ONE PERFECT DAY

Australia, 2003, 105 minutes, Colour.
Daniel Spielman, Leeanna Walsman, Andrew Howard, Nathan Philips, Abbie Cornish, Kerry Armstrong, Frank Gallacher.
Directed by Paul Currie.

The target audience for this film would be the young clubbers, especially in big cities, who need a night out to the accompaniment of the loud music beat, flashing lights, crowded dance floors and a thriving drug culture – although this is not the perfect day of the film's title.

The film itself is something of a downer in its plot, especially with untimely deaths of young people by raw drugs.

Daniel Spielman plays Tom, a musician who is unconventional, who wants to create music of the people, incorporating the sounds of the city, of nature, of the hardships of people on the street. His opera is created in and around London and performed there. Meanwhile, back in Melbourne, his young sister is desperate to talk to him about her pregnancy, his girlfriend is working as a nurse but also hoping to be a singer. When tragedy strikes, he comes back home, makes some rash assumptions about what has been going on and gets involved in working as a DJ, creating his sound, in a vast club in the Docklands. It is run by a real screen nasty. What happens is not entirely unexpected except in terms of deaths. The relatively unknown cast carry it off with support from Kerry Armstrong as Tom's mother.

One Perfect Day is the name of the song that Alysse, Tom's girlfriend composes and sings. It is a song of 'what if…?' and 'if only…".

1.The intended audience for the film? Young adults? Clubbers? Audiences interested in popular music?

2.The title, the desire for Tom and for Alysse? The song and its lyrics? As sung by Alysse? A gift for Tom?

3.The English settings, Oxfordshire, Camden Town, London? The concert hall? The flat? The comparison with Melbourne, the flats, the clubs, ordinary homes and streets? A real world, fantasy world?

4.The significance of music, Tom and his classical training, his going out into London to get ordinary sounds and words of people, his opera? The contrast with the world of the clubs, the beat, the songs combining the beat? One perfect day?

5.The structure of the film: the introduction to Tom, his flashbacks? The introduction to Alysse, her singing? Its being reprised at the end? The introduction to Emma? The intercutting between England and Melbourne? Tom’s return, the ironies of his judgments about Alysse, her being with Hector, his being employed by Hector, the two coming together, tragedy?

6.The portrait of Tom, lying down under the train in Oxfordshire? In his flat? The rejection by the music school and the instructors? His going out with his recorder, the old lady singing in the Underground, the sounds of nature, the sounds of the city, on the bridge over the Thames? His putting all these together? His creating an opera, his performing it and the response of the audience? The Berlin director? The contrast with his own private life, away from Alysse, the irregular phone calls, Emma desperately trying to reach him, his hanging up on her before the opera? His grief on return to Australia, with his mother, the funeral? Looking at Emma’s things? The meeting with Alysse, finding the pregnancy test? His rejection of her? His trying to track down what happened to Emma, her friend the deejay? His meeting with Trigg, being invited by Hector to go to the club, play at the open-air concert? His learning the truth about Alysse, going to her, her wanting to leave? His not going? The consequences of his action? Being with her, her being drugged, at the club, her death? The plan to confront Hector, the help of Trigg, the video recording of his killing Alysse? Listening to Alysse’s music? With his mother? A future?

7.Alysse, her singing, the lyrics to the songs, the phone calls from Tom? Her work at the Alfred Hospital? The drug scene, getting the drugs from Trigg, giving them to Emma on her birthday? Their celebration? Emma’s collapse, her trying to revive her, taking her to the hospital, panicking and going? The disappointment with Tom, the pregnancy test, his rejection of her? Trigg, the job with Hector, her night with Hector, the recording? Hector and his infatuation, his hold over her? Tom’s coming to her again, the reconciliation? Her being at the outdoor concert, seeing Tom play, Hector’s jealousy, her going to him to say she was leaving, his injecting her, her collapse and death? Her final realisation in the trance on the rooftop? The pathos of her singing again, sounds filling empty spaces and her desire to sing?

8.Emma, her age, not talking to her mother, with the deejay, her verve? Going out for her birthday, looking at herself in the mirror, pregnant? With Alysse, at the club, dancing, the drugs, Hector and the mistake about the drugs, her death? Her family’s grief? The final video brought by the deejay and Tom watching it?

9.Trigg, his companion, their working for Hector, Trigg and his camera, vitality? The attitude towards Hector, his commanding them? Trigg and his love for Alysse, trying to protect her, sad with Tom’s coming, angry with Hector? The confrontation, his videoing the killing? The other henchman, being slow, naïve, but saving the day against Hector and acting with Trigg and Tom?

10.Tom’s mother, trying to talk to her daughter, her kindliness, remembering the birth? Hearing her daughter go out? Her grief at her death, the comfort of Tom, looking at the video with him?

11.The club world, the music and the beat, the nights out, the dancing, the drug scene? Hector and his role, owning the club, importing the drugs – and his henchmen making the mistakes about distribution? Trigg taking the bag, Hector seeing them scattered all over the road? Hector and his obsessions, always getting his own way, infatuated with Alysse, his finally being taken away?

12.The grim aspect of the film? Presenting the world of the thirtysomethings, the clubs and music, drugs, their dreams in life – for one perfect day?