Film Review: The Dry

Film: The Dry

Stars: A solid 4

Seen at: Hoyts Victoria Gardens

The first film of the year was a good one - a very good one. Having read the novel by Jane Harper a couple of years ago, I was always going to see this, especially as I enjoyed the book, not that I'm taken with crime novels, but as with all of Jane Harper's novels, she is the queen of the Australian outback and country. I'm also not a huge fan of Eric Bana, but I was willing to give this a go.

I'm glad I did. They've done a great job of this. 

The premise of the film centres around Aaron Falk, a Federal policeman who returns to his country hometown for the funeral of an old friend. Aaron was driven out of town years earlier after the death of a friend. 

And so two mysteries are there to be solved. What happened to his friend Luke and his family, gunned down in a senseless apparent murder suicide, and also what happened to Ellie Deacon years earlier. 

What entails is a good, honest mystery as to what happened in the town, both in the present day and year earlier, which Aaron, Luke, Ellie and their friend Gretchen were teenagers. 

No more needs to be said about the plot. What is so masterful about this film is how it captures life in small town, rural Australia. The inherent boredom and hopelessness of some, the misfits, the rebels - it's all there. Plus the small town grudges which last for an eternity. 

The movie is split between real time, with the fallout after the Luke and his family's deaths, and the time before, when Aaron and his friends were carefree teenagers and what went down then. 

This is a cohesive, though provoking film which keeps you thinking. Thankfully, I'd forgotten most of the book's plot, so things were pretty fresh. Eric Bana is great as Aaron, a man whose past has appeared to have caught up with him. There is a great Australian cast. John Polson is creepy at Whitlam the teacher. Miranda Tapsell, Genevieve O'Reilly, Julia  and Bruce Spence all appear along with a large cast of up and coming Austrlian actors. Bebe Bettencourt, who plays the ill-fated Ellie, is luminescent. 

Filmed in Castlemaine on the Wimmera borders, the film highlights the relation between the setting and landscape with the people of the town.

This is a very solid Australian film. It comes highly recommended. 

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