Fascinating is how I would describe the ten wee vignettes
that made up the Australian film The Turning (2013). All ten stories
shown in this 110-minute version are based on a collection of short stories by
Tim Winton - the full version has 18 stories and extends the movies running
time to 180 minutes. Winton is an Australian novelist and short story writer
who allegedly draws his inspiration from landscape and places "The place comes first. If the place isn't
interesting to me then I can't feel it. I can't feel any people in it. I can't
feel what the people are on about or likely to get up to."[1]
First published in 2005, the collection was originally adapted
into a play for the 2008 Perth International Arts Festival before becoming an
award winning movie that was nominated for nine AACTA awards, one of which Best
Actress was awarded to Rose Byrne. Each part of the anthology was directed by a
different director including actress Mia Wasikowska on her debut directing gig,
and as well as Byrne, the best known of the actors on display would probable be
Cate Blanchett, Hugo Weaving and fellow Australian actress Miranda Otto who you
may have seen in I
Frankenstein (2014) and the western The
Homesman (2014).
The best of the stories are The Turning about a woman (Byrne) who along with her abusive
husband and her two wee daughters live in a trailer park. When she befriends
Sherry (Otto) she discovers God. In Reunion
its Christmas Day and Vic and Gale (Blanchett) invite Vic’s mum Carol to join
them. All three are invited to their relatives for lunch but Carol gets the
address wrong and they end up in the wrong house and the wrong swimming
pool. I was also impressed with Aquifer a moving story directed by
Robert Connolly about a High School music teacher who hears of a tragedy on the
TV news broadcast and without a word to his family drives all night back to his
hometown to face a secret from his childhood. Each of the individual film’s are
linked by a common emotional bond, bound together by recurring themes; the
passing of time, regret, addiction and obsession. Well put together and
photographed with each of the directors putting their own stamp on they’re own individual
piece of work.
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