| Dir: Rupert Glasson, UK/Australia, 2009, 89 mins
Cast: Robert Taylor, Lisa Chappell, Sam Parsonson
Review by Dave Hall
This is a tight, tense thriller from Australia , which keeps the pot boiling nicely right to the end, and even finds time for some diversions into the darkly comic. Though the title and publicity shout “horror” (and there are one or two scenes here that fit the profile), writer-director Glasson is just as interested in the undertones of his characters' actions, their weaknesses and breaking points, as he is in putting the frighteners on us.
The setting is a small fishing community in South Australia – a place where crayfish racing is considered a pub sport. Local couple Rob and Jess Willis (Taylor, Chappell) have been trying for a child for some years without success. On a visit to an IVF clinic, Jess unknowingly attracts the attention of Evan (Parsonson), the wan young Irishman working (rather unbelievably) on reception. He follows Jess home and before long his Tigger-like attentions have tipped over into a ‘roo-endangering obsession. One evening, drunk and upset with Rob , Jess has a one night stand with Evan – and is horrified to find herself pregnant. Worse, it soon becomes clear that Evan has every intention of setting up home with her - and that he is murderously unstable.
A fairly hackneyed set up, but this is no Fatal Attraction (though animal lovers be warned that there is an Oz equivalent to the bunny boiling scene from that film). The small town setting is well used, and Glasson gives the pushes and pulls of community life subtle importance: Jess, a woman with a responsible job, is doubly an outsider in this alpha male town; Rob , his masculinity already undermined by the implications of their childlessness, is further antagonised by a fishing buddy (“If that wife of yours gets hungry, send her over to me, mate”); Evan is immediately tagged as “gay” on arrival. That each of these characters is busy having their buttons pushed is as important in building tension as the camera lurking in the undergrowth or the sudden, shocking explosions of violence. It's Evan's reaction to being called gay that leads to the film's most deranged scene.
Equally unusual, we see the aftermath of each act of violence. No one's fate is ignored, and the final few scenes, virtually silent, are a model of how to tie up loose ends. Glasson keeps the atmosphere brooding throughout (grey skies and empty beaches are hardly typical Aussie images), whilst the naturalistic acting makes you believe that there's something real at stake. And Parsonson is outstanding as Evan, at once nervy, delusional and homicidal, but never a one-dimensional bogeyman.
Although the conventional thriller elements are all in place, there's a measured calm at the centre of this film. It's refusal to get hysterical works with rather than against the thriller elements and there are faint echoes of In the Bedroom in tone and setting. This is Glasson's feature debut, but he's confident enough to take the low key route to high anxiety.
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