LAKESPEARE'S RICHARD lll

 

Bojana Kos  , Dene Kermond, Duncan Driver and Christopher Stollery in Rockspeare Richard lll  Photo by PassOut Media

Rockspeare  Richard lll, by William Shakespeare. 

From Live in Ya Lounge. Directed by Lexi Sekuless. Music composed and directed by Jay Cameron. Costumes by Fiona Victoria Hopkins.Lakespeare and Co. in association with Event Audio Visual Services and RAMADA Canberra. Where You Are Festival.  Streamed Live from the Mallee Pavilion EPIC (Exhibition Park in Canberra ) Until August 8. Bookings www.lakespeare.com/stream/

Reviewed by Peter Wilkins

As the saying goes, “Never let the truth get in the way of a good story. It is advice that Shakespeare would have agreed with in his history play about Richard lll. Readers of Josephine Tey’s Daughter of Time and avid followers of findings resulting from the alleged discovery of the two princes’ bones and Richard’s skeleton under concrete in a Lancaster car park might question the authenticity of Shakespeare’s political thriller. But then Richard was a Plantagenet and Queen Elizabeth was descended from Henry Vll, a Lancastrian, and we know where Shakespeare’s loyalty lay. Lakespeare’s electrifying live streamed production of Richard lll from Live in Ya Lounge at EPIC  brings a chilling and thrilling stream-lined Rockspeare version production of Shakespeare’s Machiavellian inspired royal villain.

From the opening jig it is evident that Lakespeare’s Richard lll promises a pulsating version of the play, highlighted by Jay Cameron’s brilliantly inspired composition and costumed once again in Fiona Hopkins’s highly imaginative and creative costumes. Who would have thought to costumes Christopher Stollery's murderous Tyrell in a kilt, tweed jacket and a high hat? It is the kind of imaginative, experiemntal interpretation that characterizes the entire production. Bathed in rock concert lighting and choreographed with forceful imagination, the dance is fired with the spirit of the time. Wars and conflicts, intrigues and betrayal, murder and ruthless ambition lay open the drama in this engrossing online production. I confess that I longed to be in the Mallee Pavilion at EPIC, witnessing live this explosion of energy and feeling Cameron’s music course through my body. But this is the time of Covid, and as well as introducing the company to the viewer, it also effectively evokes the character of the drama and the Time.

Adele Querol as Buckingham

Director Lexi Sekuless has pared back Shakespeare’s drama, eliminating certain characters, such as the viperous Queen Margaret, distributing characters between the eight actors and gender switching, casting women as Buckingham (Adele Querol), Catesby (Bojana Kos) and Hastings (Heidi Silberman). We view gender through the prism of human behaviour and universal human truths. Action is at the core of Sekuless’s production, carefully selecting the scenes that drive the drama forward just as the music of a rock concert may thrust the energy of a concert towards its climactic moment. 

 

Lexi Sekuless as Anne. Dene Kermond as Richard lll.

 

What evolves is a series of highlights that will punctuate the story and illustrate Richard’s intuitive and guileful plots to seize the crown. Sekuless and her cast lead us deliberately and with purposeful clarity through the passage of Richard’s villainous intent. The wooing scene between Richard (Deane Kermond) and Anne (Lexi Sekuless), whose husband, slain by Richard, lies in state beside them, continues to leave one amazed by Richard’s power of persuasion or is it Anne’s only hope of survival to marry her loathed suitor. Duncan Driver  gives an effective performance as Richard’s naïve and trusting brother,  the Duke of Clarence. Richard’s devious amorality is skilfully played   in the scene between  Kermond’s Richard and  his sister in law Queen Elizabeth ( a sensitive performance by Lainie Hart) after the death of his brother  KingEdward (Christopher Stollery). The final scene to mark Richard’s deception and betrayal of loyalty is between Kermond and Querol’s Buckingham, who defects to the forces of the invading Lancastrian Richmond and future Henry Vll.  In the first half we see Richard’s ascent to the throne after the death of Edward. In Rockspeare’s version, the second half gathers apace to the final battle on the field of Bosworth where justice holds sway and after an encapsulating scene in which the ghosts of the slain condemn Richard and promise victory to Richmond, Richard is slain screaming that immortal line, “My horse. My horse. My Kingdom for a horse.” Justice is dealt, order is restored and Damon Baudin’s dtug infused high Rock Star Richmond restores unity to the Plantagenets and the Lancastrians to serve the House of Tudor. 

 

Lainie Hart, Dene Kermond and Bojana Kos  Photo: Pass Out Media

Lakespeare’s liberties with text and characters have resulted in an exciting and dynamic telling of this historical tale. As a live theatre performance it may appear a little sparse at times and speed too swiftly towards its denouement, but as a live streamed performance of Shakespeare it is superbly compact, constantly engaging and thoroughly accessible. Central to this engagement is Dene Kermond’s performance of Richard. His villainous intent comes as no surprise. It is espoused in his opening prologue. However evil has many expressions and Kermond combines self-righteous malevolence with invidious guile, animal instinct and rhetorical persuasion .  Kermond’s absorbing, energy-charged and at times chilling performance presents a  complex and intriguing character who can make the unbelievable believable. 

Lakespeare’s reputation is already affirmed with its Summer Season of Shakespeare. Its first live streamed Winter production is again proof of the company’s ability to provide excellent professional performances of the Bard’s plays. My hope is that the company will be adequately supported financially to present first rate Shakespearian productions and return to live theatre once the pandemic has passed and Rockspeare’s Richard lll can be reprised on a Canberra stage.

First Response

 

Photography, Film, Video | Review by Brian Rope

Martin Ollman, Marissa McDowell, Anna Georgia | First Response

Tuggeranong Arts Centre | Until 19 September

First Response comprises four works commissioned to document Canberra’s initial response to the COVID-19 pandemic. This review looks at the three photography, film and video works in the exhibition. The fourth work was a live dance response choreographed by Shannon Hanrahan, seeking to explore the way that dance artists can work around, and even be inspired, by spatial limitations.

Photographer Martin Ollman is a freelancer based in Canberra. He has had more than 2000 of his images published around the world and has been awarded two national photographic awards. During the initial stages of Canberra’s pandemic response, he was granted access to frontline health services, political figures, and major institutions, including the Australian parliamentary Senate inquiry into it.

Ollman’s work in the exhibition, Plagued, comprises eight large monochrome digital prints on aluminium and a huge digital print on vinyl. The latter is the first thing to attract attention when you walk into the gallery. It is a collage of many images, including portraits of health workers, members of the arts and tertiary education communities and politicians, and it fills two walls. Whilst having impact for its sheer size and vibrant colours, I enjoyed his other works more. Seven of the eight are traditional portraits. Of those, the image of Nigel McRae and Beth Tully revealed something of the importance of companionship, whilst one of Peter Barclay spoke about mateship.

Nigel and Beth, Smith's Alternative © Martin Ollman, 2020

Peter Barclay © Martin Ollman, 2020

The eighth print portrays several frontline health workers by showing some of their personal protective equipment hanging on hooks with their names.

 

First Response, 2020 © Martin Ollman, 2020

Marissa McDowell is a Wiradjuri woman with Irish and English ancestry who has worked with Indigenous communities telling their stories through documentary film making, photography, and writing.

McDowell’s work here, Isolation, is a short documentary film exploring the COVID-19 experience of Canberra’s Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander community, including their unique fears and hopes for the community’s future.

The film features personal accounts from a broad range of community members, including Elders Aunty Matilda House and Uncle Warren Daley, artists Brenda Croft and Dale Huddleston, and local students, offering insights into how they felt about these new and unfamiliar circumstances, how it has affected their families, businesses and education and their thoughts about the future.

The audio can be listened to through headphones, but I found it better to read the captions across the bottom of the video screen. The film is well made and very interesting. I was particularly struck by the fact that many of the issues identified by the indigenous community members were the same as I have heard identified by others, myself included.

Anna Georgia completed a Bachelor of Arts (History, Philosophy, Film Studies), then pursued a Masters of Visual Anthropology in the Granada Centre of Visual Anthropology at the University of Manchester. This quasi-artistic field values the contributions that audio-visual mediums have to offer in the ethnographic description of human experience.

Georgia’s work here, Notes on Canberra Lockdown (A Non-Travelogue), draws on her training in ethnographic filmmaking and investigates many aspects of the lives of individuals during the restrictions and the economic downturn; including everyday circumstances and states of mind, digital engagement, and material spaces.

This film is, for me, the highlight of the overall show. Sitting watching the material on two side by side monitors I was drawn into the story being told and by the high-quality imagery I was viewing. The soundtrack did not appeal as much, perhaps because I found the volume unnecessarily loud. Indeed, it was why I found it easier to read the captions on Isolation which is showing in the same gallery space.

Still from Notes on Canberra Lockdown (A Non-Travelogue) © Anna Georgia

This review was also published in The Canberra Times at https://www.canberratimes.com.au/story/6860921/portraits-of-pandemics-front-line/

and on my personal blog at https://brianropephotography.wordpress.com/2020/08/08/first-response/, both on 8 August 2020.

BRIGHTON BEACH MEMOIRS

Written by Neil Simon

Directed Karen Vickery

Canberra REP at Theatre 3, Acton to 15 August

Reviewed by LEN POWER 5 August 2020

At the time of his death in 2018, the American playwright, Neil Simon, had written more than 30 plays. He has received more combined Broadway Tony Award nominations than any other writer and many of his plays have been successfully adapted to film.

‘Brighton Beach Memoirs’ is a semi-autobiographical play by Neil Simon, the first play in his Eugene trilogy. It precedes ‘Biloxi Blues’ and ‘Broadway Bound’. The play premiered on Broadway in 1983 and ran for nearly 1,300 performances. It is still the last non-musical play to run over 1,000 consecutive performances on Broadway.

Set in the Brighton Beach section of Brooklyn, New York in September 1937 during the Great Depression, this coming-of-age comedy focuses on Eugene Morris Jerome, a Polish-Jewish American teenager who experiences puberty, sexual awakening, and a search for identity in the day to day interaction with his colourful family in an over-crowded and financially struggling household.

Director, Karen Vickery, has given us a production of great depth and attention to detail. The interaction of these family members is very real, American accents are convincing and sustained and the cast members display a deep understanding of the manners and morals of 1937 American culture.

Jamie Boyd (front) and cast members

 

Everyone on that stage gives a superb performance in this tightly-knit ensemble. Their comic timing of the many laugh lines is excellent and they can play the dramatic scenes equally well. There is a tender moment late in the show that will bring a tear to your eye, indicating the high level of involvement these skilful players have drawn you into.

The attention to detail is also apparent in the suitably cluttered and atmospheric period set by Chris Baldock. Anna Senior’s costumes for this working class family are perfect for the times. The lighting design by Stephen Still and sound design by Neville Pye and Amelia Allarakhia are intricate but so subtly done, they add atmosphere without drawing attention to themselves. Every one of the period props on that stage has been well-chosen and placed by Yanina Clifton, Michael Sparks and Antonia Kitzel.

If there’s ever a time where we need a good laugh, this is it. Karen Vickery’s fine production of this very funny and life-affirming play provides comedy and drama equally. It’s so good to see superbly produced live theatre again!

Their first live play to open since the Covi-19 pandemic started in March, Canberra REP’s production is following a strict Covid-19 Safety Plan with restricted numbers of seats available. I felt very comfortable with the arrangements and audience members’ compliance on the night I attended.

Photo by Helen Drum

Len Power’s reviews are also broadcast on the Artsound FM 92.7 ‘In the Foyer’ program on Mondays and Wednesdays at 3.30pm.

‘Theatre of Power’, a regular podcast on Canberra’s performing arts scene with Len Power, can be heard on Spotify, ITunes and other selected platforms or at https://player.whooshkaa.com/shows/theatre-of-power.

Brighton Beach Memoirs

Brighton Beach Memoirs by Neil Simon.

Directed by Karen Vickery.

Canberra Repertory. Canberra REP Theatre, Acton. July 30 – Aug 15.

By Alanna Maclean

CANBERRA REP has come back to welcome life with a socially distancing (and now sold out) season of Neil Simon’s Brighton Beach memoirs. There are notices on seats that are not to be used and the spacing out of an audience is disturbing. But none of that stopped a positive opening night response to the touching and funny story of the Jerome family in 1937’s New York, which is given an insightful production under Karen Vickery’s perceptive direction.

Kate Jerome (Victoria Tyrrell Dixon) her husband Jack (Paul Sweeney) and their two sons share a small house with Kate’s widowed sister Blanche (Amy Crawford) and her two daughters, Nora (Caitlin Baker) and Laurie (Ella Buckley). Living space is crowded and work is tight. People are battling to survive. There are struggles to earn enough money and the suggestion that Nora take up an offer to audition for a Broadway show is treated as the pathway to uncertainty; better that she finish high school. Her sister Laurie is growing up fast but has health problems, as does her still grieving mother. Older son Stan (James McMahon) is faced with having to apologise to his boss or lose his much needed employment. Patriarch Jack juggles more than one job. And out of Europe come the pre war rumblings. They are Jewish and there is still family in Poland.

Jamie Boyd as Eugene

 

All of this is narrated by younger son Eugene, in a sunny and authoritative performance by Jamie Boyd, that drives the show along as the boy’s understanding of things deepens. He’s still not an adult by the end but he might be on the way. In fact there is not a weak performance among the cast and the teamwork is quite superb.

Whether it’s McMahon’s Stan trying to guide his younger brother or Sweeney as father Jack balancing his crippling working life with his faith or the growing pains of Baker and Buckley’s Nora and Laurie or the powerful treatment given by Tyrrell Dixon and Crawford to the inevitable grand row between Kate and Blanche, there’s integrity in the work.

Chris Baldock’s set creates the claustrophobia of shared bedrooms and steep stairs and mean streets outside and there on the door frame is the mezuzah, the prayer scroll that is touched whenever someone in the family enters the house. (Think 1959’s Ben Hur, which underlines the importance of family and faith with a similar repeated image) Anna Senior’s muted costume designs echo the downstairs wall’s red pattern with the splendid red coat brought out by Blanche as she hopefully readies to go on her first date since the death of her husband.

This 1983 play has dated somewhat in its approach to Eugene’s sexual explorations. But it has heart and humour and a very real sense of family arguments. Will Blanche marry again? Will relatives arrive from Poland? Will the family survive the coming war? Well, it’s Neil Simon so you can bet the outcomes will be bittersweet. 

Photo by Helen Drum

Russian arts patron Wielhorski inspires pianist Neeman and cellist Rann

“The Russian Cello” 

Thomas Rann cello, Edward Neeman piano

Wesley Music Centre

August 2 2020

Reviewed by Tony Magee

CONCERT THEMES are a particularly excellent way of preparing a program of music and the choice of the Russian-Polish Count Matvei Wielhorski and his legacy of enthusiasm for the cello, provided such an opportunity for cellist Thomas Rann and pianist Edward Neeman.

Beginning with Beethoven’s Variations on a theme by Mozart, “Bei Männern welche Liebe fühlen”, the performers engaged each other with superb phrasing, balance of tone and volume.

Edward Neeman (L), with cellist Thomas Rann. Photo: Peter Hislop

Neeman extracts a beautiful singing tone from the piano, using a relaxed weight technique. Rann projects his cello sound in a bold, dramatic and engaging manner, partly due to his own stylish and beautiful playing, but also his magnificent modern instrument, made in 2010 in France by luthier Frédéric Chaudière.

Rann varies his upper register intonation at times, complimenting the beautiful rich middle register of his cello and its incredible bass foundation, the low open C string projecting with almost contra-bass proportions.

This pattern of finely honed balance, exquisite phrasing between the two players, tone production and projection of immense clarity and cantabile was repeated throughout the entire concert.

In addition, Neeman and Rann provided the audience with a master-class in dynamic shadings, taking us on a whirlwind tour from the most delicate pianissimos, to forte passages and cadences of immersive strength and intensity.

Both artists play as if they “lived” every moment of each piece. Rann in particular seems to savour the opportunity to visually engage with his audience with occasional eye contact before disappearing back into his inner world of music making.

Two pieces by Karl Davydov followed, his “Romance sans paroles, Op. 23” being beautifully melodic and romantic in nature, before his “At the Fountain, Op. 20, No. 2” which revealed a striking vivace opening of intensity from both musicians before relaxing back once again into a romantic melody of beauty and feeling.

Vieuxtemps’ “Elegy, Op. 30” followed, the cello part being transcribed from the original viola setting. In this, the cello played the dominant role with piano dropping back into a sensitive and moving accompaniment.

To close the program, Mendelssohn’s massive “Cello Sonata No. 2 in D Major” was spell-binding in its delivery from these two master musicians, where piano and cello share equal roles. Neeman recreated Mendelssohn’s own rippling arpeggiated phrases, based on a Sebastian Bach motive in the Adagio movement, both instruments fading into a sublime, almost mystic conclusion. 

The final Molto allegro movement was played with conviction, style, precision and emotion of a magnitude rarely heard these days.

Perhaps its partly the large gap in time since I’ve heard anything live, but I truly believe this was a concert of the first rank.

First published in City News Digital Edition, August 3, 2020

Vibe of delight, as audience and performers return to polished and refined "live" performance.

“Venite, Venite!” 

Luminescence Chamber Ensemble

Gorman House Gallery

August 1 2020

Reviewed by Tony Magee

I N A SUITABLY relaxed and informal atmosphere, Luminescence, in one of their many guises, performed a highly polished and refined concert of music ranging from the late Italian and English Renaissance to modern day composers.

Beginning with Claudio Monteverdi’s “Venite, Venite”, roughly translating as “Come, Come”, soprano Veronica Milroy, mezzo soprano AJ America and guitarist Benjamin Grace captured beautifully the polyphonic style of the composer, with superb harmonic blend and phrasing from the singers, aided by Grace’s sensitive and stylish guitar accompaniment.

Giovanni Legrenzi, an early Italian Baroque composer, was showcased using the same players in his piece “Lumi Potete Piangere”. In this, one could hear harmonic structures that seemed way ahead of their time.

A selection of five Elizabethan pieces from the feather ink quill of English composer John Dowland followed. “Flow My Tears”, arguably Dowland’s best known work, later re-arranged by the composer as the lute solo “Lachrimae Pavin”, was sung with passion and great feeling by tenor Dan Walker, who followed up with “Weep No More Sad Fountains”. The melancholy, heartache and despair these songs evoke came across so perfectly. With Walker’s ability to phrase and enunciate very skilfully, one could feel the immense sorrow.

Soprano Veronica Milroy, tenor Dan Walker and Mezzo Soprano AJ America.
Photo: Peter Hislop

Veronica Milroy brightened things up with Dowland’s “Awake Sweet Love”, beautifully sung with sweetness tenderness and passion.

AJ America completed the Dowland set with a move back into the somber tones of “In the Darkness Let Me Dwell” and “Can She Excuse My Wrongs”, the latter also being re-arranged by Dowland later in his life as the lute solo, “The Earl of Essex Galliard”. In these, America displayed her excellent pitch and phrasing abilities, capturing the sadness and despair of both pieces.

Throughout the Dowland set, guitarist Benjamin Grace supported the artists most sensitively, achieving a delicacy of tone that sometimes captured lute-like qualities.

It was lutenist Julian Bream and tenor Peter Pears who brought this repertoire to international attention in 1962, with the release of many recordings for RCA. Pears, incidentally, was also the life partner of composer Benjamin Britten, who featured later in the evening’s program with his arrangement of “I Will Give My Love an Apple”, exquisitely sung by America with Grace on guitar.

The Elizabethan selections closed with all three singers presenting a cappella renditions of Wilbye’s mournful “O What Shall I Do”, showcasing the group’s superb vocal intonation, followed by the bouncy triple-time “Though Philomela Lost Her Love”. 

Morley’s “With My Love My Life Was Nestled” was sung with imaginative period vocal ornamentation by America and once again demonstrating Grace’s lute-like qualities from his Australian made Paul Sheridan guitar, a most impressive instrument.

Now - a change of guitarist and a change of period and style. Minh Le Hoang won first prize in the 50th Tokyo International Guitar Competition in 2007 and is also a long-time member of the Australian quartet, Guitar Trek, founded by his mentor Tim Kain.

Playing his recently acquired and stunning sounding instrument made by Australian luthier Greg Smallman, Hoang delivered the most superb Spanish guitar accompaniments with bold projection, over which swept the voice of AJ America in two pieces by Manuel De Falla - “Jota” and “Canción”.

Dan Walker then took centre stage with Hoang on guitar, performing two pieces by Mátyás Seiber - “Reveille-vous” and “Le Rossignol”, both capturing the essence of French peasant country life with lively and engaging performances. Hoang was playing arrangements by Julian Bream, equally noted as a guitarist as he is a lutenist.

Tenor Dan Walker with guitarists Minh Le Hoang (C) and Benjamin Grace (R).
Photo: Peter Hislop

Walker completed the program with a thrilling account of the Italian Tarantella “La Carpinese”, composer unknown.  The vocal line, sung with passion and deep emotion, was complimented by wonderful countermelodies from Minh Le Hoang on guitar, with the strumming support of Benjamin Grace on second guitar and the light, gentle percussion playing of Veronica Milroy on tambourine.

The five performers took well deserved bows to very appreciative applause from the socially-distanced audience. You could feel the vibe of “isn’t this great!” swirling through the room from both the performers and the audience, as we all gently took our first, tentative steps back into the world of live performance.

First pubished in City News Digital Edition, August 2, 2020

Australian movies, where to from here?

 

By Jane Freebury

It’s been a treat catching Gillian Armstrong on ABC TV’s Home Delivery this week. Her reminiscences of her student days in the early 1970s are a reminder that there once was a time when ‘there was,’ the celebrated film director pauses for emphasis, ‘… no Australian film’.

Could this conceivably occur again? There hasn’t been much this year.

When and on what platform will we get to view Babyteeth, The Dry, and the others pending? Screen Producers Australia say there are 120 projects impacted during the current health emergency.

Without ongoing government support for the exceptional creative talent that we have in the Australian screen industry, we will all be very much the poorer.

While Armstrong was at the Australian Film and Television School (now AFTRS), one among the first intake, an Aussie accent on screen was disconcerting, it was so rare, and local news was delivered in accents the BBC would have approved of.

Armstrong’s resolve to pursue a career in an industry that had not yet been established, is really admirable.

There were a few local films around, relating the sexual exploits of characters like Barry McKenzie and Alvin Purple, but two seriously powerful Australian stories by overseas directors appeared on screen in 1971. Walkabout and Wake in Fright still resonate today.

By the end of the decade, there were so many Australian films of fantastic quality, including Armstrong’s exquisite My Brilliant Career – that screened at the Cannes and New York festivals – that  the surge downunder was hailed as a new wave.

The first Mad Max, Picnic at Hanging Rock, Newsfront, Storm Boy, The Devil’s Playground, Long Weekend, Caddie, Don’s Party, and The Chant of Jimmie Blacksmith all appeared in the 1970s. Along with plenty of others well worth a mention.

The bilateral government support for a film industry that began in the late 1960s was realised by Australia’s screen industries, and they have continued going strong.

A stocktake of more recent films is very surprising and rewarding, a reminder of how richly we benefit from the film and television made in this country.

The 2000s kicked off with Andrew Dominik’s Chopper, based on a real-life criminal still serving time for murder. It certainly had impact, but I preferred the mockumentary indie about an underworld hitman that arrived a few years later from Scott Ryan, The Magician. It was cheeky, smart and less visceral.

Serenades, a dead-pan comedy from Shirley Barrett appeared the same year, with the tagline  ‘Two sisters will do anything to hook the right man’. It won a Camera d’Or at Cannes for best first feature.

Can it really be nearly 20 years since Lantana showed how subtle and compelling a local adult drama could be?  There was an abundance of talent involved on the project and it won many awards here and overseas, including a best screenwriter gong for Andrew Bovell. Director Ray Lawrence’s next film Jindabyne traced contentious territory but was also excellent.

Phillip Noyce’s The Quiet American in 2002 was given unaccountably short shrift by critics and audiences here, although it was a fine drama that captured the spirit of Graham Greene’s novel. I was glad to see it win prestigious awards in the UK and US.

The 2000s were an immensely productive time for writer-director Rolf de Heer, whose The Tracker with actor David Gulpilil in the lead appeared in 2002. It was quickly followed by Alexandra’s Project, a masterwork in the suburban thriller genre. His unique collaboration with the Yolngu people, Ten Canoes, audacious and whimsical by turns, was released in 2007.

Gulpilil’s performance was outstanding in The Tracker. He also had a small role in The Proposition, the brilliant outback western directed by John Hillcoat and written by Nick Cave that was released to general acclaim, though some took exception to the violence.

Did others take exception to the sex in Jane Campion’s psychological thriller, In the Cut? It certainly divided critics and audiences but this intense, sensual, psychological thriller deserved much more recognition than it received.

Rachel Perkins’ One Night the Moon appeared, as she was consolidating her career in Australian film and television. A collaboration with singer-songwriter Paul Kelly, it had a running time of under one hour but it was certainly compelling. In recent times, Perkins has directed the first season of Mystery Road and miniseries Total Control. Both exemplary TV drama.

Another Indigenous writer-director, Ivan Sen, arrived. His very impressive work includes the features Toomelah, Goldstone, and Mystery Road the film that inspired the popular television series of the same name. Sen made his fiction feature debut in 2003 with Beneath Clouds.

Australian comedy had an uneven run during the noughties but it doesn’t mean there wasn’t some first class work. Getting’ Square from Jonathan Teplitsky and Kenny by Shane Jacobson were equally hilarious.

The hard-to-pigeonhole asylum seeker drama, Lucky Miles, directed by Michael James Rowland, was a hoot. I also really enjoyed Ali’s Wedding, directed by Jeffrey Walker and written by Osamah Sami, very definitely a comedy, that was released in 2017. Sami has called it the first Muslim rom-com.

Teplitsky also had an international hit in The Railway Man, that elicited sensitive, intimate performances from major stars Colin Firth and Nicole Kidman.

Writer-director Sarah Watt Look Both Ways, also about a couple dealing with trauma, was a miniature in comparison, and beautifully rendered at that.

Jane Campion’s Bright Star appeared in 2009 to a lukewarm reception. I thought it terrific though I’d admit to being a bit of a die-hard when it comes to this filmmaker.

I was also hugely impressed that same year by Rachel Ward’s Beautiful Kate, an intense, disturbing family drama in the gothic style.

And in 2014, The Babadook announced a bold new talent in director Jennifer Kent. It’s held in very high esteem by cinema horror cognoscenti. I just thought it was one of the most effective scare fests I’d ever watched.

Director Jocelyn Moorhouse returned in 2015 with The Dressmaker, an outback western in which a stranger arrives in town with a sewing machine on her hip. It’s a flamboyant revenge comedy drama that, for all its colliding elements, works brilliantly.

That same year, George Miller took us on another exhilarating journey into the post-apocalyptic desert in Mad Max: Fury Road. It won wild praise from many critics and now holds the record for achievement by an Australian film at the Oscars, bypassing the previous record held by Campion’s The Piano.

Lion, directed by Garth Davis and based on a screenplay by Luke Davies and with a wonderful performance by Dev Patel, was another huge success here and overseas. Who didn’t love this film?

Another home grown favourite of the 2010s was The Sapphires. Impossible not to respond to its bouncing with irrepressible joy.

The 2010s have also seen the emergence of David Michod as a major creative talent. His pitch-black crime-family drama, Animal Kingdom, shook us up and launched the international careers of Ben Mendelsohn and Jacki Weaver. Michod’s The King last year was equally impressive.

Although there are so many contenders, my pick for the most outstanding Australian film of the last two decades has to be Warwick Thornton’s Samson and Delilah. When I reviewed the film in 2009 I wrote that it announced a major new talent and could be come a modern classic. I think, as it turns out, that was the right call.

First published in the Canberra Times on 4 July 2020. Also published on Jane's blog

Featured image: Rowan McNamara in Warwick Thornton's Samson and Delilah (2009)