(Based on the book "In My Father's Den", by Maurice Gee)
Cinematographer:
Stuart Dryburgh
(The Piano, Bridget Jones' Diary, Once Were Warriors)
Music Score:
Simon Boswell
(Shallow Grave, This Year's Love)
Cast:
Paul: Matthew MacFadyen
Celia: Emily Barclay
Penny: Miranda Otto
Andrew: Colin Moy
Jackie: Jodie Rimmer
Ms Seagar: Vicky Haughton
As seen in everything
from Heavenly Creatures to Whale Rider and The Piano -
not to masquerading as mention Middle Earth - New Zealand has the uncanny
knack of feeling spacious and scenic while naggingly claustrophobic. Which
means it provides the perfect backdrop for this dark chamber piece of a
movie.
Marking director Brad McGann's full-length feature debut, the film is also
most notable for coaxing an extraordinary performance from newcomer Emily
Barclay as the central teenage character, Celia. For she is the catalyst for
all the main twists, turns and motivations of a handful of dysfunctional
adults who seem fated to repeat the mistakes of their younger selves and
their predecessors.
The plot is superficially simple: a glamorous, yet jaded war photographer
Paul (Matthew MacFadyen) returns home for his father's funeral in small town New
Zealand to be reunited with his estranged brother Andrew (Colin Moy), a pious, yet
bitter ostrich farmer, now married with a voyeuristic teenage son. When
revisiting their father's old den, Paul stumbles across a teenage girl Celia
(Barclay) who uses the place as her secret hideaway. They strike up an
unlikely friendship as Celia attempts to break down Paul's weary aloofness
while he discovers that she is the daughter of his old flame, Jackie
(Jodie Rimmer), now the local butcher with a dodgy and voyeuristic boyfriend.
But when Celia goes missing, the narrative takes on a darker, more violent
hue and the fingers point at Paul. Has she discovered her true identity and
gone abroad, or has a family member disposed of the inconvenient teen? Was
voyeurism to blame? Why did Paul and Andrew's mother die? And what was their
father really getting up to in his secret den?
Through a mixture of diary entries, frequent flashbacks and Paul's move away
from his position of denial, the truth is uncovered in all its raw
unpleasantness. Paul might make a pyre of his memories, but despite this,
the characters seem unable to escape the grip of the past.
The movie is above all, an exploration of secrets, voyeurism, escape and
memory, much like an early novel from Ian McEwan. And the lynchpins are the
excellent performances not just from Barclay, but also from MacFadyen.
No-one does careworn, moody, introspective silence like MacFadyen, and
whether snug in the den or dwarfed by majestic landscapes, he certainly gets
to strut his silent stuff here.
NB. Trivia fans will be interested to know that casting director Diana
Rowan, who found Emily Barclay, also unearthed Anna Paquin for The Piano and
Keisha Castle-Hughes for Whale Rider. And look out for Patti Smith's Horses
album, which features in the plot and on the soundtrack.
DVDs reviewed by the editor are watched on a Panasonic TXW32R4 32" widescreen TV
connected to either a Creative Dxr2 DVD-ROM player or Microsoft Xbox and
played through a Sony STR-DB930 amplifier.
PC games reviewed by the editor are on:
Since Nov 2005: Intel Pentium D 830 3.0Ghz, 1Gb RAM, 128Mb nVidia GeForce 6700XL, Windows XP
Since Aug 2003: Intel Pentium 4 2.66Ghz, 512Mb RAM, 128Mb GeForce4 MX440 graphics, Windows XP
Since May 2003: Intel Pentium 4 2.6Ghz, 512Mb RAM, 128Mb ATI Radeon 9600TX graphics, Windows XP
Since Jun 2002: Intel Pentium III 600Mhz, 384Mb RAM, Windows 98 SE, 64Mb ATI Radeon 8500LE
Since May 2000: Intel Pentium III 600Mhz, 384Mb RAM, Windows 98 SE, Voodoo 3 3000 AGP
