Ashlee Warren

Subversive National Critique; An Analysis of Australian National Cinema and its Use of Character and Landscape in Genre to Undermine Idyll Stereotypes
Ashlee Warren

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Australian national cinema can be approached from the perspective of a modernised Krakauer (1974), where the views, beliefs, and values of both national and international audiences are inextricably embedded within the semiotics of all Australian production. And as the cultural perception of Australia’s national identity is diverse, evolving and informed largely by Western-centric ideologies and mythologies, this is reflected in Australia’s national cinema. If the essence of national cinema is that which makes it distinct from all other cinema, concepts of Australia’s national identity can be explored through two integral and intertwined features of its cinema; its depiction of the characters and landscape, as well as the use of genre as a vehicle to subvert Western ideologies and mythologised Australian stereotypes. Specifically, the interactions seen between characters and the landscape are mythologised stereotypes played out on screen, though often these stereotypes are revealed to be warped, inversed or exaggerated as critique. Genre provides a cinematic storytelling framework for these character and landscape relations to be expressed. With Australian cinema drawing from traditional Gothic elements to create a uniquely Australian Gothic genre, as well as developing a distinct and subversive comedy style, the national cinema’s use of genre profoundly reflects a critique of glorified early settlement, pride in the urbanisation of nature, and indulgence in Australian ‘ocker’ masculinity. Both gothic and comic genres will be explored through their use of character and landscape in order to extrapolate an analysis of Australian national cinema and its representation of national identity.

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The history of Australian cinema is reflective of the history of Australian identity, both of which struggle with the innate contradictions of a mythologised portrayal. This struggle can be considered in terms of two opposing narratives; the Australian idyll, and the Australian anti-idyll. In order to understand the Australian anti-idyll narrative, or distopia, one must first define the Australian idyll. Scott & Biron (2010) explain that there are several key symbolic elements that are central to the mythologised Australian idyll; the bushman, the beachgoer, and nature as a harsh but utopian oasis to be tamed and consumed. The Australian idyll seeks to reinforce these symbols of nationalism, beginning with the bushman as a first settler of the land; portrayed as a hard-working, masculine and solitary individual, carving his identity into a harsh but feminine landscape. The bushman is tied to early colonialism, succeeding against the odds in a rural outback, seen immortalised in Frederick McCubbin’s 1904 oil painting ‘The Pioneer’, and made spectacle as Mick Dundee in Crocodile Dundee (Faiman, 1986). As Australia grew and evolved, the bushman stereotype was replaced by the beachgoer, a representation of Australia’s urbanisation and the beach as a symbol of leisure. This stereotype is distilled in ‘Australian Beach Pattern’, a 1940 oil painting by Charles Meere in which a group of sun-lit Anglo-Celtic subjects appear carefree and heroically poised on the beachfront, an image also made famous in Australian TV series Home and Away (Bateman, 1988-present). There is also another stereotype that is idyllic in its glorification and widespread adoption, yet also born paradoxically out of perceptions of ineptitude and a rejection of conformity to traditional and conservative values. The ‘Ocker’ – a term often used to glorify the perceived underclass or uncivilised Australian – is a stereotype with origins in the same-named film genre of the 1970s known for “its vulgarity, its crassness, [and] its shallow social goals” (O’Regan, Tom, 1989, p. 81). Taking the themes of a hyper-masculine, beer-swilling and sexed up fantasy world where the average-joe protagonist always comes out on top, the Ocker stereotype, such as Alvin Purple in Alvin Purple (Burstall, 1972) is an embracing of this glorification, and a re-imagining of nationalist pride through the idolisation of its indulgence. These stereotypes of the mythologised Australian idyll depict a rough, but utopian landscape that the glorified, masculine, Caucasian Australian can conquer and consume, urbanising the shoreline while retaining the fantasy of the bush.

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In the alternate narrative, that of an Australian anti-idyll, the mythos of the Australian idyll is inverted and critiqued to reveal a critical flaw, ‘trouble in paradise’, or a darkunderworld. In Australia’s subversive comedy genre, where we would once see the nationalist bushman who has tamed the picturesque and mystical forest, we now see products of urban life demystify and comedically disrupt the idyll imagery, and the bushman is now an inept fool displaced in the bush. In the Australian Gothic genre, the bush and the bushman act as wolves in sheep’s clothing, using their unassuming or idyllic mythology like a trap to ensnare outsiders that wander too far from civilisation. The beachgoer stereotype that would seek to represent the vitality of Australia’s urban development is, in comedy, a victim of aspirations to live the ‘Australian Dream’, blind to their own inadequacy and kitsch tastelessness. In the Australian Gothic, the beachgoer is more radically transformed, to the point of being unrecognisable. Rather, urban Australians are portrayed as prisoners of their urban environment, and instead of the bush ensnaring them, it is their poverty, their homes, or their families that are oppressive and inescapable. The Ocker stereotype is pervasive and blended into the bushman and beachgoer critiques, where their vulgarity, toxic masculinity and binge-drinking qualities are no longer celebrated, but seen as destructive, backwards and perverse in both subversive comedy and the Australian Gothic. These new representations coincide with a disillusionment from the idyllic stereotypes that were once a source of national pride, which now appear obscure, frighteningly toxic, patriarchally domineering and comedically ignorant. While subversive comedy focuses on Caucasian Australian stereotypes and ideologies as naïve, ignorant and outdated, the Australian Gothic magnifies the darkness, toxicity and danger that exists under the veneer of idyll stereotypes and ideologies.

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In analysing character and landscape relationships in the Australian Gothic genre, films can be separated for analysis by their setting; either urban, or outback. When set in the outback, the landscape works as a prison for the protagonist, and as a delineation of two opposing worlds; the urban mirage of safety and normality, and the gothic underworld of the outback. The narrative played out repeatedly in this genre is that of the naïve tourist who enters the outback and is lead into a trap when they accept the help of a local; the wolf in sheep’s clothing. Wake in Fright (Kotcheff, 1971) uses this narrative to specifically critique the very real ‘ocker’ binge-drinking machismo culture of Australia, using this culture to snare the British outsider. In this film, the British protagonist seeks to return to the urban shoreline to reunite with his blonde, bikini-clad lover. The idyllic image of this woman on the beach is shown repeatedly as if it were a distant mirage, and creates a strong contrast from the harsh and male-dominated outback he finds himself in. Quickly accepting the customs of binge-drinking imposed on him by the sweaty, lumbering locals, he quickly loses his bearings and his savings, becoming dependent on their toxic hospitality and a victim of aggressive and destructive masculinity in an alcohol-fuelled nightmare. With the vast expanse of dry red dirt and blistering sun between him and civilisation, the protagonist is a prisoner of the land, which seems to almost supernaturally draw him back each time he attempts to escape. Rayner (2011) describes the drinking, gambling and hunting of the “corrupted and corrupting’ (p. 93) locals as “hyperbolic expressions of otherwise accepted… national pastimes” (p. 93), indicating that the idyllic stereotypes which found Australian nationalism are rotten and false. Wolf Creek (McLean, 2005) carries a similar sentiment, and follows a similar narrative, with several tourists travelling from the picturesque beachfront into the heart of the outback. Their perceptions of the bushman stereotype as honest and trustworthy lead them to naively accept the hospitality of a local named Mick. Sharing the heat of this stranger’s campfire, the tourists converse with Mick and discuss the freedom the idyllic outback must grant him and quote the famous Mick Dundee, “that’s not a knife – this is a knife” (Crocodile Dundee, Faiman, 1986). Mick suddenly appears confused and repulsed by this parallel being drawn, and Scott & Biron (2010) describe this as Mick being “placed as an object for the consumption of his tourist audience” (p. 313). Scott & Biron go on to describe that as the sun bears down on the tourists the next morning, they find themselves to be Mick’s prisoners, trapped by the expanse and volatility of the landscape far from civilisation, and “the rural idyll is peeled back to expose a landscape of horror” (p. 313). In both films, civilisation and the coast represent safety, one which is out of reach of the protagonist who wanders too far inland. The outback landscape acts as a prison to all who enter, as if it has a supernatural bloodlust, and also acts as a catalyst to the perversions of the destructive, fevered locals who prey on naïve outsiders. These are representations of a disunity between Australia’s national image of idyll bushman and masculine Ocker, and the darker, twisted inverse of these images that is hidden away; forgotten in isolation.

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While gothic films set in the outback will often characterise urban and beach settings as safety out of reach, gothic films set in an urban environment will shatter this illusion of safety, as the darkness of the bush creeps up onto doorsteps like an all pervasive and inescapable entity. Often used to describe the Australian Gothic genre, Freud’s unheimlich, or the uncanny, is explained by Thomas & Gillard (2003) as “the recognition of anxiety based firmly in the familiar” (p. 42), with gothic cinema “building the remarkable strictly out of the unremarkable” aspects of the landscape (p. 42). The film Snowtown (Kurzel, 2011) perfectly captures this sentiment. Based on a true Australian crime, Snowtown is set in a dilapidated, dreary housing trust estate in the Australian suburbs, populated by marginalized individuals who seem hopeless and unable to escape their poverty. The mundanity and authenticity of characters and landscape in combination with the deeply vile and unpredictable acts that take place creates the ideal environment for the uncanny, and an atmosphere of insidiousness and dread pervades the entire film. Instead of the isolation of the outback expanse holding the victim protagonist captive, it is intergenerational poverty and alienation from society that trap the characters in their own homes. It is in the home where we first see teenage protagonist Jamie being molested by brother and male neighbour, then later the home is used as a male-dominated meeting place to arrange plots of violent revenge on perceived local deviants, before finally becoming a place for men to torture and murder. The living room floor, the kitchen table, and the bathroom tub respectively, are transformed from places of family and safety into places of terror and trauma. The idyll urban beachgoer is nowhere to be seen, and the absence of a law and order presence is profound as acts of molestation and murder continue unchallenged, suggesting that this is a place beyond the borders of safety and civilisation; a neglected, forgotten suburb left to rot. Protagonist Jamie, in his desire to escape this hopelessness, becomes attached to his mother’s new boyfriend, John, who at first provides stability and a sense of family to them. However, it is quickly revealed that John is another wolf in sheep’s clothing, much like those seen in the aforementioned films, and he begins to draw Jamie deeper and deeper into his sadistic world of murder, becoming both mentor and abuser. As Thomas and Gillard describe of the gothic genre, the fate of Jamie in this film holds “no faith in the ability of people to transcend or transform their everyday world” (p. 42), concluding with Jamie as submissive to the will of his captor and the hopelessness of his isolation. The idyll national stereotype of Australia as an urban paradise is challenged by the depiction of a poverty-stricken suburb abandoned by society, and the masculinity in this world is not heroic or blissful like the beachgoer, nor celebrated like the vulgar Ocker; it is perverse, pervasive, and all-consuming. It is through the veil of the idyll urban environment that the home becomes corrupted, and through the veil of the idyll male that the family and the innocent fall prey.

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Australian subversive comedy also uses character and landscape to critique national stereotypes and ideologies. One method of comedic critique is that of subversive affirmation, described by Mason (2018) as comedy that appropriates the features of what it seeks to critique in a “surplus which destabilises affirmation and turns it into its opposite” (p. 5). This will manifest as exaggerated caricatures on screen, such as the incompetent bushman Russel Coight in All Aussie Adventures (Gleisner, 2001-2018), or the naïve working-class family in The Castle (Sitch, 1997). The latter film tells the story of Aussie-battler and father, Darryl Kerrigan, as he fights against the compulsory acquisition of his home, with much of the humour stemming from the family’s naïve pleasure in and value of mediocrity. The wife’s cooking and handicrafts are adored by the family, yet to the audience her creations appear tasteless, and similarly where the family see their home as a castle, the audience sees a valueless and dilapidated property. In this sense, the audience can find the characters endearing for their naivety and humble pleasures, while simultaneously laughing at their perception of living the ‘Australian Dream’. In this way, the film can position the audience as both identifying with the ideologies of the protagonists while also questioning the idyll perception of the Australian Dream (Mason, 2018, p. 2). The family perceive their environment to be one of idyllic serenity, with Darryl remarking at their holiday home, “how’s the serenity” as the deafening roar of their motorboat ironically cuts across the otherwise tranquil lake. Sound corrupts the environment repeatedly to symbolically shatter the Australian Dream, with deafening planes constantly taking off and landing over the family home, and the zapping of the mosquito light detracting from the sounds of nature on their rural holiday retreat. This suggests to audiences the need to re-evaluate their perception of the Australian Dream as both idyllic and realistic, offering the suggestion of an inherent mediocrity in the reality of the Australian dream, and a naivety in subscribing to that ideology. Furthermore, the film focuses on the central characteristic of the Australian Dream as home ownership, and home ownership as a perceived inherent right and freedom of Australians. Interestingly, the film compares the plot of the Caucasian Aussie-battler fighting for the right of home ownership with the famous Mabo decision which granted recognition to Aboriginals as the original owners of the land. Darryl comments that he knows how the Aboriginals must feel now that he too is experiencing his land, his castle, and his Australian Dream being taken from him. The film appears to intentionally use Darryl’s misapprehensive comparison to further highlight the naivety of the protagonist, while also acknowledging the irony of a national ideology that highly values land ownership being founded on the unlawful acquisition of land through genocide and slavery. Through exaggerated characterisations of the naïve working class, jarring aural interruptions to what should be a peaceful Australian landscape, and a comparison that highlights the hypocrisy of believing land ownership to be an inherent right, the subversive comedy of The Castle enables audiences to engage in a critique of their own Australian Dream ideology.

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With Australia’s national stereotypes being strongly patriarchal, the subversive comedy genre also undermines the male-centred narrative through female-lead self-aware romantic comedies. Muriel’s Wedding (Hogan, 1994) uses the cheesy Hollywood romantic comedy format and applies it to an Australian setting with unflatteringly gaudy characters. Centred around the protagonist, Muriel Heslop’s obsession with the idyllic dream of a white wedding, the film subverts the cliché narrative of “the princess’ desire for ‘the one’” (Snetiker, 2015) through the protagonist’s epiphany that her happiness is not fulfilled by her conformity to this traditional ideology. Wishing to escape the isolation of her rural hometown Porpoise Spit and the demeaning authority of her parochial father, Murial initially saw marriage as a way to fantastical paradise. However, after her entry into a loveless marriage, and after the suicide of her mother prompted by the father’s infidelity, she becomes disillusioned with this hollow fantasy. Choosing instead to empower herself and live independently, she rejects the “overbearing patriarch of the Heslop clan” and the limitations of conforming to traditional gender roles. Love Serenade (Barrett, 1996) also tells the story of female disillusionment with male-centred ideologies through an awkward love triangle. The two protagonists are sisters who both become enamoured with a washed up DJ from urban Brisbane, and the allure of an escape from the mundanity of their isolated rural town that he brings with him. Using the isolation of the rural landscape and the dilapidation of the neglected town, the film subverts conventions of the romantic comedy genre by setting the romance in an emphatically unromantic location. Furthermore, while the characters are blinded by their desire for a romantic escape, the audience can see that the DJ is a heartless phony, and a hollow fantasy. Much like Muriel’s Wedding, the protagonists’ ultimate choice to reject the DJ by pushing him off a silo represents a rejection of conforming to the narrative of submission to male-centred ideologies as well as a claim of rurality as a female space. Muriel’s Wedding and Love Serenade both demonstrate Australian national cinema’s use of landscape and characters in subversive comedy as a critique of national male-centred stereotypes and ideologies through their female protagonists’ disillusionment with traditional gender roles.

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Australian national cinema uses the two key features of: a.) character and landscape relations, and b.) distinctly Australian genre styles to subvert traditional, idyll national stereotypes as critique. The expression of characters and landscape in the Australian Gothic genre seeks to expose the darkness and toxicity hidden within false stereotypes and flawed ideologies. This is achieved through the portrayal of the dominant bushman stereotype as a degenerate wolf in sheep’s clothing, and the Ocker as destructive and toxic. The isolation of the outback does not provide peace and power over nature to those who enter, instead the harsh expanse acts as a prison that consumes all who enter. The urban beachgoer stereotype is also lost in the Gothic genre, instead replaced by characters trapped in suburban poverty and victims of oppressive and abusive male domination. The subversive comedy genre uses naïve, ignorant and gaudy hyper-Australian caricatures as well as ironically unglamorous landscapes to question the perceived national idyll of the ‘Australian Dream’. This genre also rebels against male-centred national ideologies through the portrayal of female protagonists as disillusioned from the limitations of traditional gender roles and hollow idyll narratives. The ubiquity of these features throughout Australian national cinema demonstrates their importance as tools for social commentary. Their application to critiques of traditional Australian nationalist stereotypes and ideologies creates the unique cinematic discourse and style in Australian national cinema.

 

References:

KRACAUER, S. (2004). From Caligari to Hitler: A Psychological History of the German
Film (Quaresima L., Ed.). PRINCETON; OXFORD: Princeton University Press.
Retrieved from http://www.jstor.org/stable/j.ctvc77cxj

Mason, M. J. (2018). Over-identification in The Castle: Recovering an Australian Classic’s
Subversive Edge. Senses of Cinema, (89), 1. Retrieved from
http://search.ebscohost.com.ezproxy.lib.swin.edu.au/login.aspx?direct=true&db=f3h
&AN=133819304&site=ehost-live&scope=site

O’Regan, Tom (1989). “Cinema Oz: The Ocker Films”. The Australian Screen. O’Regan,
Tom and Albert Moran (Eds). Penguin: Australia. p.75-98.

Rayner, J. (2011). Gothic Definitions: The New Australian “Cinema of Horrors.”
Antipodes, 25(1), 91–97. Retrieved from http://search.ebscohost.com.ezproxy.lib.swin.edu.au/login.aspx?direct=true&db=lfh&AN=63308592&site=ehost-live&scope=site

Scott, J., & Biron, D. (2010). Wolf Creek, rurality and the Australian gothic. Continuum:
Journal of Media & Cultural Studies, 24(2), 307–322. https://doi-org.ezproxy.lib.swin.edu.au/10.1080/10304310903576358

Snetiker, M. (2015). MuRiEL’S WEDDiNG 1994. Entertainment Weekly, (1385/1386), 52–55. Retrieved from http://search.ebscohost.com.ezproxy.lib.swin.edu.au/login.aspx? direct=true&db=f3h&AN=110220137&site=ehost-live&scope=site

Thomas, D., & Gillard, G. (2003). Threads of Resemblance in New Australian Gothic
Cinema. Metro, (136), 36. Retrieved from
http://search.ebscohost.com.ezproxy.lib.swin.edu.au/login.aspx?direct=true&db=f3h
&AN=9954290&site=ehost-live&scope=site

Films Referenced:
Barrett, S. (1996). Love Serenade.
Burstall, T. (1972). Alvin Purple.
Faiman, P. (1986). Crocodile Dundee.
Hogan, J. P. (1994). Muriel’s Wedding.
Kotcheff, T. (1971). Wake in Fright.
Kurzel, J. (2011). Snowtown.
McLean, G. (2005). Wolf Creek.
Robbins, G., Gleisner, T. (2001-present). All Aussie Adventures.
Sitch, R. (1997). The Castle