Wake In Fright (1971/aka Outback/Madman
Entertainment Region Free/All/Zero Blu-ray + Region Four/4 PAL DVD Imports)
Picture:
B-/C+ Sound: C+ Extras: B Film: B
PLEASE NOTE: The Blu-ray edition will play on
all players worldwide, while the DVD set can only be operated on machines
capable of playing back DVDs that can handle Region Four/4 PAL format software
and can be ordered from our friends at Madman Entertainment at the website
address provided at the end of the review.
Box/Cover Image © 2009 Wake in Fright Trust.
The usual
split in Australian Cinema is prestige films vs. Oz-ploitation, but one rare
exception was almost lost forever. Canadian
Journeyman Director Ted Kotcheff (the original Fun With Dick & Jane, North
Dallas Forty, Rambo: First Blood)
was starting to move from TV projects to feature films and Wake In Fright (1971, aka Outback)
was a groundbreaking film for Australia (arriving on movie screens as Roeg’s Walkabout (see our Criterion Blu-ray
review elsewhere on this site) co-produced by Group W (Westinghouse Electric’s
broadcasting/entertainment production division) in the U.S. and distributed by
United Artists there.
John
Grant (Gary Bond of Zulu (1964) and
character actor work on TV shows like The
Avengers, The Main Chance, Hart To Hart and Roald Dahl’s Tales Of The Unexpected) is an Australian school
teacher unhappy with his life or the fact that he had to give the school system
AU$1,000 to get the job to begin with, so he decides to head to Sydney,
stopping by the mining town of Bundanyabba for a day before catching that
plane. However, he starts to get
involved with gambling, drinking and some of the colorful local characters, especially
the rough and tumble drunken men who like to get nuts and starts a decent into
his own private hell.
Based on
the Kenneth Cook novel, this is a remarkable film and a vital, priceless piece
of Australian filmmaking that was lost for too many decades. Even with its strong cast, including
internationally known Donald Plesence (You
Only Live Twice, Carpenter’s Halloween,
The Great Escape, Fantastic Voyage, THX-1138, Raw Meat, Oh, God, Escape From New York) and other strong actors like Chips Rafferty,
Jack Thompson (Mad Dog Morgan, Chant Of Jimmie Blacksmith) and Sylvia
Kay, this was not on the map.
This is a
brutal look at the hard living of the sparser side of Australia and
the kind of working-class life that challenges the basic character of any one,
especially men and in male bonding situations, which includes males challenging
other males. Evan Jones (These Are The Damned, Eva, Funeral In Berlin, Victory
(1981)) adapted the book into a solid screenplay that holds back nothing about
the gluttony of alcoholism and self-destructive excess the residents indulge in
not knowing any other way of life and how a few of the characters might enjoy
bringing a school teacher (read city man, intellectual, etc.) down to a baser
level. The issues of sexuality are also
handled with exceptional maturity and you can see why this was issued in a few
edited versions, making restoration and preservation that much harder.
Bond
could have been a big screen movie star and it turns out (to his later regret)
Michael York turned this film down, but it was not a huge hit in its time, but
at least it got a theatrical release that films this smart and savvy rarely get
today. Besides violence, humor, surreal
moments and some great acting throughout, there is also a very graphic scene of
Grant and three of the people he has met hunting kangaroos that many will find
shocking and has footage of an actual hunt cut into the acting as the actors
were on location with a real hunting club for day and night scenes.
Though a
few moments are predictable, the majority of the film is often bold and takes
us somewhere we have never been before. Wake In Fright singularly captures an Australia
rarely seen, not unlike working class towns in other parts of the world before
their infrastructure was disassembled in the 1980s and serves as a record of
that kind of labor space far beyond Down Under.
Serious film fans will want to go out of their way for this one.
The 1080p
1.85 X 1 digital High Definition image is from a digital restoration of the
original camera negative that was fading, often badly. In playback, colors are still a little inconsistent
and fleshtones can look too yellow (the film, too yellow and sepia at times) to
the point they (especially faces) can have too little red. Still, there are some fine shots here and
Director of Photography Brian West (The
Ceremony, Squeeze A Flower) does
some of the best work in his very long career here and Editor Anthony Buckley
delivers a very original approach to his assembly. The film was originally issued in
three-strip, dye-transfer Technicolor prints, but unless any survive in a
private collection, this is the best the film will ever look. A good such print would be a huge find and
extremely valuable. The anamorphically
enhanced DVD is not as good as the Blu-ray, but it’s not bad and not much
worse.
The Dolby
Digital 2.0 Mono on both versions are the same and were painstakingly restored
from various audio elements, including shortened TV prints. I was surprised how articulate the dialogue
was and I just wish a lossless option was included on the Blu-ray. Also impressive is the music score by John
Scott (aka Patrick John Scott) whose approach is minimalist and standard
narrative going back and fourth, without ever being intrusive. An underrated composer, his other work
includes A Study In Terror (1965), Berserk, Trog, S*P*Y*S, Hennessy, Kotcheff’s North Dallas Forty, Greystoke, The Final Countdown and the theme song and much of the music for
the TV series Return Of The Saint. He deserves more all around credit than he
gets.
Extras in
both versions include 32-page booklet inside the case in each respective format
version with great texts, information and illustrations, while the discs offer
feature length audio commentary track by Kotcheff and Buckley, on camera
Kotcheff interview, International Trailer, Restoration Comparison shows how
they cleaned up the negative and restored the film with what they had, Not Quite Hollywood (2008) segment on
the film, (Australian Broadcasting Company) ABC’s7:30 Report segment
on the recovery of the film and a Ken G. Hall interview with Chips Rafferty.
As noted
above, you can order both import format versions of this film exclusively from
Madman at:
https://www.madman.com.au/actions/channel.do?method=view
-
Nicholas Sheffo
