A bunch of high-profile Australians (including actors Cate Blanchett, Hugo Weaving and Rose Byrne) love gritty, mystical author Tim Winton and have put together 10 short films (based on a collection of his short stories) in the hope of widening his appeal. What went wrong? The first offering is casually profound (a childless housewife, played by Blanchett, shares a surprising Christmas Day with her prickly mother-in-law) and the rest may look suitably poetic but are either non-events or actively crass.
Winton seems fascinated by underclass lives — males who screw their daughters, piss on weaklings at school, beat up their wives. But the words that tumble out of these characters’ mouths make you think of keyboards and computer screens rather than snaky dysfunction. To be fair, the project originally involved 17 films. The stories are meant to be interlocking and perhaps subtleties will emerge that make the precious words sing when The Turning is released intact on DVD.
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