably just as - probably more vivid than the national sort of Polish cultural stuff.

You made scenes of the religious dimension - I notice the dominating Polish clergy - which I, of course, found very interesting. How much was yours or was that a Kennealy kind of thing as well, or not?

I think I brought that in, because I grew up as a Catholic - my family were very Catholic. I'm not any more and my brothers aren't, I'm sure, either, but my mother is still deeply Catholic. She prays every day and night for me still and it's very much part of her. I can't remember, actually, the development through the script, what - I think that might have been me. I think it probably was, the confessional scene.

And the severity of the priest visiting the house. It's almost a dominating or humiliating kind of authoritarianism that I remember from it.

Yes. I have to admit I think it was me.

Which of course some people would say some of the clergy still are, but anyway, we won't say that.

I think, in terms of characterisation, one of my criticisms now of the film would be - like it was a first film, it was an immature film - it's a very different film from the film I would make now, for instance, and I think that especially with some of the minor characters I did fall back on stereotypes. I did with the priest, probably, and certainly with the Australians.

The couple next door? No, they were nice.

But even the Roy Jenkins character with the big ears who she tries to get involved with her - I think I would do it differently now. I would try and make the characters much more three-dimensional. I think I achieved that with the Polish characters, the main characters, but with the minor characters, I didn't know then, I wasn't experienced enough as a writer to understand that to make them more interesting and human they had to have more light and shade and three dimensions, basically.

In defence of it a bit, in a way you were showing the Australian mentality and culture through the eyes of the migrants, which could have been to that extent caricature.

Yes, but I could have done both. I could have still seen it from the perspective of the immigrants, but I also could have given the Australians more depth and complexity and less stereotype.

I wonder what the people like your mother, when she arrived - I wonder what she was hoping for and what Australia could provide and whether it did in those days?

I think it certainly did for her. The other option would have been to go back to Poland. She was orphaned, her part of Poland didn't exist any more. If she had gone back there, I think her life would have been a lesser life. With my stepfather - I think he paid a price. My mother had never been to school, she's totally illiterate, she had never been inside a classroom, so if she had gone back, I think she would have only had the possibility of menial work anyway, which is what happened here in Australia, but at least there were opportunities that opened through hard work that I don't think she would have - my feeling is that she made the right choice in coming to Australia.

But with my stepfather, who is a much more educated person - he was actually studying to be a teacher and had been to university - had not finished his studies when the war broke out - he became a prisoner of war in Germany, and all his family ended up going back to Poland, apart from him. He was actually terrified of going back to Poland. In the refugee camps in Germany, there were refugee officials going round saying, "With the Iron Curtain you can't go back to Poland; you're not even allowed to speak Polish in Poland any more." He started writing to his own family in Poland in Russian because he believed he was not allowed to write letters in his own language. So he was too frightened to go back to Poland and ended up coming to Australia and ended up working as a labourer at General Motors Holdens for his entire life. When I think about his life, I think it was diminished by coming here. He would have gone back, been with his family, probably got himself educated - finished his education - and become a nice middle-class, or equivalent of, guy in Poland.

It's quite a background, isn't it, to those characters in the film, and also I presume from when you mentioned the letters there in Russian, that what you did in Letters from Poland - was that part of the theme there, since I haven't seen it, but I just thought I must ask you.

Letters from Poland was a story about a man who a Polish woman is waiting for to come to Australia to join her, who's the father of her child, who never arrives. That's very much autobiographical, with my Italian father, so yes, that's slightly different.

The other side of it, of course, which again was interesting for the film, is the Australians like the neighbours, but I suppose how unprepared they were for the groups coming in after the war. And the second question is how were they changed by such groups like your family?

The Australians, you mean?

Yes. I don't think, with all that kind of language of New Australians from those days - - -

Yes, I think Australians had absolutely no concept of what that group of refugees had experienced. I think they do now, a lot of them, in retrospect, understand, but at the time how could they? There wasn't the exposure. All they were seeing were people coming off the boats. They had no idea what they had actually been through. I can't really generalise, and my family mostly had good experiences with the Australians - my mother got work and my father working at Holdens tended to work with just other immigrants there. That was his world, they were the labourers who were working there, so he didn't have as much contact with Australians.

But my mother ended up getting domestic work in the Royal Adelaide Hospital, where she was involved with food for nurses and there was the interaction between Australians and Europeans. She had mostly positive experiences - I've never heard her actually say anyone was racist towards her, I've never heard any stories like that.

Have you seen The Sound of One Hand Clapping?

Yes.

That's interesting - it's just a bit later, but set in a different part of Europe, but very depressing.

It was. I'm not sure I enjoyed that film. I didn't think it quite came off.

It's just such a grim picture. I was just thinking of the two - your mother compared with the mother killing herself. I mean, she had had the terrible experience back in Yugoslavia and then the decline of the father, although he was isolated. So those stories I think are still worth telling. They need to be. I had better ask you about Times Raging, which I did see on television when it was made. That was the collaboration with Frank Moorehouse. It was one of his stories?

Yes, that was with Frank Moorehouse. Funnily enough, I had the two projects in development, Silver City and Times Raging, with Joan, and the idea was in fact to make Times Raging before Silver City, just because it was such a huge leap.

As I said, Joan and I had Times Raging in development at the same time as Silver City because I was supposed to have made that as my first movie after graduation, because it was a huge leap between making a student film to making Silver City. But as it turned out, Silver City got funding before Times Raging, so we ended up having to put Times Raging aside. Then finally when Silver City was completed - I actually can't remember why Joan didn't follow up on Times Raging, I can't remember the circumstances, but I think we tried but it was just too difficult getting the funding and eventually it never happened.

But a friend of mine, Michael Carson was then a producer at the ABC and was looking for telemovies to put on as a series. So rather than make it as a feature film, I decided to go ahead and develop as one of these telemovies. So that's how that happened.

The themes and relationships that you were exploring there - would you like to comment on that? It's a while since I've seen it.

It's a while since I've seen it, too. I can barely remember it. I liked that movie, it was a lot of fun to make. The theme of it was a woman in her thirties with biological time running out, wanting to have a kid and being involved with a guy who was psychologically incapable of having a kid, who basically was a kid himself. He couldn't be a father because he was a kid himself. That was just one of the themes that interested me at the time, I guess, because I suppose I was working through those sorts of things. Everything I write isn't directly autobiographical, but it draws on whatever I'm going through at any particular stage of my life, I guess.

I hesitate to ask you then about the other telemovie you made after that. Hasn't that got suicide in it?

Is this I've Come About the Suicide? Yes, you mentioned that on the phone. That was silly, basically. It was a telemovie that I made for the money. It was one of those dreadful 10BA shonky money type of movies where most of the money went God knows where rather than into the movies. But working freelance, I was broke at the time and just had to take the work. And I can remember looking at it and thinking, "Oh, my God, have I come to this?"

Who wrote it?

I can't remember - it was a playwright. It had been a play that he had put on, that had then been converted as a telemovie. He was very inexperienced. He didn't know how to actually structure and shape a film story, and I didn't have the time to work on it to reshape it. I was brought in as a director, I wasn't involved in it as a writer at all. I had a couple of meetings with the writer. So all I could do was try and salvage it and shape it as much as I could in the rehearsal period, which was about a week. And what I did was get some really good actors like Goscia(?) and Barry Otto and Ralph Cotterell and said, "Look, this is a heap of rubbish, guys, but we'll see what we can do." And we just tried to improve it and find some sort of story structure to it in the course of this week's rehearsal, and that was the best we could come up with, I'm afraid.

It's interesting to hear people reflecting now on some of those 10BA films.

So when I say everything I do is autobiographical, it's only specifically the movies that I write myself. Were there any more after Times Raging that you wanted to ask me about? Because after that I tried to get other projects up of my own, and couldn't, went broke and basically had to redirect my career into television just for income. And that's where I've been for the last eight or nine years - and having a really good time and a good income, I must say, and working in a lot of children's drama.

I was noticing that. I bought a book the other day by Tom O'Regan, 1956-93, and I was thumbing through that to find out what people were doing, and I noticed you had been doing some television work and children's films, so you've been enjoying that.

Yes. I've got a ten-year-old child, so over the last decade or so I've had a natural interest in kids' drama because of my son growing up, I guess. And that's where I've done a lot of my work. But after coming back from New Zealand, I've started to think I would just like to get back into film, so just this year I've been trying to reorient myself back into film and I'm just working on a script - in fact I'm just putting the finishing touches to the second draft at the moment and I'm about to send it out to producers and start that whole game again - lottery, and who knows what's going to happen. But I'm pulled back now towards film.

Just one last thing then about Gosia Dobrowolska, because she was very, very striking when I first saw the film, and there's all the stories about how she didn't have the English, but she certainly did very well and has never stopped working, really, has she?

Yes, she has been working - I'm thrilled to bits that she's got this job in Poland because I think she has been limited by her accent in the sort of roles that have been offered in Australia


Interview: 19th November 1998

JOHN TATOULIS


You made television films and documentaries before you went into feature films.

I guess I'll start prior to that. I had an interest in film and television since I was very, very small. We used to live in Northcote and our local cinema was the old Westgarth Theatre and religiously every Saturday afternoon from age 5 or 6 I would go to the Westgarth Cinema and watch the film and the serials that preceded it. It was almost as if I knew before I was ten that I wanted to work in this industry. At high school I was into making short films. It was something that really interested me. And I was an avid cinemagoer right through my teens.

I then did a course Scotland in communication studies. Basically, it was a many-media course. It preceded media studies as a course. I wasn't so interested in film-making courses specifically, nor journalism courses. I was actually after a broader-based course, interested in selecting which way I would like to go. Having completed that, I worked as a producer and a journalist in the UK and then in Europe. At the same time I worked on a number of film sets as well. Then I came back to Australia and worked freelance for a number of publications, then worked for SBS. I was one of the first journalists that started on SBS, working in the Melbourne newsroom.

Then I moved more into the area that I really enjoyed: production. So I started working on documentaries and television specials as well as the odd small drama and formed the company Media World some 14 years ago. We just continued making the sorts of programs that interested us - drama documentaries and television series, children's series - and then slowly moved towards adult drama.

Your move into feature films?

We made a very low-budget feature, In Too Deep, shot on a shoestring, but it managed to open a lot of doors. We got a Paramount video release in the States and a bit of notice. We then went on to make The Silver Brumby, which was a family-oriented feature. We went into a spin off animation series of The Silver Brumby and then established an animation studio in Carlton. On that series I act as the executive director or supervising director. The next feature production was Zone 39.

Returning to In Too Deep, what focused your attention on the themes of inner-city life, police and society?

I think that all those themes are universal in terms of life in a metropolis like Melbourne. Melbourne is not dissimilar to other cities around the world and, subsequently, the problems aren't dissimilar. I was interested in two things in In Too Deep: one was the corruption of innocents and the other was the strengths and weaknesses of sexuality. And I wanted to set it in an urban landscape. What I was really keen to do was create a mood and a feel through a variety of ways. I believe that film is like a tapestry and all the components that go to making the texture of that tapestry are all important: sound, pictures, editing, performances, direction. If one doesn't work, then the final tapestry won't have the texture the director had in his or her mind to start with. If a film doesn't have a feeling, a feeling that has a texture to it, then it's lacking. So that was something I was very keen to explore: how do I give this film a feeling of claustrophobia, a feeling of heat, a feeling of menace and vulnerability. Whether I succeeded or not is a different matter, but that's what I was after in that very first film.

The atmospheric use of colour was part of the process?

Yes, it was very much designed, right from the outset. That was the look and the feel that I wanted and the soundscape creating the tensions that I wanted. It was basically a simple story. I don't think the story was its strength and I think I realised that, even when we started shooting it but, at the same time, I felt that maybe the technique and the feeling that I could bring to it would help take it above the strength of the story.

It offered a serious look at the police and corruption. You focus on society and questions of society which interest you.

Absolutely, yes. I think human beings are exactly that; they're human beings. There are no super beings. At every level of society there are good and bad people. Every nation has its good and bad people. What makes them so, I don't know, but they're there and, yes, there is a lot of corruption and no, it's not easy to stamp out - and how do you deal with it? I don't know. As an individual, I deal with it in a particular way; as a society, I don't have the answers. I don't think anyone really has. But it is something that's prevalent and I think it's something that's becoming more noticed because communication is growing so much stronger these days that we're actually being advised of it happening much more readily than society was ten or twenty or thirty years ago. So it appears that corruption is more prevalent.

It seemed quite a jump in theme and treatment from In Too Deep to The Silver Brumby. Your interest in a children's film? You had done children's television in the past.

The bottom line is that I like to work on projects that I find interesting. At the same time I'm not blinkered in what I appreciate. My reading sources are varied. I like romance, I like adventure, I like science fiction, I like historical pieces - as long as they are interesting or they're deemed to be interesting. The Silver Brumby was introduced to me by one of my partners many, many years ago - we were actually childhood friends - and it had a spirituality about it that I found incredibly intriguing. It really gave me a sense that there was something incredibly magical and raw and energetic about the Australian high country - almost mystical and mythological - and that's what I was really hoping to capture in the film, that element of spirituality that I felt was present in the book. Subsequently, when I met the author, Elyne Mitchell, I found that was exactly where she was coming from. She wasn't trying to write a linear story; she was trying to capture the whole feeling and essence that the Australian high country enveloped her in. So, in shooting The Silver Brumby, that was my main focus: to really tell a simple story well, but at the same time try and capture the essence of the spirituality that was being portrayed in the book as well as I could. Again it's getting back to that texture. I wanted to give the film a feel, a mood, a presence, and I'm very happy with the result. That was my main aim.

You got good reviews?

Very good reviews, yes.

Was the author's writing of the book a part of the original or did you add it?

I added that. The book deals with an animal kingdom in which the animals have anthropomorphic features. They literally communicate to each other. In fact the humans are peripheral characters. They're non-communicative characters in a sense. All the animals communicate at different, especially the horses. Now, I couldn't produce a live-action film that could get across everything I needed to say by trying to have the animals act without any other narrative device, so we created that storytelling device as a means by which we could actually keep the story moving when the acting of the animals could no longer tell the story. But the story that I used was actually a true story. It was how Elyne Mitchell came to write her book. She wrote it for her daughter. She was concerned that her daughter wasn't reading. Yet there's all this magic and mystery around them. So she decided that what she would do was try to write something that was close to her that was identifiable, that was readily accessible, and hope that in that way she could draw her daughter into the wealth of experience that books have to offer.

It worked very well for adults, identifying with the writer and it worked very well for children, identifying with the child and with the action. You went back to the animal kingdom for the series?

Yes. In animation you can suspend your disbelief considerably. The series is aimed at children aged four to nine and, yes, the animals do talk. There are humans in there but they can't actually communicate with the animals. So there is an animal kingdom with a human society and some interaction between the two, but it is a far lighter than the film. We've taken certain liberties so it's more `inspired by' the characters of the books rather than being a translation of the books.

If The Silver Brumby is `light', Zone 39 is surprisingly grim - very grim by the end.

There again it is a totally different film in the sense that it's certainly not a family movie but, again, it was a subject that interested me, a concept that interested me. In Zone 39, I was exploring a couple of things.

One was the way in which a person deals with grief, the loss of a loved on. I truly believe that someone doesn't die until we stop thinking about that person. I think once we forget that person, once that person ceases to live in our memories, then that person is truly dead. Often it takes a long time for that person to truly die in people's hearts. I wanted to explore this theme in an environment that I think we're heading towards, one of being like a society that is particularly unfriendly to the individual and particularly isolates the individual and controls that individual.

I think we're heading towards an age where those who control communication and those who have political power are going to unite and form what I believe will be almost political corporations, when a Rupert Murdoch and his empire join forces with - let's say a consummate politician like Henry Kissinger and his political party. These guys join forces to form a world political order, something like the United Nations, a peacekeeping force but with a commercial and a political side to it. I think we're moving towards something like that. We're moving towards an amalgam of media owners and politicians and I think that when that eventually does happen, there'll be a very powerful, insidious control over the individual and over what the individual will or will not be able to do, hear, see, say.

That was the world that I wanted to place this character in. One, he is alone because he has lost a loved one but, two, he's alone because that's how society is, or that's what society is becoming. And how do you deal with that? How do you deal with that double whammy? Yes, it's nihilistic, but I believe it's important to look at the strength of the spirituality of the individual. The film does not have a happy ending but, at the same time, I think it does have an ending that has some form of resolution for that particular character.

It's almost imagining the worst. It was hard to believe that the main actress is killed at the beginning and the main character at the end. But you're giving the picture of that kind of future society. The initial confrontation in the train and at the station was similar to scenes in American thrillers, so it had a dramatic credibility. Then you moved the hero to a more remote science-fantasy land. So it was a disturbing kind of science fantasy. Do audiences respond well?

We've screened it both in Australia, in Europe and in the States and the reactions have varied from, `Well, look, I just don't like this sort of film,' to, `Well, gee whiz, it blew my socks off.' It dealt with subjects that are grim, but it dealt with them in an interesting way, and it provokes thought. Now, I don't know. You try and create something for as wide an audience as possible, but at the same time you also try to create something with an integrity that you're hoping will be accepted by an audience as opposed to it being just formulaic and subsequently being automatically accepted by an audience. It is a grim tale, but at the same time it's a tale that I wanted to tell.

Even the issues of the environment are grim.

It's been described as a science fiction eco thriller. I don't think it's science fiction. I truly believe that the world that I was trying to portray in Zone 39 is not that far away, so I'd almost call it science fact. Designer drugs such as Novan are being tested as we speak. The technology that I was suggesting in that film is actually available today - not necessarily for general consumption, but it's certainly in advanced stages of development. The military is using sattelite-link type weaponry and personal communications.

Moving away from the militaristic side of things and the technological side - the environment is suffering enormously and will continue to do so unless something is done about it. Money and greed are more important for some than the legacy of what their greed causes. So it's all there, it's all here, it's all now. Whether Zone 39 is like today or five years or ten or 15 years away, I believe it's within our lifespan.

Peter Phelps gave a frantic and aggro performance, desperate. Satirists are perfectionists; they satirise things because they wish the world was better. Is your making such a seemingly nihilistic film working on the same principle: here is the worst; surely we need to do better.

Absolutely. I think that's very much the case. In one way I'm an optimist and in another way I'm a pragmatist. I believe that's where we're heading, but I think that it's important to make any attempt we possibly can to avoid that happening. I think it's my way of saying, `Hey, we can't treat individuals like this, we shouldn't be treating individuals like this and, hey, we can't treat our world like this.' I have a child five months old and I naturally hope that he will be able to grow up in a world that is going to be at least as comfortable as mine was and hopefully even more so, but I don't believe that's actually going to be the case. So I guess it is a little bit of a warning, as insignificant as it might be. I think we do need to look at those issues because potentially they're going to be very tragic.

In that sense people who make futuristic films like this are moralists with ethical concerns.

I think so. There are some who are totally exploitative, who are doing it simply for shock value and for commercial gain, but I think many are not. Many are moralists who are simply seeing what the future holds or seeing what they believe the future holds and trying to warn either themselves or others that that's the way we're heading: `Hey, let's talk about it.'

And next?

We have three feature film projects in development - and again they're varied. One is a magic-realism piece, it's a book that we optioned. It was written by a young West Australian author and it's called The Mule Spoke. It won the Australian Vogel award three years ago and the young writer was only 21 or 22 when she wrote the book - very much an Isabella Allende, Garcia Marquez style. It's going to be a challenge. We have a very fine script that we hope to realise within the next six to 12 months. I'll be directing that feature.

There is another feature that came to us as an unsolicited script. It was written by two Western Australians - again coincidentally Western Australia. One of them went to Duntroon in the early '80s and the story's actually set there. It deals with bastardisation and the effects of institutions that are disciplinarian. It's stark but real and very powerful. It's called A Mere Bravo. We've brought a young director on board for that - I won't be directing that film, I'll be co producing it with my partner. The director is Alan Tsilimidis. He shot a movie, Everynight Everynight, which was his debut feature, which is a very powerful piece, very gruelling. If you can sit through that, you can sit through anything. He's a very, very talented filmmaker.

The third is totally different again. It's a romantic comedy, a screwball comedy set in the Mediterranean, about a young Australian boy and a young German girl and how chance and coincidence and fate and destiny all mesh in order for them to meet and continue to meet along their quite disparate journeys - and finally they come together, so it's a lot of fun.

How do you see yourself within the Australian industry?

I see myself and the company I'm part of, Media World, as being distinctly Australian and distinctly independent. Media world has grown over the past five or six years. We now, as I said, have an animation studio which employs 50 full-time staff. We have a lot of creative people working under the Media World umbrella and infrastructure. It's a very exciting time because I truly believe that the filmmaking process and the television program-making process are collaborative processes and we have got a lot of very, very talented people in Australia and, in particular in Melbourne and in Victoria, and it's a matter of combining those talents and nurturing those talents and then amalgamating those talents in order to create something, joint passions coming together in order to create a finished product. So I think my role now is moving from the independently creative through to hopefully the nurturing of new talent. It's an exciting thing to be doing, working with new directors, working with new writers, working with new cinematographers and helping make their projects come to life as well as some of the ideas that we have.


Interview: 20th May 1997