Flirting

John Duigan's sequel to his critical hit The Year My Voice Broke is a continuation of the story of Danny Embling (Noah Taylor) - the quintessential intellectual outsider in rural 1960s Australia. Tonally, it shifts into a little more of a lively gear than the previous film and doesn't quite manage to achieve the same nostalgic/melancholy atmosphere. That said, it's a very worthy continuation of Danny's story and is still very much a great film on it's own terms.



It's a year or two since the events of The Year My Voice Broke and Danny is now doing it tough in a country boarding school. The 1960s are marching on in the outside world but the isolated nature of rural Australia means that the outside world may as well not exist for Danny's school. He's disliked by the headmaster (Marshall Napier), who takes exception to Danny's long-ish hair and suspected subversiveness, and the majority of his peers bully him. But Danny is a martyr - he knows how to take a beating and he stands strong in the hope of retaining his individualism in such a conformist environment. Danny's world is about to be turned upsisde down by the arrival of a Ugandan student at a nearby girl's school; the exotic and sophisticated Thandiwe (a young Thandie Newton), who is drawn to Danny's intelligence and anti-herd mentality.



This is a brilliant film that seems deceptively uncomplicated on the surface but manages to sum so much up in just under 100 minutes. Duigan captures the hopefulness and insular nature of teenage life so perfectly that it could be set in any era. Taylor builds on his terrific characterisation of Danny by introducing a slight stammer to his urbane disposition, suggesting that he's not as confident as he seems or wants to be. It's an easy (if unlikely) hero-figure to identify with - who didn't want to be cool at that age? The rest of the cast is perfectly pitched, each character feels real and complex despite the brevity of their screentime. Nicole Kidman is well cast as the snooty alpha-female, her presence is a nice reversal of the dynamic of the previous film. She's the upper class female equivalent of Ben Mendelsohn's character - an unknown quantity and unexpected ally to Thandiwe.



Flirting starts out with the caption "rural Australia" and this shouldn't be glossed over. The use of such a bland descriptor suggests that it's just one place... it speaks more of a feeling than a real location, and it surmises the distance and isolationism that makes up a big part of the Australian national character. The introduction of an African character and an interracial teenage love affair in the 1960s would've made almost any other film into a tract on racism and civil rights, but here it's oddly a non-issue that furtehr contributes to Duigan's deft command of atmosphere. The Ugandan angle is used to some effect, feeding into a subtext about Australia's then-naive relationship with the rest of the world - if we were to look at it as symbolic, Danny would be Australia's awakening spirit of 1960s freedom and social upheaval, and Thandiwe would represent the rest of the world that Australia finally got in touch with on it's own terms (and it's no coincidence that she's from a former British colony and sounds like a British private school girl, if I had more time I'd go off on a tangent about colonialism here).



I can't emphasise enough how much I would've loved a third and final film in John Duigan's proposed Danny Embling trilogy. It's a shame that the story didn't continue (and I'd be interested in hearing from anyone who knows why this didn't happen) but at least we have Flirting and The Year My Voice Broke to enjoy, together they're a rare cinematic Australian treasure.



NOTE: The poster above the review is a fairly typical representation of how Australian films are often misrepresented by advertisers... the wacky writing and choice of photo doesn't really do the film justice, but unfortunately this is the best of a bad bunch. The other posters were even worse, three of the other designs indicate that the film stars Nicole Kidman and that it's all about her character. Whilst it's true that she has a major part in the film, her role is purely a supporting one and I think it's fairly poor form that not a single one of the five or so poster designs I could find even mention Noah Taylor's name let alone show his face, and he's meant to be the star!



DIRECTOR: John Duigan

WRITER/SOURCE: John Duigan, semi-autobiographical.

KEY ACTORS: Noah Taylor, Thandiwe Newton, Nicole Kidman, Marshall Napier, Jeff Truman, Les Hill, Naomi Watts, Kym Wilson, Bartholomew Rose



RELATED TEXTS:

- Flirting is the sequel to The Year My Voice Broke. As mentioned in the above review, John Duigan intended there to be a third and final film but it never eventuated.

- Boxing, private schools, Africa and a small but strong-willed hero... could this be The Power of One? There are a few superficial similarities between both films but I'd be uncomfortable with saying that one was better than the other.

- For a 1980s look at coming-of-age in school days Australia, check out Puberty Blues.

- Noah Taylor and Bartholomew Rose both appeared in another Australian coming-of-age drama two years later; The Nostradamus Kid.



AWARDS

AFIs - won three Best Film, Best Editing and Best Production Design. Also nominated for Best Cinematography, Best Sound and Best Supporting Actor (Bartholomew Rose).