Fabulous cinematography in this lyrical tale of a young girl kicked out after making a pass at her mother's boyfriend. The scenes flow into each other with striking use of gentle colour. Our central character is - what we would say in Britain anyway - 'taken advantage of' by several young men (whose idea of a chat up line might be "well, take your top off then . ..") Such gender political incorrectness (or simple male loutishness) goes by in our story without any narrative comment. It had to be an Australian film - I have seen such Neolithic attitudes, sadly, in that beautiful country more than anywhere else in the world. The director (Cate Shortland) didn't see any problem. When I asked her about the direction of Australian filmmaking, that used to be experimental and controversial - and now makes international news largely for its right-wing censoring of sex and nudity by such internationally acclaimed filmmakers as Catherine Breillat - she replied that it is politically difficult to do anything in Australia at the moment as the leader of the country is practically a right-wing disciple of Margaret Thatcher. And politicians wonder why so many artists have leftists tendencies . . .
Review of Somersault
Somersault
(2004)
Beautiful cinematography and lackadaisical Australian political incorrectness
28 August 2004