THE DARKSIDE

Australia, 2013, 94 minutes, Colour.
Deborah Mailman, Aaron Pederson, Claudia Karvan, Bryan Brown, Marcia Langton.
Directed by Warwick Thornton.

Cinematographer-director, Warwick Thronton, and his production company, asked aboriginal people to send in their experiences in the form of ghost stories. Over 100 were submitted, and a dozen or more were chosen to be filmed.

A number of the stories used prominent actors to speak the words of the stories that had been sent. Amongst them were aboriginal actors including Deborah Mailman (with Marcia Langton in the background) and Aaron Pederson. Their powerful simplicity keeps our attention.

Non-Aboriginal? actors also recount some stories the stories, Claudia Karvan, Bryan Brown, Sasha Horler.

The focus is on straightforward storytelling, though some of the stories have action, for instance a family driving along the road in the Northern Territory seeing a little girl, going back to her, finding that she had disappeared.

Quite a number of the stories are single takes, some of them quite long, with the storyteller simply speaking to camera. One of the most effective is the final story where a young woman in a hospital corridor recounts her experiences both with calm and with emotion.

In one sense to call these stories ghost stories is a misnomer, at least for Western audiences who are used to hauntings and spooky stuff. These stories are ‘spooky’ in a different sense, more along the lines of ESP or a sense of presence which cannot be explained rationally. They also raise questions about the nature of body – spirit – soul.

Aboriginal people, with the centuries-old understanding of the world and of human beings, lead more rational people into questions about this world, this life, the afterlife.

Western audiences are invited to reflect on the past with a story where the researcher goes to the National Film and Sound Archives where she finds that this was previously the Institute of Anatomy, where the bones of aboriginal men and women were kept as specimens and studied. Her field of investigation changes and she delves into this eerie reality of a correlation between film and bones.

One of the more exotic stories is that with Claudia Karvan, a white woman drawn into an aboriginal experience, the playing of the didgeridoo, the invitation to dance, a whirling imaginative experience, a sense of aboriginal presence, of elders.

But, most of the stories are not told in this exotic way. Rather, the audience is invited to listen, to look, to feel, to share, to puzzle.

1. The impact of the film? The work of the director/cinematographer?

2. The stories, the range, the performances, the interviews with the director?

3. A collection of ghost stories, sent in by people, the director choosing those for filming, the cumulative effect? The nature of the ghosts, the nature of haunting, intimations of an afterlife? Ghostly presence in aboriginal culture?

4. The range of settings for the stories, the cast, the editing?

5. Story: the single take, the sister, her head down, the close-up, the narrative about her brother, the single take? Her mother, the gift, the suicide and the funeral? He Ain’t Heavy…? The sad sobbing? The reassurance to the brother? Matey, moving on? The music, being free?

6. Story: the woman singing, talking, 1996? Thursday Island, the pregnancy, the mattress on the floor? Stiff, paralysed, the comments about the Christian God, faith, her attacking the ghost in Jesus’ name? Her husband? The black woman? The crockery, the quilt folded, the skin? Arms, crawling on the wall?

7. Story: travel, Alice Springs to Adelaide? The 11 years old girl wandering, the group in the car, the fence and finding her alive? The turning back, no girl present? The child, the little boy, mother having left him? Hunting, grubs, no car? The truck, Nana, long and the relief? The girl as a spirit of Rio?

8. Story: the girl in the portrait, the girls singing, the painting, the painting of the face, white and brown, the tryptich, it’s being dismantled?

9. Story: on the beach, with the woman, going to South Australia, the brother and the wife, memories of the York Peninsula massacre? The family history? people, the leader and the hat? Knowing that the presence was there? Boots and cloaks? Warm? The ancestors’ show, honouring them?

10. Story: the man, 72, the bar, he and his wife travelling, the cane-cutting, white hair? The shed, the fireflies, the high hill? The boathouse, the flowers blooming? The family burnt out in 1952? The wife taking the flowers, putting them back? Light nevermore? The body, the soul leaving, the spirits remaining? And the beer?

11. Story: actress Deborah Mailman representing the storyteller, sitting on the veranda, her monologue, ‘stickybeak’, the Ouija board, avoiding it? Playing the board? ‘I’ll get you for that’? the old woman sitting playing cards (the presence of Marcia Langton)? The family gone, alcoholic, schizo, dead, insane, the curse? Unable to get rid of the curse?

12. Story: the black spot at the centre of the screen, the eclipse, the diagram? The man at the station, the eclipse, the black screen for the eclipse? The interpretation, ill, myths, life, explanation?

13. Story: the National Film and Sound Archive, the visit, the researcher and her skills? The background of Sir Colin Mackenzie, the Institute of Anatomy in the ACT? The anatomical examination? The film, and natives as specimens? The irony of the Archive housing the remains as well as the archives? The portraits? Being watched? The film visuals? The fear of going to sleep, dozing, the silhouette of a man with the scalpel, slicing her, the pain, waking up? The change in her research? The anatomical research, finding the morgue, the skeletal photos, the ethnographic films? The measuring and the subjects being measured? Upset, the issue of repatriation of remains? The shipping? The container of bones? The spirits, restless? The ghost leading the researcher to the Institute and this new research?

14. Story: the boys dancing, the music, the sticks, the chant?

15. Story: the boats, fishing, the rainbows, the 1970s? The presence of Bryan Brown? Telling the story? The dinghy, the strange feelings? The river, the girl, her legs, tucked, clean, blue floral dress? Learning to the side, gone? The response to this experience?

16. Story: the presence of Claudia Karvan, playing the didgeridoo? Her aboriginal friend, the traditional garb, painted? the yoga mats? The vibrations, of the didgeridoo? Her five senses, affected? The holographic image in the mind? The different consciousness? Transported? Her dance? The flames? The aboriginal elder and the talk, not understanding? Like a drug experience? The massive rainbow serpent on her body? Dying or not? The snake flicking the body, on her throat, protecting, comforting? Fear and anger, pale? The room, spinning? The red barren land, the men dancing, the circle? Should women be present? The white dots on the surface of Claudia, the convulsion, back, no didgeridoo, no smoke? saying ‘you saw my grandfather, the first for a white woman’. Claudia open, the heart of the child, and experience of initiation and her being honoured?

17. Story: the campfire, sitting, the presence of Aaron Pederson? The travel story, the small shed, no power, and the old aboriginal women, the dog barking? alone with the dog’s? The beautiful night, the group of the swags, the intermittent rattle, loud, no wind, sharpness, stillness, staying in bed? ‘Thing’ pushing the bed and the talk, the bed tossed, groaning and breathing? Feeling the presence on the face? Hearing something and listening, bad energy? The white cattle drover who lived there? Racist? Angry that the newcomers were there? The old lady, always picking on her?

18. Story: the girl in the hospital, stoned, on her way to the mate’s house, the car cold, anxiety? The visitor’s room? The mirror and her presence? Hallucination or not, freaking out? With a friend, telling her? ‘I’m always here you’, she being a rock, sorting out matters with her parents? Sometimes seen, sometimes not? Her healing? To understand death, the other side, loss and grief? The niece at 25 weeks, surviving, happy and the issue of her lungs? The questions, respiratory, (‘its time’)? The name and the details about the girl, the dying, the sister, the vigil? Nana preparing me for this? The issue of prayer, more prayer, God-like?

19. The film as a contribution to Australian storytelling, aboriginal heritage, stories, ghosts and afterlife, aboriginal style?