Review: So
when does being an innocent bystander become a crime? If quick
action isn't required to rectify the situation, is quick action
required anyway? That's a moral conundrum, which isn't easily
answered.
Jindabyne is one of those towns which was drowned by a dam a few
decades back, and living in its replacement are a number of
dysfunctional families. Claire(Laura Linney) and Stewart(Gabriel
Byrne) are immigrants to Oz, and they've been married for a
number of years and live in the town with their son Tom(Sean
Rees-Wemyss), who's best friend Caylin-Calandria(Eva Lazzaro) is
a bit on the weird side, in fact the second inciting incedent
[not counting the murder of an Aboriginal woman (Tatea Reilly)
by a local fiend(Chris Haywood)] is C-C and Tom's attempt to
sacrifice a Guinea Pig at school.
This version of “prayer in school” leads to a conflict between
Claire and her mother-in-law (Betty Lucas), who doesn't think
bringing a big knife to school is that big a deal. This leads to
a confrontation at a dinner before the annual fishing trip that
Stewart is going to make with his pals Carl(John Howard),
Rocco(Stelios Yiakmis) and Billy(Simon Stone) the next day.
Everything starts out really well. Australia's Snowy mountains
are quite beautiful, and the cinematography really does it
justice. Then the corpse shows up, and the quartet of mates
faces a conundrum. What to do? End their long-planned fun and
immediately hike up the mountain back to civilization to call
the cops, or tie the corpse to a nearby tree while they finish
their fishing and inform the authorities then. They make the
wrong choice, and then all hell breaks loose.
The rest of the film is about guilt, and how to deal with the
unwanted publicity and whether or not to make some sort of
restitution. There's lots of talk about kharma without
mentioning the word, and a major theological debate on
transmigration of souls
The reaction of the women(Linney, Deborra-lee Furness, and Leah
Purcell) is very different from that of the men, as well as each
other, and the whole group is about to fracture. This is
definitely drama.
Eric Lurio
Richard E. Schiff
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Richard E. Schiff
