STRANGERLAND (Kim Farrant) See listing. Rating: NN
Where to watch: Netflix, iTunes
Strangerland stars Nicole Kidman and Joseph Fiennes as Australian parents trying to find their children after they disappear from their small outback town.
That sounds like an urgent, panicked situation, but first-time director Kim Farrant treats it so elliptically and obliquely that her film becomes a pretentious slog. Psychosexual and quasi-mystical aspects are evoked to no real purpose. It feels like screenwriters Michael Kinirons and Fiona Seres are aware of Australian classics like The Last Wave, Walkabout and Picnic At Hanging Rock, but settled for reading the backs of their DVD jackets. Maybe they were on deadline.
Kidman commits admirably to her hysterical, desperate character, and Hugo Weaving does a fine stoic turn as a policeman investigating the disappearance. Fiennes, on the other hand, struggles to humanize his wet-eyed, closed-off protagonist.
I felt for him. His actions are supposed to be proud and private, but more often than not they seem as random and ill-considered as everything else that happens in this dopey narrative.
