Something Cult, Foreign-Language or Indie #72: Samson & Delilah (2009).

Imagine life as deep in the sticks as possible. No education, no TV or internet, one car between about twenty people and the nearest supermarket or hospital could be hours away. You even have to cut your hair with a knife instead of scissors. That's how it is for Aboriginal teenagers Samson (Rowan McNamara) and Delilah (Marissa Gibson), who are stuck in a squalid Indigenous campsite in remote Arnhem Land in the Northern Territory. She spends her days helping her elderly grandmother (Mitjili Gibson, Marissa's real-life grandmother) with cooking and painting; when he's not breaking into other cars for fuel to sniff, hunting kangaroos or jamming on electric guitar with his mates, he's basically a couch potato. But after meeting, they instantly understand each other even while most of their community dislike them both. They quickly fall in love and now choose to steal the car and take a trip to Alice Springs, in the hopes of finding a better life there. But this proves very challenging, thanks to the language barrier, their mutual introversion and particularly Samson's recalcitrant attitude and near-deafness from all his fuel-sniffing.

What an honest but caring and seductive story of Indigenous adolescent life Samson & Delilah is. Writer, director and even cinematographer Warwick Thornton, with his feature-length debut, proved what was once considered box office poison in Australia - Indigenous cinema - could now be lucrative and acclaimed, as deservedly it grossed over $3 000 000 here and won the Camera d'Or at Cannes before becoming Australia's 2009 entry for the Best Foreign Language Film Oscar. Thornton's approach is very slow-paced, but thoroughly engaging and resonant because very wisely he uses minimal dialogue and sound to convey how a romantic connection depends equally on what you don't say or hear, and because he wants us to experience all these environments exactly as the protagonists do. Thornton also uses his camera to expose all the layered density of the Outback instead of just focusing on the wildlife like we so often see in such movies, and his condemnation here of the status quo for remote Indigenous Australians is very objectively expressed.

He also gets nice performances from his whole cast. Non-professional performers McNamara and Gibson have unquestionable chemistry and just the right manner for their parts, Mitjili Gibson makes a powerfully feisty community matriarch and as Gonzo, a homeless man they shack up with under a bridge in Alice Springs, Thornton's brother Scott balances light relief and growing frustration with the pair effectively. There are many Aussie movies that overseas audiences could understand, but this is not at all among them. But for all Australians, it is just unmissable. Samson & Delilah is an unflinching but tender and ultimately hopeful tale of love and survival among our land's traditional owners.

RACE RANT INCOMING.

As a white male I cannot and should not try to speak for any of my Indigenous fellow Australians; hell, I often struggle to articulate my own thoughts and feelings and many of you know why. But despite so much, I love Australia. However, it's BECAUSE I love my country that I want her to progress and improve for all the world to see, and I don't believe we can fully do that while we maintain Australia Day on its current date.

Now, I acknowledge even with a date change that many Australians will likely still observe 26 January unofficially as Australia Day; that'd be their choice, too. And changing it certainly won't fix the contemporary plight of Indigenous Australians, especially in rural areas. Not fully, anyway. But as a reflection on what we've already achieved - from the 1967 referendum, to native title, to the parliamentary apology and efforts to bridge the life-expectancy gap - and all the activists, black AND white, who struggled in their fight for those milestones, it will let us send them a message, that their struggle was never in vain and that we are prepared to fight the rest of the way.

What new date should we adopt? I don't know. I don't even think any one stands out. But while history never changes, the perspective on it often does, and in this case it has changed dramatically. This argument reappears annually, and there's only one way to end that if you want to. But if it is ended, I hope it's ended out of a desire for national compassion and humanity, and a sincere expression of it not based on guilt or obligation. When that time comes, all Aussies will be able to finally celebrate EVERY day, together, as Australia Day.

#ChangetheDate 

Something Cult, Foreign-Language or Indie #71: The Wackness (2008).

In 1994 New York City, Luke Shapiro (Josh Peck) is 18 and a drug dealer masquerading as an ice block seller. He and his parents are facing eviction, and on the eve of college he's struggling with depression and a nascent sex life. Enter Dr. Jeff Squires (Ben Kingsley), his Dionysian therapist whom Luke pays in fresh pot. After they're arrested together, Luke meets and falls for Dr. Squires' ethereal stepdaughter Stephanie (Olivia Thirlby), who's practically his spiritual opposite. As she says, she focused on the "dopeness," and he's fixated on "the wackness." As their budding romance grows (they even make out in an outdoor shower), Luke must also navigate his rather inconsistent sessions with Dr. Squires and the turmoil at home, before cementing his future.

Coming-of-age tales can be so derivative and PC now, but The Wackness stands head and shoulders above most others from this century. Extrapolating from his own adolescence, Jonathan Levine (who's since made 50/50 and Warm Bodies, both disappointing) deftly takes us into the lives of these three disparate but connected people and a few oddballs they encounter, like has-been folk rocker Eleanor (Jane Adams), hippie Union (Mary-Kate Olsen) and Luke's DJ former friend Justin (Aaron Yoo), along with very authentically recreating 1994 NYC, when Rudy Giuliani had just become Mayor. His polished screenplay also features some very witty and fitting dialogue.

Peck makes a strong dramatic debut after his breakout work on the Nickelodeon sitcom Drake & Josh, and Thirlby has deep chemistry with him. But showing them both how it's done, no doubt, is Ben Kingsley in one of his best (and definitely strangest) roles ever.  Besides mining maximum laughs from the most immature shrink imaginable, he also expertly depicts a middle-aged guy who ultimately tries to re-evaluate his own life thanks to his teenage charge.

Throw some lush cinematography, a pulsating period hip hop soundtrack and some very cool graffiti title cards in, and the result is a bildungsroman like no other. The Wackness is anything but wack.

Literally (almost) day after day.

Among the enduring stereotypes of autism is a lifestyle of strict routine. Many are untrue but mark my words, not that one. Not absolutely all autists fit it, of course, but a broad sweep of us do. For example, two of the most frequent names among retrospective diagnoses of it are Emily Dickinson and Glenn Gould. Dickinson nearly always wore white and lived her whole life on her parents' estate, while Canadian pianist Gould used the same stool for performances until it was worn right through. For a modern example of an officially diagnosed person, there's Aussie teen Sam Best, whose father James took him on an African holiday to help his long-term social skills. James wrote a terrific book, Sam's Best Shot, about it, and a 2017 episode of TV's Australian Story featured them. Pre-trip, Sam's life basically consisted of school, reading Harry Potter and playing Xbox. Anything disrupting that gave him a meltdown, and despite still having those on their trip, it aided him immensely.

Now, I honestly don't have anything like a meltdown per se frequently, but my routine (although I do like some variety) being disrupted can still jar me. When I'm home on weekday afternoons I watch three quiz shows, but in forgetting about the Australian Open being on I was jarred when I couldn't watch one of them today; that provoked this whole line of thinking. I then chose to post here about it, for hopefully a more specific commentary on autistic life than usual. But I don't and shouldn't try to speak for anybody else, so here are my routine tendencies:

- All my DVDs/Blu-Rays/CD are alphabetised. The CDs are alphabetised by artist's name (surname for solo artists), and where I have multiple albums per artists, I arrange them chronologically.
- My books are arranged by height, and alphabetised when several are equally tall.
- I never share food or especially drinks for hygiene reasons.
- I wash my hair every Monday, Wednesday and Friday.
- I wash up every second night (although, when living alone, dong so each night is virtually pointless).
- I vacuum and mop my unit every second Sunday.
- I always leave my phone in its separate compartment when driving.
- I always brush my teeth after breakfast and before bed.
- I usually leave my laundry out for exactly 24 hours.
- I have several groups of shirts for certain franchises and bands, and I wear them over consecutive days.
- I visit the gym twice weekly, and do 30 minutes of calisthenics daily. (My gym trainer encouraged the latter.)
- I usually eat the items on my plate in order of preference, from least favourite on.

Again, I'm not trying to tar my whole community with the same brush, and nor am I mocking routined lifestyles. Obviously doing so would make me a hypocrite anyway. I'm just detailing how I fly. 

Such a special Dolly.

This month, a 14-year-old girl has made news in Australia for all the wrong reasons. Her name was Amy "Dolly" Everett, and she has just joined the tragic many who've taken their own lives due to cyberbullying.

Now, I must be honest and admit, a part of me doesn't quite understand why her case should be more high-profile than others. It's no isolated incident. But regardless, if it helps the cause of suicide prevention, which I hope so, she will still have a legacy.

Considering my own life, at school I was both bullied and a bully, the latter remaining a very heavy cross to bear. I'm thus very glad social media during my adolescence was hardly what it is now. We have MySpace and email, but that was about it. That's also lucky for those I bullied because hey, back then if I could've hounded them online also, I probably would've. Plus, two girls I went to school with (but never harassed) committed suicide; one in Year Nine (her death was announced on assembly and it shocked me so much I couldn't sleep that night), the other several years after school. I don't know to this day why either one ended their lives, and I have no business knowing, but like Dolly, they both went far too early. Also, one boy in my school year witnessed a very public suicide and naturally he was off school for weeks.

I've read of a man named Don Ritchie, who became a Member of the Order of Australia for suicide prevention work. He lived in the Gap, a Sydney beach suburb infamous for cliff-face suicides, and reached out to roughly 500 would-be jumpers by inviting them to his house for a cuppa and a chat. Many returned years later to thank him for talking them out of it, and he was eventually nicknamed the Angel of the Gap.  He died in 2012 but as much as we need his like again, we all even more need to say "NO" to bullying (in reality and online) and inequality.

RIP Amy "Dolly" Everett.

Lifeline: 13 11 11
BeyondBlue: 1300 22 4636
Kids Help Line: 1800 55 1800

Something Cult, Foreign-Language or Indie #70: At the End of Daybreak (2009).

23-year-old Tuck (Tien-you Chui) inhabits a run-down hut in semi-rural Malaysia with his doting but alcoholic mother (Kara Hui). Suffocating under her thumb (as you can see above, she even still cuts his hair), he pursues a romance with the consenting but underage Ying (Ng Meng-Hui), sparking a dispute with their families as her parents threaten to report him to the police. This and Tuck's rather simple nature gets him in even more strife when he's seen hanging out at a local forest where another teenage girl was recently raped and murdered. Although he was obviously just in the wrong place at the wrong time, he's now a prime suspect, especially as his relationship with Ying has already been reported. Now, along with controlling some emotional demons, Tuck must clear his name - with Mumsey's help, of course (whether he wants that or not).

I love how foreign-language cinema can offer a refreshing, juxtaposed insight into another culture, and At the End of Daybreak does this very well. It also marries two disparate kinds of dramas (crime and family) with real assurance to make one very unique by Hollywood's standards. It's also very carefully plotted, and writer-director YuHang Ho employs lush photography and a low-key soundtrack to make the mood all the more atmospheric. Chui makes a personable protagonist, giving Tuck flickers of self-confusion and insecurity to help explain some of his less favourable behaviour, particularly towards his mum, to whom Hui brings a nice sort of passive-aggressive, duplicitous authority, and Meng-Hui is sweetly affecting as Ying.

At the End of Dayybreak seeks to be a relationship study, a police procedural and even a portrait of past and present-day Malaysia. That's a strange trio to juggle and combine, but somehow it pulls that off.

Two Trajectories: Australia's, and Mine.

Written first for a competition with a local online newspaper, earlier this week.

Nearly all my live I've called Central Queensland home. Born in Ipswich, I moved up here with my family at age 1, and here I've stayed ever since. I've often longed to move back down south just for job prospects, but so far that hasn't been possible. Even so, I'm very proud of my community. I consider this region a prime slice of grassroots Australia: a smaller-scale reflection of the capital cities, along with an enduring link to the bush and its lifestyle, both of which have become permeated into Australia's cultural image abroad.

I turn 30 this year – indeed I was a Bicentennial baby, for better or worse – and history and politics have always fascinated me, so I feel I'm in a perfectly reflective and interested mood to ruminate on the Australia of yesterday, today and tomorrow. In my lifetime we've seen seven prime ministers (one of whom served twice, and another the first woman PM), seven Governors-General including the first woman one, and Queensland has had eight premiers, two of them women who were both publicly elected. Nationally, we've had the parliamentary apology to
the Stolen Generations and the legalisation of native title, gun control and most recently same-sex marriage, but we have also had lingering issues of race play out, numerous Aussies being prosecuted overseas for drug trafficking and the threat of terrorism reaching our shores, to name but a few.

This decade has also seen the establishment of the National Disability Insurance Scheme, which could have helped my family and I all my life. That's because I have Asperger's syndrome, a high-functioning autism spectrum condition. This inevitably made me largely a pariah at school and even at home, as the youngest of three. One good aspect of that was that I was diagnosed at 12 and therefore could at least know for some of my formative years why I struggled to fit in. For over a decade then, I was in the autism closet (with all due to respect to
the LGBTQ community, we also have one), and yet even as proud and open as I've become about being autistic, that fight to be accepted and to accept myself will stay with me always and is one which too many Australians still have to wage.

As if that wasn't enough of an adolescent burden, I've also had generalised anxiety disorder since I was 14. It first took hold through panic attacks most nights while I tried to sleep, which inevitably affected my schoolwork, and my family – my mum, particularly – also soon felt its toll. To this day I'm on anti-anxiety medication, but no amount of pills can truly make you happy or confident in the long term. I've recently read up on the history of the Kew Cottages, a former asylum in Melbourne opened in the 1880s and closed a century later for children with disability and mental illness, and it's quite disturbing and sobering to think that just two or three generations earlier, one of those kids could've been me, or any of my friends with disabilities. Just for starters, patients there often were sexually and physically abused and forced to eat expired food. Australia should be deeply proud of, and not take
for granted, the fact that we now have national charities and initiatives like beyondblue, Headspace and Kids Help Line tirelessly working hard to eradicate the challenges, stigmas and stereotypes of mental illness. But we cannot rest on our laurels quite yet.

And while I appreciate sympathy, I don't want your pity. My life is hardly perfect, as am I, but in the face of everything upstairs I've achieved a great deal. I have a Bachelor of Arts with Honours Degree from Central Queensland University, I have my own car and an Open licence, a decent employment record, many close and longstanding friendships, strong familial bonds and I've been living independently since 2013. Both conditions will always hang over me, and sometimes it's like they gang up against me, but overall I genuinely feel this: I don't suffer from them. They suffer from me.

Now, let me tell you about just one of those friendships, and my adult reflections on it. One of my Year Four classmates was an Indigenous boy named Alex. We clicked immediately, and while he wasn't my first friend at school, I now know he was probably the most telling one. After all, we were both marginalised, and thus, we instinctively understood each other from the start. I love how hindsight helps to make sense of fateful things like that. And I know this may sound like white guilt on my part, but I now believe that connection Alex and I
had was the first inspiration for my sensitivity for racial issues now. Our brains and skin come in many colours, but our blood? Just one.


I don't want to summarise or conclude all this with the usual cliches (“We all must join hands for tomorrow” et cetera). And I should emphasise that even on the matters I've covered here I'm no true authority overall; I just see, think and understand what I do. But it's a fact that like all nations, Australia is a broad canvas; hell, it's one of the broadest. You couldn't cover its whole history or culture in a book without it being longer than War and Peace. But
that's an unmistakable reminder of our national endurance. And even for all its shortcomings and traditions and institutions I dislike (perhaps unsurprisingly I'm a congenital republican), overall I will love Australia forever. What lays ahead of her? I have no clue. But in fighting to make a difference and to keep Australia on the world
stage, it's just like what John Farnham (even if he was English-born) once sang: we're not gonna sit in silence. We're not gonna live with fear."

Is "Enjoy" the right word?

Firstly, yes, this is meant somewhat as a companion piece to my latest review. My close friend Laura, also an arts lover, has often said to me that when somebody asks if she enjoyed a certain type of very mature work, she will reply "Well, I'm not sure if "Enjoy" is the right word." I've known her for over a decade, and I must say (without being a kiss-arse) I've recently found myself thinking of that quite a bit. I'm sure we could both apply it to different but equally mature and serious texts, but it now makes sense to me and has real depth.

After all, not every memorable thing is pleasant, per se. Seeing or hearing about family or friends in distress obviously never is, or being in that yourself for that matter. There's also frequent subjectivity to most works or situations. But in art, that comes down to separating the content from the craftsmanship, as much as necessary. For example, my #1 movie of the 1990s is Schindler's List, which is a true story and about as narratively serious as cinema gets. It's also three hours long, but it's not great because it's historically important, but because everybody involved worked their hardest and smartest on it, and wanted to do the subject justice.

Maybe it's just because I love when art (intentionally) challenges or provokes me, and I know not everybody does, but that is one of its purposes. Otherwise, it would be superficial and pointless. Overall, I don't think you have to be able to enjoy something content-wise in order to enjoy it artistically.

Something Cult, Foreign-Language or Indie #69: Romper Stomper (1992).

1992's Romper Stomper, one of the most controversial Australian movies ever made, surfaced in a year which also saw the landmark High Court Mabo decision regarding Indigenous native land rights, and Prime Minister Paul Keating's famous Redfern Park Speech on our racial history. It follows a gang of neo-Nazi skinheads led by Hando (Russell Crowe in his breakthrough role), in the Melbourne suburb of Footscray, who initiate a street war with the Vietnamese immigrant community who have no alternative but to retaliate. They soon acquire a new member in naive runaway Gabe (Jacqueline McKenzie), whom Hando and his more sensitive wingman Davey (Daniel Pollock) both fall for. When this sparks growing conflict between them and a house siege goes to shit, Gabe has a reawakening and leaves. Hando now takes a road trip to reel her back in, with tragic results.

Writer-director Geoffrey Wright prompted a national debate with Romper Stomper as to whether it was pro- or anti-racist. I don't actually think it was meant to be either; I've always interpreted it just as a reminder that, like them or not, white supremacists exist, and in contemporary Australia, and to counter them we must understand them. Most disturbingly, another of Hando's gang members is the preteen Bubs (James McKenna).

Naturally it's a very challenging watch, but Wright (who's since made the 2006 version of Macbeth set in Melbourne's ganglands, among other things) handles it with energy and authenticity that makes the suspense truly palpable, and Crowe is just frighteningly convincing, with solid support from McKenzie (who shows a lot of flesh). Another plus is John Clifford White's ominous score. Romper Stomper is an unflinching, powerful and daring achievement, and after events like the 2005 Cronulla riots and the 2014 Lindt Cafe siege, it's arguably now more relevant than ever.