Ivan Sen is an
Australian filmmaker whose latest feature film he directed, wrote, edited and
composed the music and if that was not enough he was also the cinematographer. He
describes it as a ‘genre film with a
cultural perspective’[1],
which he says makes it a little more unique and ultimately more interesting for
its movie audience. It’s a story of mystery and intrigue that involves
corruption, race relations, local politics and wild dogs! A modern day western emphasised
by the dress code of the lead character with a style that references the look
of the Coen's No Country for Old Men
(2007) - it even has a spectacular gun fight!
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| The beautiful countryside hides a bleak and dangerous existence for its indigenous population. |
Mystery Road (2013) is a murder mystery investigated
by an indigenous detective Jay Swan, played by Aaron Pederson, an estranged
family man with a young teenage daughter who lives with her mother Mary (Tasma
Walton) and is running wild. Swan was born and lived in the area until he went
away to a detective school. Ten years later he has returned to the community
with the intent to make it a better place for his daughter to grow up. He’s
back just in time to investigate the death of a young Aboriginal girl who has
had her throat cut and her body hidden by the side of a desolate truckers highway
in a storm drain. Swan’s has two main problems,
the first is that individuals do not want to talk to him, including his own
people who regard him as a turncoat, secondly the white dominated police force do
not seem to want the crime solved!
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| Jay Swan is on his own, no backup, no support.... |
The murder is
based on a true incident involving a family member of Ivan Sen. It’s set in a
nameless nondescript town but we know from the credits that it was filmed
around the community of Winton, a town in Central West Queensland, and although
the landscape has a certain raw beauty I don’t think the movie will attract
many tourist to the area!
 |
| ....but he will get to the bottom of the young girls brutal murder. |
As with all
his feature films Sen did his own casting but in this instance Pederson helped
him with the selection of the young aboriginal children and the teenage girls,
who play quite a big part in this story, all of whom had not acted before. The
main roles in the movie are played by some very well known Australian actors
including Ryan Kwanten as the small town bigot, an actor best known for his
role as Sookie Stackhouse’s brother Jason in the award winning TV vampire drama
True Blood and Hugo Weaving (Oranges
and Sunshine 2010, Captain
America: The First Avenger 2011) as the rather threatening white policeman
Johnno, a character who we are never
sure about?
 |
| Your never quite sure who's side Johnno's on? |
A typical hard
faced Australian crime drama that says more in its silent moments than some
movies do in their complete running time, leaving the viewers at times to work
things out for themselves which has the affect of drawing you in, making you a bystander
rather than just part of a cinema audience. It is a very well made film with an Australian
cast that fills ever part with authenticity. The Queensland landscape plays an
important role in the story underlining the bleak natural countryside - you can
taste the atmospheric dust as it rises from the outback roads. Not to be missed
and highly recommended.
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