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Sophie Lowe finds love in all the wrong places in Beautiful Kate (2009).
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She'll remind you of Saoirse Ronan in
The Lovely Bones (2009). |
At a glance:
Some family secrets are more criminal than terrible, as we reluctantly learn from actress
Rachel Ward's directorial debut
Beautiful Kate (2009), an accomplished Aussie mystery thriller that could've done with a more effective title. I've been lookin for similar stuff havin wet my beak with
Snowtown (2011) and
Animal Kingdom (2010), not to mention I've developed an interest in
Ben Mendelsohn's CV since he starred as Daggett in
The Dark Knight Rises (2012). This one's about a rugged writer (Mendelsohn) who returns to the family farm after some 20 years just to visit his dyin dad (
Bryan Brown) but finds himself lingerin in his repressed guilt over his dead siblings. Our protagonist remembers all to well the untimely death of his twin sister (
Sophie Lowe) and brother (
Josh McFarlane) when they were all backwater brats. Fortunately, there's a survivin daughter, Sally (
Rachel Griffiths), who remains filial to the bedbound bastard - a grumpy old man who's takin his failures and resentment to his grave but not before givin his son hell.
Bad news on the doorstep:
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| Ben Mendelsohn and Maeve Dermody. |
I read that native viewers took exception to how the rural folks speak but I think what sapped some power out of the picture was the diminishin focus on Mendelsohn as the movie wore on. His emo downtime came up short and our connection to the character is interrupted. I'm guessin the narrative tone of the 1982 Newton Thornburg book from which it was adapted is such? More landscape, less love? Wouldda been awesome if we could just invest in the main character more.
Perennial wonderment:
Will I ever figure out the difference between yabbies, crayfish, crawfish and lobsters? I'm not even sure what I've been eatin for a tenner at the local Chinese every week.
Affliction (1997),
The Lovely Bones (2009),
Somersault (2004) and
The Cement Garden (1993). Not the most upliftin stories, are they?
Most memorable line:
"She's an actress. She doesn't wear clothes." Our
protag pokes fun at his spoilt nympho girlfriend (
Maeve Dermody). She's
the sort who professedly exaggerates her moans durin doggy style sex and
complains that she's only a whore because she's bein fucked like one.
The needy always fuck face to face, no? I recall
Sergio Castellitto and
Claudia Gerini's tender scene in
Don't Move (2004).
Amacam joker, berapa bintang lu mau kasi?
It
finishes as a dreary drama made worse by an overused, though excellent
soundtrack. The epilogue also does smack of self-importance and there's a
certain conceit to the way the camera lingers around the characters.
Still, it's a compellin rural tale built on no small measure of effort
and you'll find it very palatable for mature audiences game for some
disturbia.
★★★
Bonus material:
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| Can you have sex while staring directly at your parents' pictures? |
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| I don't think you can see what they're up to from here. |
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| Pleased to see me? |
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| L-R: Ben Mendelsohn, Brian Brown, Rachel Griffiths, Maeve Dermody. |
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