Much like with Ari Aster and Midsommar, this review is
basically going to be me admitting that I severely underestimated the director on
their previous work. Except I can’t even blame the density of the material this
time around; I legit just wasn’t experienced enough in cinema to give Jennifer
Kent’s The Babadook its fair due.
For the incredibly unconventional and
confronting work it was, one that dealt with parenthood and depression in a way
that truly blind-sided me on first viewing, it really took me a second viewing
to properly get over what were ultimately some rather minor grievances with the
film’s tone. Or, more accurately, my inability to understand the tone. And much
like with Midsommar, I’m not leaving anything to chance now that I’m fully
aware of what this director is capable of. And oh boy, is this one hell of a
follow-up to one of the greatest horror flicks of the 2010’s.
The story is essentially a rape revenge drama set in
colonial-era Australia, specifically the territory of Van Diemen’s Land that
would eventually come to be known as Tasmania. It follows Irish convict Claire,
whose family is murdered and whose body is violated by British officers, and
her quest through the bushland to wreak vengeance on the ones responsible. It
is incredibly confronting in its content, with multiple depictions of brutality
and rape in the first half-hour, but it deftly manages to avoid becoming
exploitative in the process. It is disgusting and hard to look at… but keep in
mind that we only have to watch it. In Australia’s past, this is what the early
citizens of this land were subjected to.
The acting is fucking phenomenal, starting with Aisling
Franciosi as Claire. She is the embodiment of just how furious this entire
production is, and through every moment of grief, heart-break and
spleen-rupturing rage, she makes it pretty much impossible not to be moved.
Opposite her is Sam Claflin as soldier Hawkins, the main perpetrator, and the
man apparently has untapped potential as a villain because he unloads all of
it in this one. Where Nicholas Hault in True History Of The Kelly Gang
embodied British authoritarianism, Claflin ends up representing something far
worse: The innate capacity for cruelty that lies in all of humanity. Damon
Herriman as his lieutenant adds to that, in a role that makes his turn in Judy & Punch look like a frothy rom-com lead.
And then there’s Baykali Ganambarr as Billy, a blackfella
that Claire encounters on her warpath, and the point where the film’s scope for
righteousness truly gains its footing. While his chemistry with Franciosi ends
up giving this a bizarre buddy-comedy tinge, something that winds up being
sorely needed as the events grow more harrowing, their pairing basically
presents the extent to what the British were doing at this time.
On one side, there’s the Irish convicts, the people taken
from their home for what were usually extremely minor offences like stealing
food for a starving family, and whose personhood was frequently squandered. And
on the other, there’s the First Persons of the land, the ones who were close-to-eradicated
when the settlers arrived, and whose culture was scorched by those who seeked
to ‘civilize’ these savages.
What makes that connection work so damn well is that, in the
process of showing the oppression that they have both faced, the film never makes
the mistake of turning the discussion into a game of ‘Whose Oppression Is
Bigger?’. It acknowledges how that kind of in-fighting is far from productive,
allowing the brutes behind both of their respective miseries to get away with
murder (and worse) while they argue amongst themselves. And while Claire and Billy’s
relationship starts out on quite hostile ground, that quickly melts away into a
mutual understanding that not only have they both been fucked over, but they
were fucked over by the exact same people.
Of course, simply showing the hate of the era is a
relatively simple idea; it’s not exactly difficult to make murderous rapists
look bad. But where it easily could just wallow in its own misery, the most
powerful moments aren’t the result of brutality but empathy. Claire and Billy
connecting over their displacement from their respective cultures, the strangers who give
them food and shelter, the understanding that bloody vengeance is only a
short-time solution to the pain of the victim; it highlights a lot of the
worst that humanity is capable of in order to highlight how vital it is for us
to do the opposite. To not give in to hate, to apathy, to this behaviour being
the accepted norm. And through Claire’s traumatic character arc, the film’s
grab for empathy on both sides of the screen results in an exceptionally
powerful offering.
Even knowing this is from the same writer/director as
Babadook, I am quite floored at just how fucking good this is. It basically
combines the persecution of the Irish convicts from True History Of The Kelly
Gang and the systemic racism against the Indigenous Australians from SweetCountry, and gives them both space to breathe in a story all about what little
excuse some need to disregard human life as even being human. It’s the
kind of film that Jennifer Kent was always going to end up making, given her
origins as a production hand on Lars Von Trier’s Dogville, and if she continues
being this unabashedly confronting and brilliant, she’s well on her way to
being one of the greatest filmmakers in our nation’s history.
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