Something Cult, Foreign-Language or Indie #121: Oranges and Sunshine (2010).

In 1987, after meeting a desperate woman who claims she was forcibly separated as a girl from her family and deported to Australia, English social worker Margaret Humphreys (Emily Watson) uncovered one of the most shocking scandals in recent Commonwealth history. Throughout the post-war era, thousands of children as young as three were taken from their families and sent Down Under, where they were promised "oranges and sunshine" (hence the film's title) but instead were subjected to years of institutional abuse and hard labour, along with often being told their parents had died. Over seven thousand are thought to have come to Australia, and they came to be known as the Home Children.

Based on Humphreys' book Empty Cradles, Oranges and Sunshine is a superbly delicate and measured treatment of such an uncomfortable subject, and the result is appropriately infuriating. In his directorial debut, Jim Loach (celebrated English social realist director Ken's son) shows consistent intuition and objective sympathy in navigating the story of Humphreys' mission to reunite so many families around the world, and he has Rona Munro's restrained screenplay at his disposal. He wisely resists the more cliched drama/biopic artistic choices (a big, swelling score, emotional monologues etc.), instead drawing more on occasional period pop songs and silent conversations to elicit the after-effects of these adults' childhoods. And the actors all bring thorough heart and soul to them: Watson was a fully suitable choice to play Humphreys with her consistently tenuous but deep stoicism, and as the two survivors she most prominently counsels here, David Wenham and particularly Hugo Weaving match her all the way. Their characters couldn't differ more; Wenham's Len assumes a strong larrikin facade but has the memories of his past always right under the boilerplate, while Weaving's Jack is more shattered than a dropped glass.

Okay, so it's clearly not feelgood fluff, but it was past time for this scandal to be brought to the silver screen, and I can't think of how it could have done so much more effectively. Oranges and Sunshine is a film that will remind you of how healthy and appropriate being angry can be.