Beneath Hill 60

Beneath Hill 60 adds to a grand tradition of Australian war films that encompass what it means to be Australian and the way our national character engenders greatness on the battlefield (and I don't mean that in terms of actual battle - the 'greatness' refers to the retention of identity, survival and certain coping mechanisms linked to 'mateship' amongst the troops). Whilst Australian war films often look at the tragedies of war like their international counterparts, they differ greatly from American war films in that they often feature a curiously positive subtext to the ANZAC spirit... this idea that our national identity can see us through the toughest of times. Beneath Hill 60 is no slouch in this department, striking a fine balance between the melancholy and the rousing. I'm not patriotic in the slightest sense, but I can appreciate an idealism in it's purest form when it's not linked to aggressiveness or exclusion.

Most Australian will already be familiar with the story of our involvement in WWI... it's a bloody tale of attrition, futile trench warfare and British incompetence. Beneath Hill 60 uses this backdrop as a stepping stone to tell the untold story of WWI tunnel warfare. It's the height of the Great War and the two sides in Europe are locked in a stalemate. Australian miners are enlisted by the allied British-ANZAC forces to help man and maintain tunnels that have been dropped beneath enemy lines in order to prevent the Germans from the same thing. Captain Oliver Woodward (Brendan Cowell) proves so adept at this that he and his team are given a highly important mission under the hellish Hill 60. A mission to detonate a huge payload of explosives directly underneath an amassing army of German soldiers.

It's a stirring warts-and-all war story told with remarkable sensitivity in a characterisatically Australian voice. Brendan Cowell is perfectly cast as Woodward - he has that slightly pugilistic look of a fair dinkum character. His face has character. Woodward's experiences on the front are intercut with the story of how he came to be involved with the war... we see the homefront atmosphere, the opening credits play out under the overbearng song of cicadas as a soldier dramatically dons his uniform in a sun-soaked room. It's an idyllic world about as physically far removed as you can get from the muddy fields of ruined Europe, but the attitudes of Australian society highlight the pride, duty, ignorance and social pressure that made the era what it was.

Owing to our budgetary constraints, Australian war films have traditionally been less about spectacle and more about recreating an era or exploring way sin which these wars have informed or benefited from our Australian-ness. The scenes set on the front explore notions of identity through various aspects - larriken humour, mateship, bullshitting, mistrust of strangers, and the hard lot of the honest Aussie battler under the command of cowardly senior officers.

This is a great film, easily the best Australian war film since Gallipoli. It looks the ticket too, brilliantly recreating 1910s Australia and the terrifying imagery of the first world war in full swing.

DIRECTOR: Jeremy Sims
WRITER/SOURCE: David Roach
KEY ACTORS: Brendan Cowell, Gyton Grantley, Aden Young, Anthony Hayes, Jacqueline McKenzie, Steve Le Marquand, Chris Haywood, Bob Franklin

RELATED TEXTS:
- Australia's involvement in WWI was also portrayed in Gallipoli, The Lighthorsemen and The Hero of the Dardanelles.
- Other Australian war films include: Breaker Morant, Kokoda, The Odd Angry Shot, The Highest Honour, Blood Oath and Australia.
- The story of Hill 60 is also told in a semi-novelisation of the film also called Beneath Hill 60, by Will Davies.

AWARDS
Won Best Sound at the IF Awards, where it was also nominated for Best Director, Best Film and Best Production Design.

Also nominated for an Australian Screen Sound Award.