Reviewed: The Turning (15)

Cast: Cate Blanchett, Rose Byrne, Hugo Weaving, Richard Roxburgh, Miranda Otto, Callan Mulvey and many more.

Directors: Robert Connolly, Mia Wasikowska, Claire McCarthy and seven others

Writer: Tim Winton

Screenplay: Various

The Turning is an adaptation of a collection of 17 short stories by acclaimed Australian writer Tim Winton. When the book was published in 2005 it was well received by critics and won a number of awards. Apparently, the plot centres on a number of recurring themes threaded through each short story and in the film the protagonist Vic Lang is seen through different stages of his life via different actors. Sometimes he is a young white boy, sometimes he is an aborigine boy and sometimes a ginger haired boy. As an adult he is seen as a witty laid back husband (Richard Roxburgh) as in the first promising story also featuring Cate Blanchett in a fairly amusing tale called Reunion. But then he is also portrayed as an old recovering alcoholic portrayed by Hugo Weaving in the segment titled Commission.

Richmond and Twickenham Times:

It’s just a shame that the Vic Lang link is not explained before-hand. I only found out about the common denominator after researching the film and book after the screening and I’m not the only one. I was expecting much more. Particularly as the film boast’s an array of Australia’s finest acting talent. Sure, some of the landscapes are stunning which is to be expected from such a lavish continent but unfortunately the film went downhill with each new story. You wouldn’t guess that the stories are all related in some way and most of them are slow and quite depressing and just when you think the narrative is hopefully going somewhere, the stories often just dwindle away to nothing.

Richmond and Twickenham Times:

Personally, I think it was a little ambitious to have 17 different directors and script writers for each segment. It just made the whole film very disjointed and dare I say quite pretentious. American director Robert Altman did this type of interlinking of characters with more clarity with his 1993 film Short Cuts.

Richmond and Twickenham Times:

The Turning was originally released in Australia in 2013 with the full 180 minutes (yes…three hours!) but the UK gets the 106 minute version reducing the short stories from 17 down to 10. On the one hand this was a blessing as I was falling asleep even during the condensed version. On the other hand by stripping out 7 of the story adaptations, surely the film losses some of the original identity? Also how do you know which stories to leave out? Maybe the UK audience is missing out on some of the more interesting and possibly humorous tales.

Richmond and Twickenham Times:

Well there you have it. As you can tell I wasn’t overly impressed but there have been some glowing reviews as well. Funnily enough many of them were Australian.

I’m afraid I can only muster up two out of five stars.

Cinema release in the UK: Friday January 30, 2015