No one involved in this production has put a single foot wrong in bringing this profoundly moving and overwhelmingly beautiful film to the screen. It is as fine a film as has ever been made.
Don't be put off by any comments claiming it is a dark or depressing film. It is not. Rather, it is poignant, tender and uplifting. At its heart it is illuminated by love and forgiveness. Do not miss this haunting and rewarding cinema experience.
Twenty years after his sister's death and his brother's suicide, a man returns to his childhood home in the remote Australian outback. He has come to see his dying father who is being cared for by his remaining sister. He brings his much younger fiancé with him. The visit brings back memories of long ago and for the first time the man fully comprehends the key tragedy in the lives of himself and his family.
After the early death of their mother, a father, who is ill equipped to show his love and affection, has raised four children in the remote and demanding outback. It is a tough life that lost its emotional anchor with the loss of the mother. Educated at home via the school of the air the children, and their father, are truly isolated from the wider world and from other human contact. Elder son Cliff has been subjected to "toughening up" treatment, younger sister Sally, though only a child, is aware of the currents within the household, while middle children, Ned and Kate have the deep and interdependent connection often observed in twins.
Within this isolated, oppressive and emotionally constrained environment, the children's need for love, affection, and for models for their developing sexuality and for human relationships goes unmet. Normal adolescent confusion and uncertainty mutates with tragic consequences when Kate's fear of growing into womanhood, with its concomitant morbid fear of her mother's breast cancer, finds resonances with Ned's primary emotional connection to her and his emerging sexuality.
Kate's fear of loosing her twin by them both growing up and by Ned finding a girlfriend is compounded by Ned's recognition also that the love between the twins is the single most important thing in each other's life. Love, fear, confusion and the desire for a physical manifestation of love propel their relationship into sibling incest. Ned's rejection of this results in the tragedy at the core of the film, when Kate seeks to both punish Ned for his rejection and to bind herself to her other brother Cliff in an escalation of emotional turmoil that was bound to be destructive. The effect is immediate and by night's end two of the siblings are dead.
This film is about love, and by the end, it is love that triumphs for the man, his sister and their father who dies surrounded by it.
The South Australian Flinders Ranges location for the film is absolutely stunning. Every frame of this film is perfect. Every performance is rich with understated nuances of character and emotional depth. Intelligence, understanding, compassion and empathy shine from this film and it is just a pity that these qualities are lost on some of the audience.
Don't be put off by any comments claiming it is a dark or depressing film. It is not. Rather, it is poignant, tender and uplifting. At its heart it is illuminated by love and forgiveness. Do not miss this haunting and rewarding cinema experience.
Twenty years after his sister's death and his brother's suicide, a man returns to his childhood home in the remote Australian outback. He has come to see his dying father who is being cared for by his remaining sister. He brings his much younger fiancé with him. The visit brings back memories of long ago and for the first time the man fully comprehends the key tragedy in the lives of himself and his family.
After the early death of their mother, a father, who is ill equipped to show his love and affection, has raised four children in the remote and demanding outback. It is a tough life that lost its emotional anchor with the loss of the mother. Educated at home via the school of the air the children, and their father, are truly isolated from the wider world and from other human contact. Elder son Cliff has been subjected to "toughening up" treatment, younger sister Sally, though only a child, is aware of the currents within the household, while middle children, Ned and Kate have the deep and interdependent connection often observed in twins.
Within this isolated, oppressive and emotionally constrained environment, the children's need for love, affection, and for models for their developing sexuality and for human relationships goes unmet. Normal adolescent confusion and uncertainty mutates with tragic consequences when Kate's fear of growing into womanhood, with its concomitant morbid fear of her mother's breast cancer, finds resonances with Ned's primary emotional connection to her and his emerging sexuality.
Kate's fear of loosing her twin by them both growing up and by Ned finding a girlfriend is compounded by Ned's recognition also that the love between the twins is the single most important thing in each other's life. Love, fear, confusion and the desire for a physical manifestation of love propel their relationship into sibling incest. Ned's rejection of this results in the tragedy at the core of the film, when Kate seeks to both punish Ned for his rejection and to bind herself to her other brother Cliff in an escalation of emotional turmoil that was bound to be destructive. The effect is immediate and by night's end two of the siblings are dead.
This film is about love, and by the end, it is love that triumphs for the man, his sister and their father who dies surrounded by it.
The South Australian Flinders Ranges location for the film is absolutely stunning. Every frame of this film is perfect. Every performance is rich with understated nuances of character and emotional depth. Intelligence, understanding, compassion and empathy shine from this film and it is just a pity that these qualities are lost on some of the audience.