Rent Walkabout (1971)
3.8 of 5 from 195 ratings
1h 36min
- General info
- Available formats
- Synopsis:
- As the title suggests, Walkabout is a journey not only in distance, but also in the transition for one Australian aborigine, from adolescence to manhood. While on a family picnic a beautiful teenager and her brother suddenly find themselves very much alone after the tragic death of their father. As they wander through the outback they meet the young aborigine. The film unfolds and tells the tale of survival, resourcefulness and sexual awareness, as the travellers become lost in the Australian wilderness.
- Actors:
- Jenny Agutter, David Gulpilil, Luc Roeg, John Meillon, Robert McDarra, Peter Carver, John Illingsworth, Hilary Bamberger, Barry Donnelly, Noeline Brown, Carlo Manchini, George Roubicek
- Directors:
- Nicolas Roeg
- Producers:
- Si Litvinoff
- Writers:
- Edward Bond, Donald G. Payne
- Studio:
- Universal Pictures
- Genres:
- Action & Adventure, Classics, Drama
- Collections:
- Award Winners, Getting to Know..., Getting to Know: Tilda Swinton, Roeg and Bertolucci: Remembering the Masters, The Biggest Oscar Snubs: Part 1, A Brief History of Film..., What We Were Watching in 1971
- BBFC:
- Release Date:
- 10/09/2012
- Run Time:
- 96 minutes
- Languages:
- English Dolby Digital 2.0 Mono
- Subtitles:
- English Hard of Hearing
- Formats:
- Pal
- Aspect Ratio:
- Widescreen 1.78:1 / 16:9
- Colour:
- Colour
- BLU-RAY Regions:
- B
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Reviews (3) of Walkabout
Amazing Survival Drama - Walkabout review by GI
Walkabout is an important modern film, a poetic, almost dreamy survival film that looks at the role of nature and of man's loss of connection with it. There's a beauty in the cinematography of the Australian outback and the dilapidation and corruption of the modern world. A teenage girl (Jenny Agutter - in her first film) and her younger brother (Lucien John) are taken on a picnic into the outback by their geologist father. He abandons them there and they are left wandering, lost and without food and water. Nearly dying they are found by a young Aboriginal boy (David Gulpilil) who is on his ritual 'walkabout', a separation from his tribe in preparation for adulthood. They tag along with him and find the world around them has more to offer than just death. There's a magical element to this story and there's a theme of sexual awakening in the girl and her saviour, but the clash of culture leads to tragedy. British director, Nicolas Roeg, here making his first solo directorial film, adds that unique style he often displayed that subverts the images so you aren't sure what is real and what maybe imagined. But this isn't a confusing film, far from it, this is a impressive story of modern day survival, against the odds, and a rediscovery of our place in the world. Highly recommended if you've never seen it.
3 out of 3 members found this review helpful.
Roeg's solo debut. - Walkabout review by Steve
Arthouse parable on the interface between colonialism and indigenous culture. This is a brilliant blend of atmospheric strains, including the ambient silences, John Barry's spiritual orchestral score, the otherness of the South Australian outback locations and Roeg's own woozy, narcotic images. The whole film is carried by a seventeen year old Jenny Agutter, Aboriginal debutant David Gulpilil and the director's eight year old son, Luc Roeg and hardly anyone else is on screen. Roeg's work was philosophical and idiosyncratic and usually incorporated improvisation, broken time structures and unusual casting. They make for a strong deep vibration of eeriness. The whole is then balanced by two contrasting conclusions, both disquieting in their different ways.
2 out of 2 members found this review helpful.
Walkabout - Walkabout review by CC
This is, by a street, the greatest Australian film ever made, brutally juxtaposing the timeless Australia of outback and aborigines with the suburban lifestyle of 'modern' Australia with its swimming pools and packaged meat, and showing in the process how these could be reconciled (but only on aboriginal terms) but are not. Jenny Agutter is simply gorgeous, as is the magical outback landscape, though this covers such a variety of places that the three children around whose journey the film is built must have had to walk a very long way to see them all. It also figures the most erotic gum tree in the world.
0 out of 0 members found this review helpful.