STRANGE PLANET
Australia, 1999, 97 minutes, Colour.
Claudia Karvan, Naomi Watts, Alice Garner, Tom Long, Aaron Jeffrey, Felix Williamson, Hugo Weaving, Rebecca Frith, Marshall Napier.
Directed by Emma -Kate Croghan.
Strange Planet seems a strange title for a film about six young people in Sydney in 1999. However, Ewan, played by Sea change and The Dish's Tom Long, explains to his friend Joel, Aaron Jeffrey, that in a Twilight Zone episode some space explorers landed on a strange planet, started to attack one another until only one survived and then found that they actually had not left Earth. This is a story about six young twentysomethings, their ambitions, their sex lives, their interactions with one another. The film has a great deal of talk in it, the kind of talk of people trying to prove themselves and trying to get some kind of commitment into their lives, even if they don't believe that it is possible.
Claudia Karvan, after a career as a child star, established herself as a strong force in Australian cinema. Naomi Watts, rather pallid as the almost ordinary young girl, does not really give any indication that within two years she would have starred in David Lynch's Mulholland Drive and within five years would have Oscar nominations. Alice Garner, the wise young child of Monkey Grip, is a daffy young woman in this film. They are very striking compared with the men who also include Felix Williamson as an eccentric lawyer feeling very lonely. Hugo Weaving appears as a television executive.
The film was directed by Emma -Kate Croghan who made the small-budget and rather similar film, with a Melbourne setting, Love and Other Catastrophes. The film was co-written by Stavros Kazantzidis, writer and director of True Love and Chaos.
1. The appeal of the film for twentysomething audiences? For older and more experienced audiences looking at young adults trying to find their way?
2. The Sydney settings, taking place from New Year's Eve to New Year's Eve, the months passing, the city itself, the seasons? Apartments, the world of television, bookshops? The musical score and the long range of songs?
3. The title, Sydney as a strange planet? The reference to The Twilight Zone, the insertion of clips from the television program, Ewan and his description of the episode - and the point being made about the strange planet being planet Earth? As applied to the characters in this film, their relationships, the potential for destruction?
4. The screenplay and the talk, the interests of the young group, their sexuality and identity, wanting some kind of commitment but unable to find it? Liaisons, affairs, marriages, marriage break-up? The finale and the pairing off of the three couples? What future?
5. The collage during the credits, focusing on the three girls? Seeing them at the New Year's Eve party, their characters, Judy and her pushiness and her tone, ambitions, sex? Alice and her being something of a wallflower? Sally and her eccentricity, her New Year's resolutions, her taking the drugs, jumping into the harbour, not swimming, her being rescued? Setting the tone for the rest of the film and the glimpses of these three girls?
6. The three men, their discussions, their studies, their relationships or lack of relationships? Joel and his wife walking out on him, taking it hard? Morose? Ewan, his law degree, his abilities, his memory of his relationship with Sally, his keeping up a brave face? Neil, his law degree, his reading Cosmopolitan, having women's magazines' ideas of how life had to be led? His loneliness, his eccentric Freudian theory about handbags? His being a man of theory rather than action?
7. The months passing, the changes in fortune for each of the six characters? Transformations within a year?
8. Judy, her musician father, her meeting him, his being drunk and stoned, his buying her the shoes and her destroying them? Her going to the cemetery, her love for her mother, talking with her mother? Her relationships, especially with the older tutor and his going on his knees to propose, her rejecting him because she had graduated? Her relationship with Alice and Sally, memories of school, shared intimacies, the film of their play and Romeo and Juliet? Her wanting to be in television, interviews, the possibility of a radio job, her working with Amanda? Not knowing Stephen was her husband, her ambitions, bumping into him in the car, his gracious response, the dinner, her confessing the truth? Her ambitions to go forward in the media world? Having Stephen to dinner, showing him the film, his meeting her friends? Her affair, the discussions with Amanda and Amanda's view of men? The development, her having to face more reality, the meeting with Ewan, her relationship with him? A future?
9. Alice, the ordinary background, an ordinary person? In the shadow of Judy? At school, her looking at the film, her wanting to talk with Judy about more serious things? The working in the café, her liking it there, Judy urging her to study? The parties, the possible date rape and her reaction? Her learning martial arts? The change during the year, her meeting with Joel, their clicking? A future or not?
10. Sally, her appearance, daffy manner, the bookshop in which she worked? Drugs, sexual relationships, casual encounters, jumping into the harbour? Her being in the background? The casual nature of her life, her meeting with Neil, two eccentrics? A future?
11. The men, Joel, his separation from his wife, his being upset, phoning Ewan, the attempted suicide? His feeling of freedom, his change, his work? The meeting with Judy? Ewan, his seemingly in control, his past years with Sally, the separation? His talking with his friends, trying to advise them? His work as a lawyer, the disputing couples, their fights, his change of heart, becoming a taxi driver? The scene from Taxi Driver? His one-night stands, girls getting pregnant, the Catholic, the abortion, his having to face reality? His work, with Judy? Their compatibility? Neil, eccentric, reading the magazines, his approach to science and theory? His going to the dating agency, fulfilling all the details, his date, the preparation for the marriage, his leaving his wife, with Sally? Eccentric?
12. Stephen and Amanda, his walking out on his wife and children, TV executive, attracted by Judy, going to her house, the affair? Its not being able to last? Amanda, with the children, her bitterness, her radio program and advice on sexuality?
13. The range of supporting characters, the former lover kneeling to propose in the shop, Joel's ex-wife, Judy's father? The young people and the party going group?
14. A glimpse at the perspectives and life attitudes of young people at the end of the 20th century in Sydney?
