Restoration - Wake in Fright (1971) Discussion

[–] puirt-a-beul 16 years ago

I tried, but I couldn't get tickets. It's completely booked out.

If you keep an eye on the website (http://www.wakeinfright.com), there's a section that will provide details of the limited theatrical release of the restored version here in Australia, starting late June.

You might very well think that. I couldn't possibly comment.

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[–] barrie-2 16 years ago

Saw it this morning at the State Theatre; my mate and I got tickets from the box office this morning. Apparently they'd sold out the session, but hadn't opened the dress circle upstairs. The demand had been so great that they decided to sell tix for the dress circle also - but this went unannounced. Sorry tiger!

It was an absolute knockout. The director was there with Jack Thompson and the editor, Tony, who had been the one to track it down across the world. He traced it to Dublin, then London, and arrived in London one week after it had been shipped to the states. He eventually found it in a dumpster in a film lab in Pittsburgh, which was labelled "For Destruction". One week later and it would have been burnt.

The film lab in London told him they also found 17 other unlabelled Australian films, and wasn't sure what to do with them. He told them to send them to the Film and Sound archive in Canberra. Crazy.

The print is crystal clear. Haven't seen a clearer print of a 1970 film at the movies. Flawless. The film itself I had never seen; it was remarkable. So powerful, strange and disturbing - a slice of Australian life that's as close to a horror film as you could get without any gore or slasher killers.

Jack Thompson said the response at the time was very negative. They didn't beliueve this showed a true Australia. We were far more refined - much more like the British or the Americans - and they didn't like the idea of this story going overseas. Very interestingly, a young Peter Weir sat in with the crew during the filming for a sort of early work experience. The influence on his work is enormous. I would have said it was his film if I hadn't known who directed it. The sense of dread, mencace, and ruin with no escape is exactly like The Cars That Ate Paris or Hanging Rock.

Good news is, it's getting a full cinema release around the country a bit later this year, and it's coming to DVD in November. Check it out guys, it's a ripper.

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[–] Sergio_Falco 16 years ago

Thanks so much for that - I'm in Melbourne and it's having a screening here next week, so I'll aim for that one.

Unbelievable that it came so close to destruction - incredible. Hats off to Tony Buckley for tracking it down and overseeing the restoration.

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[–] violachild2002 16 years ago

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=le78lMM16kC
video unavailable.

He's got the car, he's got the girl, but it's a road to nowhere-The Rum Diary

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[–] fibrecementVHS 16 years ago

I second that. Saw it at the Sydney Film Festival. it looked amazing.

Also the film is awesome- the best (and in my opinion) most honest portrayal of Australia I have seen. It's like all those camp OTT Aussie films of the ninties boiled down to their original terrifying essence.

Can't wait for this to get released in cinemas later in the year so i can see it again. Go Australia!!

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[–] violachild2002 16 years ago

It's often the outsider's view that is the more observant and honest. This is one of my top movies about Australia. I don't think Australian's on the whole want to take a good look at themselves.

He's got the car, he's got the girl, but it's a road to nowhere-The Rum Diary

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[–] Kook_booger 16 years ago

Agreed. This film encapsulates so much of Australian Culture, most notably the binge drinking... The reprint is flawless, though when i went to see it there was a little interference with the sound that ran throughout the whole film. It was only noticeable in the quiet however.
The film is a classic and essential viewing.

If I cold be anyman, I'd be a peliman

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[–] CitrusWithFuschiaTrim 15 years ago

It's often the outsider's view that is the more observant and honest. This is one of my top movies about Australia. I don't think Australian's on the whole want to take a good look at themselves.

It's worth noting that the film is extraordinarily faithful to the novel, which was written by New South Welshman Kenneth Cook, so one can debate the extent to which it's really an outsider's perspective on Australia.

On the other hand Cook based it on Broken Hill, where he worked for a time very much as an outsider. He was observing the male-dominated mining towns in the vast interior from the point of view of a Sydneysider, as was his John Grant character. Confusingly, by casting an Englishman to play Grant in the film, it gives the impression that it's an Englishman who is the outsider in Australia more generally, even though the dialogue remains largely unchanged from the book. (eg. his home is seemingly still Sydney in the film.)

One wonders whether they ever considered getting Gary Bond to adopt a more obviously Australian accent. Donald Pleasance certainly did a good job in this respect.
_____
I suppose on a clear day you can see the class struggle from here.

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[–] muzilon 15 years ago

the film is extraordinarily faithful to the novel

Having read the book *after* seeing the film I was surprised that the character of Doc vanishes from the story much earlier on in the novel. I guess the filmmakers wanted to give more screen time to Donald Pleasance. Actually I thought the film improved on the novel by giving Doc's character more prominence towards the end of the story.

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[–] muzilon 16 years ago

It's being screened as part of the New Zealand International Film Festival this month.

http://www.nzff.co.nz/n7619.html?region=2

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