Jindabyne

source: Jindabyne

source: Jindabyne

I had read so many good reviews about this film, so just HAD to see it. Well about half an hour into it, I was bored to death and it didn't get any better. Basic plot summary: young aboriginal girl gets raped and murdered and dumped in the local water system near a rural township. Four friends off on a fishing weekend in a secluded location, find the body. Instead of reporting it, one of the party ties the body up and they carry on with their holiday. They later report the find to the police and incur a backlash from the local and the aboriginal community. Each person and their spouse react differently and it is this character exploration that is central to the film's story. It sounds good and original. However the pace was too slow and I felt nothing for the characters. Laura Linney's character meant well, but she was sickeningly self-righteous. There was also a very poisonous little girl who I found difficult to watch as her behaviour bordered on sociopathic. The only character I liked was Laura Linney's son. My summary: slow, hard to watch and completely unsympathetic characters. 4/10

I saw Jindabyne last weekend and was spellbound. It was absolutely enthralling from the opening sequence for me, and the 2 hours evaporated before my eyes. The performances were breathtaking, especially Gabrielle Byrne who I had recently seen in 'Wah Wah' and also Laura Linney, and I enjoyed our local actors too - Debra Lee Furness (proving she's not simply Mrs Jackman), Chris Haywood and John Howard plus the cameo by Charles 'Bud' Tingwell - all made for excellent watching. Interestingly, as I sat transfixed at the end, and couldn't speak or move for a good few minutes, my husband was having a different experience. He tells me he too liked the film but found it too long and didn't appreciate the things I did. That made me wonder if I related to it so strongly because I am female - it proved for an interesting discussion over dinner later. Go see it and make your own mind up! Cheers Janice

Not only did I feel the writers tried to do too much, they also tried to canvas several complex social issues... and didn't succeed. The acting was good... OK well that is the 3. I thought the cinematography was ordinary, I know the area and I am an Australian and I felt the vision was not inspiring. The story was unrealistic and the social response exaggerated given what actually occurred. The editors could have cut 30 minutes without harm (2hrs was too long for what they had to communicate). I would ask if you do see it and if you agree what I have written let me know. Wait for the DVD at least you have some control on the duration, colour saturation and stop button.

It was reassuring to see, here, a couple of negative reviews of Jindabyne: I was starting to think I was the only person in the world who found this film disappointing. Why disappointing? First and foremost, I had expected better from the makers of Lantana, which, while slightly overrated, was a fine film. I had expected that Ray Lawrence's next film would be better still, whereas in fact it is not in the same class. I realise that film reviews are largely subjective, and saying that it just didn't "work" for me is not saying a great deal. The best I can do is to explain why it didn't "work". I found the depiction of the film's central incident – the men's reaction to the finding of the body, and their subsequent actions (or inactions) – frankly unbelievable. To react with (it seemed to me) almost exaggerated horror, and then for the next couple of days to blithely ignore the fact that there was a dead body tethered to a log a short distance away, while they angled pleasantly in the same river, seemed something that people simply wouldn't do. I mean, if their initial reaction had been a lot more low-key, or if there had been some other aspect of their reaction which had made their subsequent heartless indifference to their obvious moral and legal duty more believable, then the whole scenario would have been more credible. For me, the film suffered a blow at that point from which it never recovered. The other main aspect of the film which I felt didn't work was the rather muddled attempt to establish a kind of spiritual undercurrent (if you'll excuse the pun) which ran through the film. It was, like, the drowned town, with its old folks (now, presumably, dead) sitting in their rocking chairs; likewise the old people interviewed in the video: all those dead people, down there, under the water; and the spirits of those dead people rising from their watery graves to come and threaten to drag people swimming in the lake down to the depths (how many times was that motif used!); and those same spirits humming through the wires to freak Billy out as he takes a leak down in the bush, and infecting the mind of the serial killer; and the unearthly, orphaned child with the weird name practising the black arts she learned (inherited?) from her dead (drowned?) mother; and the aboriginal smoke ceremony; and the invocation of St. Brigid; and and and… Mumbo-jumbo was the term that sprang to mind. Further criticism? I thought the serial killer was a quite gratuitous imposition on the film. In Lantana, the death which drove the action of the film was accidental. Why wasn't a similar device used here? Why a serial killer? Why that final scene?? The theme of the serial killer as a kind of malevolent force in nature was dealt with much better (and with a nicely gruesome humour) in Wolf Creek (another Australian film). What else? I found the characters on the whole a highly unsympathetic bunch, which for me made it difficult to get emotionally involved with their lives and issues. A better actor than Laura Linney might have carried off more successfully the attempt to portray the guilt associated with her realisation of her family's part in the tragedy, and also with her decision to kill her own (unborn) child, and her resulting clumsy attempts to "make things right". I think a good film could have been made using this subject matter, but only by going about it very differently.

Before I watched this film I read a review here stating that this film could possibly be one of the best films ever!? ha ha Scene by scene the tension grows alright... from the annoying characters in this movie. From the little girl talking gibberish and trying to drown the little boy, to the killer just running about without any notice (and who was the guy at the beach talking to the little boy!?)..things just seem to happen and then go unanswered in this film. As I watched it seemed like the film was going in one direction, then just doesn't go anywhere, but into a new direction...and on and on... The acting is great, but the writing is horrible. Each character, in each scene, says or does something so unbelievable, unrealistic and the reactions of the fellow cast/extras are simply strange. There are no resolutions to the problems developed throughout the film, making it confusing and ultimately a big waste of time.

This is a 'typical' Ray Lawrence film. Similar in its dark view of the world, to his earlier 'Lantana'. The same slow, deliberate, menacing pace, drawing out evil in every corner ("shades of David Lynch's Twin Peaks" here). Our good ol' boy Aussies (one a transplanted Irish), on a weekend trout fishing trip away from their wives, 'park' the corpse of a murdered woman they discover floating in their stream. They continue with their fishing, not reporting the find until leaving the site - for which they are intensively and unremittingly attacked by all and sundry on their return. The fact that the dead woman is an Australian Aboriginal person adds to the 'political' impact of their offense. Through all this, the real serial killer (who we see from the first scene) hovers menacingly nearby. An interesting, if somewhat cynical, view of the highly charged inter-racial atmosphere in the Australian community: white guilt and 'political correctness'. Who are the real villains here? Our 'politically incorrect' (and morally vacuous) protagonists? Or the murderer? Accoring to Lawrence, the former, apparently. Taught and tense throughout, the film lacks a real resolution, opting instead for a rather 'weak' ending through the redemption of the fishers.

There were times when watching this movie that i honestly though i might cry at the thought it hadn't yet ended. An attempt at atmospheric cinema gone horribly wrong. Possibly the slowest moving film i have ever seen and without a single character to relate to (or care about) Jindabyne truly was a tedious couple of hours viewing. Such a disappointment when compared to the awesome reviews i had seen about this film. One can only assume it was a very slow day when those were written. Maybe the beauty of Laura Linney's character is that you want to smack her in the face, but then again it means you spend Two hours wanting to smack her in the face. Not quite as bad as Soldier of God, but almost.

JINDABYNE is a disturbing, somber little film from Australia - a film with profound observations about ethics, racism, the fragility of marriage, the vulnerability of children's minds, and the desperate need for respect for beliefs and peoples outside the mainstream. Beatrix Christian adapted the screenplay from one of Raymond Carver's brilliant short stories, 'So Much Water So Close to Home': it has been said that Carver had 'the ability to render graceful prose from dreary, commonplace, scrapping-the-bottom human misery' and this story embodies all of those traits. As directed by Ray Lawrence with a cast of excellent actors, JINDABYNE will likely become a classic movie - if enough people will take the time and commitment to see it. In a small town called Jindabyne in Australia a group of four men depart their families for a fishing trip: Stewart Kane (Gabriel Byrne), Carl (John Howard), Rocco (Stelios Yiakmis) and Billy (Simon Stone). While fly fishing in the back country, Stewart discovers the *, murdered body of a dead Aboriginal girl Susan (Tatea Reilly) floating in the water, calls his buddies to witness the ugly act, and together they decide to wait until their fishing trip is over before reporting it. When the men return home, concerned and embarrassed about their actions as they report to the police, the town is outraged at their thoughtless behavior. Yet more outraged are the wives of the men - Carl's wife Jude (Deborra-Lee Furness), Rocco's mate Carmel (Leah Purcell), Billy's 'wife' Elissa (Alice Garner) and, most of all, Stewart's wife Claire (Laura Linney) - a woman with a history of mental instability for whom her husband's insensitivity becomes intolerable. Claire sets out to 'right' things with the Aboriginal tribe who are devastated at the murder and the disregard for another human being's life that the fishermen have demonstrated. The town and the families (including children) are fractured by the deed - and the strange aspect is that no one appears concerned to discover the murderer, the greater 'crime' has been against human decency. In a powerfully moving final memorial for the dead girl every one is forced to face the dirty aspects of the recent events and come to a degree of understanding and acceptance. Filmed in the beauty of the Australian countryside with camera technique that feels intimate and almost spying in nature, the story unfolds so naturally that the audience is made to feel a part of the dilemma at hand. The acting is first rate: Laura Linney once again proves she is one of our finest actresses, and Gabriel Byrne makes his odd character wholly believable. The supporting cast (especially the women) is outstanding. This is a sleeper of a film that deserves a wide audience, an audience ready to commit to thinking and reacting to an act and subsequent public response that, while difficult to swallow, is essential information if we are to exist in the society we have created. Highly recommended. Grady Harp