OCCUPATION

Australia, 2018, 119 minutes, Colour.
Dan Ewing, Temuera Morrison, Stephany Jacobson, Rhianon Fish, Zac Garred, Izzy Stevens, Charles Terrier, Felix Williamson, Jacqueline Mc Kenzie, Aaron Jeffrey, Bruce Spence, Ben Chisholm, Roy Billing.
Directed by Luke Sparke.

Occupation is an Australian film directed and written by Luke Sparke who also wrote and directed Red Billabong.

The film opens with an ordinary setting, in New South Wales, repairs on highways to a country town, the town itself and the celebration of a fair. Without warning, an alien spacecraft hovers over the town, indicating some close encounter. The aliens (and, initially for some audiences, the make up and design, the costumes of the aliens could be offputting or a touch corny) take over the inhabitants, imprisoning them, wanting to produce a virus to destroy the humans. There is a background familiar from science-fiction of planets and dying and aliens searching for a new planet.

Quite a number of characters are introduced during the ordinary life of the town, a driver with his lorry, people at a store, two cricketers who feud, with one of them having a pregnant wife. There is also a visitor with his family, the revelation that he had served time for violence. This group becomes a microcosm, with vehicles going out into the countryside, escaping detection, going back into the town to see what was happening, surviving – although the pregnant woman gives birth but dies. There is tension in the group, arguments, a tentative romance.

Ultimately, contact is made with the military forces which are led by brisk and stern leaders played by Jacqueline Mc Kenzie and Aaron Jeffrey.

There is fight back with some heroics, especially by the leader of the group, Dan Ewing. While there is an ending with humans conquering the aliens, it is not a vindictive ending as one of the sympathetic characters proposes that everyone try to live in peace.

1. The title? The tone? War situation?

2. An Australian story, production? Universal?

3. The settings, the Australian countryside, the paddocks, the highways, the bypass, the town, the fair, ordinary? The contrast with the occupation? Resistance outposts? Battles?

4. The opening, ordinary, introduction to the characters, the driver and his impatience on the road, the workers, the shops and cafes, the man sketching and being moved on, the Asian presence? The football, the clashes and personalities, Matt and Jackson, the match? Pete, travelling with his family? Jackson and his pregnant wife?

5. The special effects, the space vehicle, the size, the close encounter, the aliens, their appearance, make up, armour? The helmets, the weapons, with their masks off? Finally speaking English? The aliens and their plan, their own planet? Destruction, imprisonment of humans, spreading the virus? The plausibility of the science-fiction plot?

6. The attack, people’s response, in the middle of ordinary situations, the football match…? The Roundup? The escapes?

7. The small group, the resistance, the vehicles, the characters, interactions, going to the hut in the countryside? Surviving? The attacks? The visit to the town to see those imprisoned? Using wits, clashes and rivalries? Absent family members? The importance of the pregnancy, the eventual birth, the death of the mother? The young girl and the artist, the sexual encounter? Issues of food, water, safety?

8. Matt, his background, football, becoming the hero? His relationships? Denis, rising to the occasion? Pete, his prison background, care for his family, searching for them, yet his brutality in bashing the alien? Jackson, the clashes, the death of his wife? The young Asian boy, treated as too young, rising to the occasion?

9. The strong group, the presence of the women, exercising leadership? Assisting with the birth?

10. The plan, the attacks, the fights, the arrival of the military, Major Davis, Colonel Grant? Male and female commanders? Grant and her strong personality, leadership, the attack? Davis and his heroism?

11. The strategy, the attacks, the battles? The factory, destroying the virus, Matt going in, the confrontation, the destruction and his escape?

12. The capture of the aliens, human victory, plans? Hostility – and the woman and her compassion, cutting the bonds, urging collaboration for a future?