Ten Canoes
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| Ten Canoes | |
|---|---|
 Promotional movie poster for the film |
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| Directed by | Rolf de Heer |
| Written by | Rolf de Heer |
| Narrated by | David Gulpilil |
| Starring | Jamie Gulpilil |
| Cinematography | Ian Jones |
| Editing by | Tania Nehme |
| Distributed by | Palace Films |
| Release date(s) | 29 June 2006 |
| Running time | 92 mins |
| Country | Australia |
| Language | Yolngu Matha/English |
| Budget | AUD $2,200,000 |
| Gross revenue | AUD $3,000,000 |
| Official website | |
| IMDb profile | |
Ten Canoes is a 2006 film notable as the first full-length feature made entirely in an indigenous Australian language. It was directed by Rolf de Heer and starred Crusoe Kurddal. The title of the film arose from discussions between de Heer and David Gulpilil about a photograph of ten canoeists poling across the Arafura Swamp, taken by anthropologist Donald Thomson[1] in 1936.[2]
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[edit] Synopsis
The film is set in Arnhem Land, in a time before western contact, and tells the story of a young man who covets one of his older brother's wives. Or rather, it tells the story of a warrior Dayindi (Jamie Gulpilil), who hunts goose eggs while being told another story about another young man who, like Dayindi, coveted his elder brother's wife. The sequences featuring Dayindi, set shortly before contact with white people, are in black and white, while shots set in the present and in the distant past are in colour. The film is narrated in English by David Gulpilil; all protagonists speak in indigenous dialects of the Yolŋu Matha language group, with subtitles. A narration in Yolŋu Matha is also available.
In the story told to Dayindi: a man (whose own younger brother desires his third and youngest wife), kills a member of neighbouring tribe, whom he believes had kidnapped his second wife the previous year. To prevent all-out war, tribal laws dictate that the offending tribe allow the offender (or the killer) to be speared from a distance by the tribe of the slain man. The offender is allowed to be accompanied by a companion, and he takes his younger brother. Whenever one of the two is hit, the spear-throwers will stop, and justice will have been served. The offender is hit and mortally wounded but survives long enough to return to his camp, where he is tended to by his eldest wife for a period of time. Shortly after he finally succumbs, the elder brother's kidnapped second wife finds her way back to the camp. She reveals that she had been kidnapped by a different tribe, much farther away and had taken this long to return. She mourns her lost husband, who had attacked the wrong tribe, though now she and the elder wife take his younger brother as their new husband. The younger brother, who was only interested in the youngest of the three wives, now has to care for all of them, much more than he bargained for.
And so, Dayindi learns the dangerous consequences of jealousy.
[edit] Nudity
In the film, the people are almost naked. They only have a rope around their waist, with only some loose ends or loop in front of their genitals. They are surprised about strangers covering the genitals with a piece of cloth, wondering what they have to hide.
[edit] Cast and crew
Crusoe Kurddal is from Maningrida and speaks Gunwinggu. Other actors and actresses from Ramingining, Northern Territory speak various dialects of the Yolngu Matha language family.
[edit] Reception
Ten Canoes won a special jury prize at the 2006 Cannes Film Festival. De Heer rejected claims he is a white director making an indigenous story: "They're telling the story, largely, and I'm the mechanism by which they can." [3] Ten Canoes was screened at the Sydney Film Festival in June 2006 and was released nationally on 29 June 2006.
In October 2006 Ten Canoes was chosen as Australia's official entry into the Best Foreign Language Film category for the 2007 Academy Awards. If nominated it would be the first Australian film ever nominated. The only other Australian film ever in the running was 2001's La Spagnola.
Ten Canoes was nominated for seven Australian Film Institute (AFI) awards, of which it won six. The movie won the awards for Best Picture (Julie Ryan, Rolf de Heer producers), Best Director (Rolf de Heer and Peter Djigirr), Best Screenplay - Original (Rolf de Heer), Best Cinematography (Ian Jones), Best Editing (Tania Nehme) and Best Sound (James Currie, Tom Heuzenroeder, Michael Bakaloff and Rory McGregor). It was also nominated for Best Production Design (Beverly Freeman).
It won three awards from the Film Critics Circle of Australia: Best Film, Best Editing (Tania Nehme) and Best Cinematography (Ian Jones). (The latter award was a tie with David Williamson's work on Jindabyne.) The film was also nominated for Best Director and Best Original Screenplay. The documentary (that aired on Australian network SBS) The Balanda and the Bark Canoes, which detailed de Heer's experiences making the film, won Best Australian Short Documentary for de Heer, Tania Nehme and Molly Reynolds.
At the end of 2006 the film stands as one of the highest grossing Australian films of the year. By October it had made just over $3,000,000 from a budget of $2,200,000.
[edit] References
- ^ Thomsom, Donald; Nicolas Peterson (ed.) (Reprinted 2006). Donald Thomson in Arnhem Land. Melbourne: Miegunyah Press, 249 p. ISBN 052285205.
- ^ Gibson, Joel. "Reclaiming the past can be personal", The Sydney Morning Herald, 2007-04-08, p. 2. Retrieved on 2007-04-09.
- ^ Time 20 March 2006
[edit] See also
- Atanarjuat, a 2001 Canadian film entirely in Inuktitut by Inuit actors, also about an ancestral aboriginal legend also involving the sexual jealousy of brothers.
