ONLY THE BRAVE
A film review by David Wong Shee
Copyright 1995 David Wong Shee
ONLY THE BRAVE a "rites-of-passage" film which follows the fortunes and in misfortunes of two girls set in the contemporary urban wasteland of the Western suburbs of Melbourne. The fundamental problem for the girls is that there does not seem anywhere for them to go. Their prospects both economically and socially appear despairingly bleak.
The themes of betrayal of trust and abandonment run through the film at the level of their disrupted families, their tenuous though highly charged peer relationships, and on a wider scale, the context of urban decay and social disintegration within which their lives unfold. The two girls in the film crave on one hand the security that most take for granted throughout their childhoods and, on the other independence and self-determination. Their experiences of parental abandonment and/or abuse leads them to yearn for stable supportive relationships with others while also making them extremely wary and suspicious of others and at other times completely dismissive of any need for someone else.
Fire is a key motif throughout, suggestive of an all consuming destructive rage born of dispair and frustration; directed both outwards, towards "society," and inwards attacking the developing personalities and the emergent sexuality of the protagonists.
The film is a distillation of Australian underclass adolescent angst fermented by dysfunctional families and future's that promise only long-term unemployment and poverty. That Australia, a country with an average standard of living comparable to any of the best in the world, should have the highest adolescent suicide rate indicates at the very least a failure of efforts to pursue social justice however you define it.
ONLY THE BRAVE makes no attempt to offer solutions to the psychosocial traumas of its characters, this is perhaps because it is a task for the the film's audience rather than its makers. The film brings to the attention of those who live comfortably in the lap of our modern consumer society that there are many who do not share such good fortune.
CREDITS
Directed by Ana Kokkinos. Cast in credits order: Elena Mandalis (Alex); Dora Kaskanis (Vicki); Moudo Davey (Kate); Bob Bright (Rog); Helen Athanasiadis (Maria); Tina Zerella (Sylvie); Mary Sifarenos (Athena); Peta Brady (Tammy). Cinematography by James Grant. Music by Philip Brophy. Written by Ana Kokkinos and Mira Robertson. Costume design by Margot McCartney. Edited by Mark Atkin. Produced by Fiona Eagger, Rina Reiss (associate). Also: Georgina Campbell (art director; Craig Carter (sound); Richard Clendinnen (assistant director); Jock Healy (sound).
-- * David Wong Shee * * dws@netspace.org.au *
.
The review above was posted to the
rec.arts.movies.reviews newsgroup (de.rec.film.kritiken for German reviews).
The Internet Movie Database accepts no responsibility for the contents of the
review and has no editorial control. Unless stated otherwise, the copyright
belongs to the author.
Please direct comments/criticisms of the review to relevant newsgroups.
Broken URLs inthe reviews are the responsibility of the author.
The formatting of the review is likely to differ from the original due
to ASCII to HTML conversion.
Related links: index of all rec.arts.movies.reviews reviews