Fantastic Fest 09: VAN DIEMAN'S LAND Review

Gripping and powerful are words that come easily to mind when describing Van Dieman's Land. Cannibalism, not so easy. Yet that's the core issue at the heart of the film, which is based on the true story of Alexander Pearce.

Reading up on Van Dieman's Land ahead of time is a requirement if you want to know the context for the story that unfolds. (Full disclosure: I watched the movie on a DVD screener during the festival, so perhaps the theatrical print has additional information disclosed in the prologue.) Rodney Perkins' excellent program note identifies Pearce as an Irishman convicted of stealing six pairs of shoes and eventually sentenced to the most notorious, toughest penal colony in 19th Century Australia, a country stocked by the British Empire for that express purpose.

Pearce (Oscar Redding) and seven other prisoners escape into the uncharted wilderness of Tasmania, then known as Van Dieman's Land. It's absolutely gorgeous country, filled to the horizon with trees, bushes, grasslands, hills, mountains, and rivers. "Untamed nature" takes on a new meaning, though, when you're a desperate, unprepared prisoner trying to make your way to freedom.

And all that beauty comes at a price, something that it took me a while to notice: there's little animal life. The prisoners don't even seem to be much afflicted by insects. They're surrounded by lush growing things that seem to have sapped the life out of any creature that makes the mistake of venturing into its territory. And where there are no animals, and where those lush growing things don't provide any apparent source of food, that makes for some very hungry prisoners.

The prisoners are the toughest of the tough, already veering near savagery as the film begins. Pearce seems to be the quietest of all, rarely talking but always observing. Eventually it seems that his wary eyes are, in reality, assessing the other men, deciding how he should deal with them, which ones he should avoid, which ones he should stay near. It's all about survival, and when there's no other source of food, you need to decide who's an ally and who's a potential meal.

Van Dieman's Land is deceptively calm, much like Pearce himself. Thus, the occasional, explicit footage emerges organically from the material and the circumstances. When, for example, the prisoners are first escaping, they overtake a rotund guard and strip him naked. It's not a pleasant sight to see him weeping and fully exposed on the cold forest floor, but neither is it exploitative. The same applies to the violence that occasionally arises, which makes it all the more startling and effective in conveying the desperation of the men.

The power of the film accumulates slowly, gradually enveloping the viewer. I never felt indifferent while watching Van Dieman's Land, yet neither did I feel fully engaged emotionally. It keeps you at a distance, always reminding you that the times were very different, that people acted differently in the early 19th Century, that these men are pushing the limits of human endurance but are too stoic to ever want to expose their own fears.

I can't say I "liked" Van Dieman's Land, but it's stayed with me as an unsettling memory, which is a testament to director Jonathan Auf Der Heide, who co-wrote the script with lead actor Oscar Redding, and his talented cast and crew.