THE WILD HUNT

Winning Best Canadian First Feature Film at the recent Toronto International Film Festival, Alexandre Franchi’s The Wild Hunt is an original examination of power, or probably more accurately- the lack of it. Centred around medieval re-enactments and the world of LARPers (Live-Action Role Players), the film was shot in Quebec in an actual rural LARPing facility-Le Duché de Bicolline, using real LARPers as extras.

The film follows Erik Magnusson (Ricky Mabe), a non-player, as he enters the ‘medieval world’ to try and patch things up with his girlfriend Lyn (Kaniehtiio Horn), who has recently been seduced by the game. Will Erik enter into the spirit of the place with its Knights, Elves,Vikings and maurading Barbarians in order to reclaim his lady?

This film makes a pretty serious statement about modern men’s feelings of impotence. Seeking power  by adopting identities from by-gone eras and getting thrills from staged battles- the fantasy world of the LARPers, in the film,  is part-history, part-Tolkien. This imagined reality allows people with status concerns in everyday life to take on personas of kings and warriors- giving them a sense of power and purpose. This deliberate departure from the mandane ‘normal world’ is best realised through the character of Bjorn (Mark A. Krupa, Co-writer and Producer), leader of the Vikings and Erik’s brother. Bjorn is so reliant on his created identity that he is unable to leave the fantasy world, staying constantly in character.

The female characters in this film  are left largely unexplored- especially Lyn, who is far from sympathetic, so much so that you wonder why Erik wants her back. The story surrounding the brothers, Erik and Bjorn is however a compelling one- making The Wild Hunt an impressive debut. The film takes its audience into a fascinating and curious setting- as it considers the darker side of human nature and the need to feel powerful. The Wild Hunt has a real sense of menace that grows as  the characters push the boundaries of their created world and identities. How far will the game go?

The Wild Hunt is screening Monday 2nd August, 8:30pm- The Dendy Opera Quays

Director: Alexandre Franchi

Cast: Ricky Mabe, Mark A. Krupa, Kaniehtiio Horn, Trevor Hayes, Nicolas Wright, Claudia Jurt

SUCK

It was only a matter of time before a film combined vampires and rock music, because what’s cooler than the blood-sucking undead? The blood-sucking undead in a band! Suck is a rock musical that breaks with horror tradition, giving us vampires that aren’t all that pretty, or that broody;  not concerned with eternal life, these blood-suckers are on a quest for eternal fame.

Suck tells the tale of a working band called The Winners. Touring bars in Canada and The States, the band has never had its ‘big break’. Living out of their tour hearse and with a truly crap manager (Dave Foley), The Winners seem to be going nowhere.  That is until bassist Jennifer (Jessica Paré) has an unusual encounter with a mysterious audience member. Suddenly Jennifer’s stage appeal increases tenfold and the band actually gets a following. But at what cost?

Writer/director Rob Stefaniuk gives us a fun, at times absurdist, music-loving film with Suck.  Along with the central band cast, the film also hosts to an eclectic mix of musician- including Alice Cooper, Iggy Pop and Moby. Suck plays for laughs not screams, with the more macabre moments twisted for comedic effect.

Using  quirky special effects and with plenty of homages to the vampire genre and its musical influences this is a film with its tongue- firmly- in- its- cheek.  Suck plays with a variation on the Robert Johnson and the Devil scenario, asking the question- how far would you go to be famous?

Suck is screening on Friday 6th August, 6:30pm- Queen St Studio- the film is followed by the Vampire Ball, click here for more details

Director: Rob Stefaniuk

Cast: Jessica Paré, Mike Lobel, Malcolm McDowell, Paul Anthony, Chris Ratz, Iggy Pop, Alice Cooper, Moby, Henry Rollins, Dave Foley, Dmitri Coats, Danny Smith

Visit the Possible Worlds website to check out full programme listings and ticketing information

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LESLIE, MY NAME IS EVIL

A scathing comment on 1960’s America, this warped satire from director Reg Harkema (Monkey Warfare) has spurned the ire of the controversy king himself cult director John Waters, for its comically ironic treatment of the Manson family murder trial. The film’s official site displays this fact proudly (ironically, Waters, who has himself referenced the Mansons in his own films, was a big influence for Harkema in making ‘Leslie’).

Seemingly a heightened blend of real events and the imagined, we meet God fearing chemical engineer Perry (Gregory Smith, The Patriot), engaged to an even more God fearing virgin, who is enlisted as a jury member on the trial of Charles Manson (Ryan Robbins, Passengers) and his harem for their horrific murder spree (which included the killing of a Hollywood starlet). Perry finds himself oddly besotted with one of the accused, Leslie Van Vouten (Kristen Hager, I’m Not There), whose fractured family life, an abortion and the assassination of J.F.K has led her into the arms of the famed cult.

‘Leslie’ treads a bold path juxtaposing what Harkema sees as the demonisation of Manson and his cult and the moral outrage of their “pig” killings (the killing of “normal god fearing people”) with the culpability of the Nixon government in the Vietnam War. “The loyal soldiers of Manson breaking into homes to kill pigs was not much different from the loyal soldiers of the United States breaking into huts to kill gooks,” Harkema has said. In its pillorying of America’s social and religious values (by a Canadian no less) the film raises its middle finger to what it contends to be that country’s hypocrisy – it wants its audience to question their beliefs.

Trippy, odd and no doubt offensive to some, with some strong performances from Smith and Hager, a swinging 60’s soundtrack and plenty of black satire, ‘Leslie’ is sure to be one of the most controversial flicks at Possible Worlds this year.

Leslie, My Name Is Evil screens at 6.30pm at Dendy Newtown, Sydney on Saturday the 7th of August.

Director: Reg Harkema.

Cast: Kristen Hager, Gregory Smith, Ryan Robbins

INVISIBLE CITY

How do you escape a seemingly inescapable situation when you’ve been born into it and it’s all you know? This somber Canadian documentary from Academy nominated director Hubert Davis doesn’t offer easy answers but is a sobering reminder of the effect of disadvantage on youth in low socio-economic areas.

On the outside, change is under way in Regent Park, Toronto in what the film claims is the oldest public housing project in Canada; buildings are being torn down and rebuilt in a 15 year ‘revitalization’. But take a closer look and the same cyclical issues remain. Black teenage friends Kendell and Mikey have both found themselves on the wrong side of the law, gravitating towards negative influences in their community but both want a better life, to walk the straight and narrow as it were.  But in this neighbourhood, there’s more glory in jail time than there is in getting an education.

Invisible City follows these insightful, troubled youths over three years capturing their ups and downs at school and their interaction with caring social worker Ainsworth Morgan, who acts as a kind of father figure for the boys whose own fathers are absent in their lives.  Their mothers emotionally reveal their devotion to them and the effect their behavior has on them personally – Mikey’s mum Sharon feels relieved when he’s in jail as it least then she knows his whereabouts.

Lingering sequences depict a community in decay – “When you’re a product of the projects, you’ve been to more funerals than you have weddings,” says Morgan – but the documentary also shows that the work being done by the likes of Morgan through community initiatives is having a positive, profound effect on Regent Park’s youth.

Kendell, Mikey and their mothers believe the cycle can only be broken by leaving their community, which at times appears akin to a toxic fishbowl. Despite their hard knock life, the positivity of both young men is heartening and admirable.

Invisible City screens at 4pm at Dendy Newtown, Sydney on Sunday the 8th of August.

Director: Hubert Davis.

Cast: Michael Lewin, Kendell Campbell, Ainsworth Morgan

Visit the Possible Worlds website to check out full programme listings and ticketing information

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In this modern day and age, where dreams have broadened to include knowledge, experience, a career and aspirations, are the Disney’s fairy tales outdated?

In Sex and the City: The Movie, Carrie Bradshaw reads the story of Cinderella to a young girl named Lily. At the end of the story, she looks at the little girl and says, “You know this is just a fairy tale, right sweetheart? Things always don’t happen like this in real life”.

Hallelujah Carrie! You nailed that one. If everyone had a “happily ever after”, it would certainly not be called “a life”, right? Life is full of challenges, imperfections and bad-hair days. We can wish to wake up every morning in a ball dress with perfect skin and nails that don’t need buffing but, in reality it doesn’t always work that way.

Princess Aurora a.k.a. Sleeping Beauty made her daily life look so effortless when she swayed amongst the forest animals and hummed a melody while picking berries. She didn’t have a doctor’s appointment, or an empty pantry that desperately needed refilling. But it also makes me wonder if this princess phenomena is a healthy barricade from the unpleasant sights of our society, or the ‘real world’. Perhaps Disney merchandisers have assisted a young girl’s mind to be safely armoured in the fantasyland.

These girls crave to sit on their magical carriers, glide through a ballroom and fall into the arms of their hero. The society has an undying fascination with “happily-ever-after” and it entails in every movie genre nowadays.

There are chick-flicks where, even after a nasty break-up, you’d find the hero sprinting across the airport terminal, stopping the airplane from taking-off and pulling the sobbing lady into his arms. In action movies, the bad guys are either arrested or killed, but your eyes won’t miss a passionate, sweaty and greasy (blame the bomb blasts) kiss between two lovers.

For obvious reasons, Disney wouldn’t want to break the trend. They follow the same strategy of magically-killing the evil character and bringing the two loved ones together.

It can be argued that little girls have an innate desire to live the fantasy of being a princess. It is either the red luscious-locks of Ariel or the perfect spotless skin of Snow White; every girl wants to be the owner of that perfection. This makes me wonder, does this princess craze hurt a girl’s self-image? Have the Disney princesses trained a generation of damsels in distress?

If you closely inspect the Disney princesses, you wouldn’t argue when I say that each one of them has ditto-same features, and are only racially unique. The difference in their hair and skin colour is prominent, but the rest is scarily similar. These princess beauties have created a stereotype of beauty in society. They have forced girls to believe that, if only you had a fairy godmother and a 24-inch waist, you will have a magical wedding. This multi-million dollar industry has camouflaged society’s ugly side and made it a hypothetical mess.

But in a world where Lindsay Lohan has loud and atrocious nail art while she’s getting sentenced to jail, and Miley Cyrus does her infamous booty dance; letting your child indulge in that blissfully perfect world seems like the best bet.

I find it obligatory to quote Carrie Bradshaw again:

“What if Prince Charming had never showed up? Would Snow White have slept in that glass coffin forever? Or would she have eventually woken up, spit out that apple, gotten a job, a health-care package, and a baby from her local neighbourhood sperm bank?”

Unlike Disney, Pixar studios pushed the boundaries of fairy tales and came up with honest and real screenplays. The heart-melting family movie, Toy Story, showcased a beautiful matrimony between eerily realistic computer graphics and old-fashioned story telling. The twinkling wit and sexual innuendos, which only adults understood, and the intricate detailed screenplay that demanded in-depth study, gave Pixar studios breaking box-office records.

Despite its collaboration with Walt Disney, it showed the audience a new perspective of life. It changed the trend and shoved the Disney-stereotype in the back seat.

Take the delicious 2007 comedy, Ratatouille, in which a rodent mastered the art of French cuisine. The picture attributed to the art of cooking the importance of trust in a relationship. While Wall-E attacked consumerism, Up made every adult weep in the first 15 minutes of the movie. The brilliantly-scripted, Finding Nemo, sent every child running back to his father and promising to never outdo their words of wisdom.

These blockbuster hits didn’t just find a place in every movie-lovers DVD collection racks, but also in the hearts of every child and adult. They don’t have pink seas and diamond tiaras – they have real families, real friendships and real human emotions. Emotions that can make a 40-year-old man shed a tear in front of his four-year-old son.

Disney’s promotion of Prince Charming had crossed the “let’s-be-realistic” borderline, but Pixar saved the day. It expanded the genre of ‘Fairy Tale’ by making it more universal.

No more does a family cringe when the kid yells, “Let’s watch an animated movie!” No more do movies end with a wedding scene. And the ultimate dream is no longer about ‘finding a lover’ or ‘having a perfect wedding’ – thank you Pixar.

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A few weeks ago, a rather inconvenient thing happened to me – my tire went flat as I was driving my friends home at night. Now, this is hardly a life-threatening situation, and even the inconvenience of changing a tire is marginal at most.

However, the episode turned into something of a saga. You see, I don’t know how to change a flat. I’ve been shown once or twice, but the method never really stuck, and even if I did know the technicalities, in practice I doubt I would succeed, given my lack of upper-body strength and inability to lift heavy things.

The two friends I was with also didn’t know how to change a flat, so we did the logical thing and called NRMA – that is, after all, why I pay for Roadside Assistance. Being a Friday night, they were quite busy, and it took a couple of hours to reach them on the phone and longer for them to get there. Then there were some complications with my spare, and by the end of it, I didn’t get home until 3am.

The next day, I was telling some friends about the episode, and they scoffed at me, claiming, ‘What kind of feminist are you? You can’t even change a tire.’

I’m sorry, I wasn’t aware that one of the prerequisites to believing in equality between men and women was that I had to learn how to perform various mechanical tasks. Strange how they don’t tell you that in Feminism 101.

The logic behind this statement was that I had somehow sold out my feminist ideals by having to call someone, who was a man, as it turned out, to fix my car tire. If I were really an independent woman, I would have done it by myself.

This kind of thought is incredibly frustrating to me. It comes directly from the school of thought that if a woman ever, under any circumstances, required a man’s assistance, she is admitting to being inferior to men in some way, or ‘needing’ men for her survival. The only way to have equality, then, is to have and do it all for yourself, to not only prescribe to traditional female roles, but also to attempt to emulate traditional male roles as well.

Now, don’t get me wrong. I am in no way claiming that changing a tire is a ‘man’s job’, or that women shouldn’t be expected to learn their way around their own cars. As a responsible driver, I probably should learn to change my own tire, if only so that I can be assured of my own safety at all times. But being a woman or a feminist has nothing to do with it at all.

Feminism, to me, is not about being women or men – in fact, that’s what it is precisely not about. It’s about eradicating gender-based discrimination, and realizing that individuals are different, regardless of what genitalia they possess; that being a man or being a woman means nothing in particular when it comes to strengths and abilities, and that women come in all different shapes, sizes and capabilities.

I may be the kind of person who can’t change their own car tire, but I can do plenty of other things. That’s why I pay for NRMA, with the money that I earn independently of any other person, man or woman.

Asking for help, or acknowledging your weaknesses is not anti-feminist in any way. I often can’t open bottles and jars at work, and generally have to ask someone to do it for me. That doesn’t mean that I’m assuming the role of a weak, helpless female – I physically can’t do some tasks, but am able to help in other ways. And there’s nothing wrong with that.

Being a feminist doesn’t mean that I have to be invincible, and it certainly doesn’t mean that I need to take on every traditionally male task in order to prove that I’m not inferior to men.

Being a feminist means having the liberty to be who I am, and have the opportunity to do things that I want to do, preferably without judgement.

Maybe I’ll learn how to change a tire one day, but I’m in no rush. Luckily for me, there are many other people who have those skills, who I can look to for assistance. And I don’t think that’s anything to be ashamed of!

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Benefit Loose Dust Shimmer Powder in Goldilocks, RRP $31

Aptly named, and if you’re feeling adventurous, don’t stop at your eyelids! Any self-respecting fairy has shimmery cheeks, lips, eyes…

Orly Metal Chic Nail Laquer in Solid Gold, RRP $18.95

Gold nails, the signs of a true fairy.

Il Makiage Liquid Shimmer in Goddess Gold, RRP $15

They call it ‘moonlight in a bottle’ – say no more.

Max Factor Masterpiece Colour Precision Eye Shadow, RRP $20.99

Sometimes you want a lil’ silver, instead of gold, right? Any fairy princess has a few options, and this eye shadow glides on oh-so-smoothly and effortlessly.

While you read through some of the fabulous articles going up on Trespass this week, fix yourself a drink inspired by Snow White’s poisoned apple.

You know the story.  Snow White’s vain step-mother, fed up with having Snow White proclaimed as the ‘fairest of them all’ disguised herself as a farmer and offered Snow White an apple to eat, which Snow White cannily refused.  The shifty step-mother took a bite on the green side, showing it was safe to eat then offered the poisoned red side to Snow White.  With a chunk of poisoned apple lodged in her throat, Snow White falls into a stupor only to be awoken by her true love.

Now I am not promising that on drinking a few of these martini’s you will wake, with mascara smeared, matted hair to gaze into your prince charming’s adoring eyes, but hey – it worked for Snow White!

Traditionally, a martini is made with a larger component of vodka or gin but I tend to find them a little too eye-wincingly strong.  This version is sweetly smooth.

Poison Apple Martini

1 part Vodka

2 parts Apple Schnapps

Green Apple

Grenadine

Fill a cocktail shaker with ice before pouring in the vodka and schnapps.  Shake shake shake, then strain into a chilled martini glass. Scoop balls of green apple using a melon baller.  Make a small incision in the top and add a sliver of apple for the stem.  Cut a wedge from the bottom before dipping half the apple into a small dish of grenadine.  Garnish the drink with the apple perched on the side of the martini glass.

Trespass Magazine encourages you to drink responsibly.

© An Original Recipe and Photograph by Chantelle Thompson.  Please do not reproduce without permission.

The career of cult director Richard Linklater has been a varied and often wonderful thing to behold. From the high school comedy of Dazed and Confused to the Parisian romance of Before Sunset and the animated science fiction of A Scanner Darkly, Linklater has scuttled from genre to genre with ease. Now he takes a detour back to 1930s New York to tell the tale of Orson Welles’ famed Broadway revival of Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar.  It’s an at times ambitious, but frustratingly limited, film that gets by on the energy of its cast.

Zac Efron (High School Musical) stars a regular everyday High School student named Richard Samuels who happens by chance upon a small role in a play by Orson Welles (Christian McKay) on a trip to New York City. At the time Welles was a young prodigious talent who, as audiences surely know, would soon go on to create some of the greatest cinema ever made. The last piece of the tale revolves around Samuels’ affection for production assistant and wannabe actress Sonja (Clare Danes, Romeo + Juliet) who is having an affair with Welles and is desperate to audition for Gone with the Wind.

Linklater’s ambition is clear, but his reach is noticeably small. Recreating the New York City of 1937 is a hard ask on a small budget and Linklater and his crew, which includes Academy Award-nominated cinematographer Dick Pope, have tried their hardest, but they can’t disguise the fact that most of Me and Orson Welles is set on a stage and that audiences rarely get to experience the vibrant setting and that we don’t get the full impact of Welles’ achievement.

It’s good to see Efron expand out of his teen-friendly comfort zone here and he may have a full on career in the making, but it’s disappointing to see Danes relegated to such a lifeless point on a love triangle. The supporting cast is filled with interesting actors such as Eddie Marsan (Happy-Go-Lucky), Zoe Kazan (It’s Complicated), Ben Chaplin (Birthday Girl), Kelly Reilly (Sherlock Holmes), Imogen Poots (28 Weeks Later) and James Tupper (Men in Trees) as legendary actor Joseph Cotton, but the film belongs to British newcomer Christian McKay who does a spot on impersonation of Welles’ famous cocky demeanour and shaky temper. Welles ends the movie asking “How can ever I top this?” and I suspect there’s a more engaging and exciting movie to be made out of that, but for now Me and Orson Welles, whilst slight, should appeal to stage and screen buffs.

Me and Orson Welles is released 29 July.

Director: Richard Linklater

Cast: Zac Efron, Christian McKay, Clare Danes, Eddie Marsan, Zoe Kazan, James Tupper, Ben Chaplin, Kelly Reilly and Imogen Poots.

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Based on a 2,000 year old legend that tells of the mysterious disappearance of the invading Roman Ninth Legion in Scotland, Centurion opens in AD 117 as the Roman Empire’s mass land occupation reaches a stalemate in Britain’s north. A territory war is being waged between Roman armed forces and a vicious cluster of tribes known as the Picts- and Roman Centurion Quintas Dias (rising star Michael Fassbender, Inglourious Basterds) bare-chested and bound, is on the run from his Pictish captors. Saved by the Ninth Legion, led by General Titus Virilus (Dominic West, The Wire), Quintas’ loyalty is secured and he vows to lead the Legion’s few remaining soldiers to asylum after they survive a bloody attack by the Picts.

What follows is a game of cat and mouse as the small band of men fight for survival in the freezing, forbidding Scottish Highlands, the Picts, spear-headed (pardon the pun) by the cold blooded super huntress Etain (former Bond girl Olga Kurylenko) in dogged pursuit.

While Marshall’s screenplay, brought to life amidst the spectacular Scottish wilderness,  may raise questions of historical veracity ( Marshall freely admits he used his imagination to fill in the gaps), Centurion, unlike the more conservative Gladiator, pulls no punches in its portrayal of battle. Ultra violent and gruesome, this is bloodletting on a grand scale. As the endless crimson tide spurts, almost comically at times, you can’t help but think that along with the grisly veracity, Marshall (who proved to be a gore lover with The Descent and Dog Soldiers) is getting a kick out of the blood sport. Look out for the stomach churning arrow-through-the-eyeball scene.

But there’s more than blood on display here. Sure it’s a dark tale with imagery filtered in murky blues and greens but amongst the bleakness there’s ample suspense, a touch of humour and romance and some reasonably well rounded characters. Fassbender brings understated gravitas to proceedings while Kurylenko, whose Etain has been rendered mute by the Romans, does surprisingly well in conjuring up pure evil. Whether the history books concur or not, this is one poster girl for lethal girl power way ahead of her time.

Centurion isn’t perfect but Marshall does bring a fresh spin to the sword-and-sandals genre giving it a modern sensibility; from rapid-fire action sequences to no-nonsense parlance  – “When will people learn not to fuck with the Ninth?” fumes Virulus – and a tongue-in-cheek sensibility.

While it may not be in the same league as Gladiator in terms of spectacle (fear not role players, there’s sufficiently epic battle-porn on display) Centurion prefers to travel a darker path with a focus on the relentlessness of survival. If you can stomach the blood, it’s a suitably slick and thrilling ride.

Centurion is released nationally on Thursday the 29th of July.

Director: Neil Marshall.

Cast: Michael Fassbender, Dominic West, Olga Kurylenko, David Morrissey.

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When travelling, there is one phrase you hear so often it almost becomes as part conversational structure as a greeting, or an enquiry into your wellbeing; ‘you’re so lucky.’ It’s usually followed by ‘I wish I could do what you’re doing, instead I’m stuck in (insert name) being boring.’ To this I usually respond, internally, that you can do what I’m doing, just do it. Sacrifice and compromise what you must in order to do it, and then just do it. But that’s another vent for another day. When one is living/working on a Greek Island, the ‘you’re so lucky’ phrase increases in frequency and, yes, largely for good reason. But nothing is ever perfect, and whilst from the outside looking in, travelling looks like a permanent fairy tale, here’s a little secret; it isn’t.

Travel is thrilling but it’s also exhausting. It’s permanently extraordinary but it’s also scary. You make friends you will never forget, but there are also times of loneliness. It’s one glorious shock to the system after another and that can be overwhelming. You get sick. You get scared. You do stupid things. You miss home. Travel is something you do because you want to. Because you choose to. Yes, the luck of being able to is involved – physically and financially able, although the latter takes discipline and sacrifice to achieve – but ultimately, paradise is only ever found if it is sought. And it is the seeking that is the challenge you take up when you buy that plane ticket, pack that bag, wave goodbye to your family and friends for an indefinite period of time and start to write your own fairy tale.

The Santorini police station is a small, whitewashed building with one computer, one fax/printer and a rather large wall of haphazardly arranged folders. Next to the station is the ‘secretary’ room – two desks and a couch. I know this because last week I spent a morning there after my room was broken into and camera and phone stolen. Two nights later, after breaking into a friend’s house in a neighbouring village, they tried to get back into mine. And so I found myself standing in front of two retro-uniformed officers who, between them, spoke ten words of English, and we all know what my Greek is like. An incredibly serious Chief, who gave deep thought to every word he spoke (which may be because he couldn‘t speak English and I can‘t speak Greek) dictated the (handwritten) report whilst gazing pensively out of the window, one hand behind his back. The young whippersnapper (rather strapping whippersnapper, actually) to whom he dictated, scribed with diligence whilst translating what he could to me. Following the half page report being finished and me signing a form I understood nothing of, relying on the whippersnapper’s translation (‘were you birthed in Sydney?’) I was told to return in 7 days, when my report would be ready. Presumably the report is rewritten in the secretary’s room by one flustered ‘secretary’. I presume this because, when I returned after 7 days, my report was unprocessed and the secretary (male, no English) was flustered. I have since collected the report (no ID necessary) and begun the tedious process of lodging a claim and finding a new place to live.

I know you’re all waiting for me to get to the part about happy endings. To get to the assurances that as difficult as it is sometimes, travel is the best thing you will ever do. So here we are. My happy ending in this particular little plot-twist is I am moving into a beautiful old cave house covered in bougainvillea, in another village, with a view over the whole of Perissa and Perivolos. I’m moving in with excellent new friends, the kind you travel to make. I’m experiencing a new village and I’m getting a quad bike. It’s a new adventure, and that’s my happy ending. For now.

Ultimately, you learn to take the good with the bad. The lost with the found. You learn that even living on a Greek island isn’t endlessly idyllic. And you learn that travel isn’t purely a fairy tale – it’s more of a genre mash-up; adventure, occasional horror, comedy and a touch of romance thrown in for good measure. And you wouldn’t have it any other way.

It’s a risky venture to set a film on an isolated island involving only a handful of characters, only to have all but two remain in an intended love match; you’d better hope that central relationship is an engaging one. South Solitary, from director Shirley Barrett, despite its wealth of talent sadly fails on this count.

It’s 1927 as Meredith (Miranda Otto reuniting with her Love Serenade director Barrett)  a plucky yet troubled 35 year old spinster travels by boat with her Uncle Wadsworth (Barry Otto, Cosi) to South Solitary, a picturesque, windswept island where Wadsworth is to take over as head lighthouse keeper. His predecessor has shot himself and ships are rare in the area due to the lighthouse’s unreliability.

The grumpy Wadsworth’s benevolence gives the hard-of-luck Meredith shelter. She in return carries out domestic duties and endures her Uncle’s bossiness and disapproving barbs about mistakes she has made in her past.

For Meredith, making friends with South Solitary’s quirky inhabitants won’t be easy. There’s Assistant Lighthouse Keeper and philanderer Harry (Rohan Nichol, Garage Days), his unwelcomingly direct wife Alma (Essie Davis, Australia), their children including the quaint Nettie (Annie Martin) who sports a foul mouth and a scab collection and the painfully closed Jack (Marton Csokas, Romulus My Father), also an Assistant Keeper, who carries within him the heavy battle scars of World War One.

In its first half, South Solitary reveals fine performances (it’s great to see Otto Snr and Jnr on screen together), beautiful cinematography and Victorian coastal locations, an affecting score and enough gentle quirk, charm and black humour to maintain interest.

But the unlikely, uneasy romance between Meredith and Jack amongst the inclement weather in the film’s dour second act proves to be South Solitary’s undoing. A courtship under the lighthouse glow might sound romantic but it’s a relationship that simply doesn’t fire. It’s no fault of Otto or Csokas, both of whom are fine actors. It’s more that the scenario of forced companionship feels unnecessarily contrived (plot twists see the other characters shipped off one way or another leaving Meredith and Jack alone together on the island) and the characters mismatched; Meredith is lonely, kindly and overzealous, Jack is gentlemanly yet painfully withdrawn. It’s an awkward pairing to witness and, like the needle work that each use to pass the time, tedious especially given there’s little chemistry or sexual tension.

And, call me impatient, but the fact that so little happens in the film’s latter half at such a ponderous pace, compared to the charm of the former, means the credits can’t roll too soon.

South Solitary is released nationally on Thursday the 29th of July.

Director: Shirley Barrett.

Cast: Miranda Otto, Barry Otto, Marton Csokas , Rohan Nichol, Essie Davis.

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