Cosi

I caught up with this movie ten years late because I'm working my way slowly through the seminal works of David Wenham, but I'm sorry I didn't catch it sooner, as it's a very entertaining means of whiling away a couple of hours when you have the 'flu (as I did when I watched it). Quite cheered me up. Australian films often seem to be able to do that, offering as they do a slightly skewed and non-PC perspective on life. California sunshine with a British sense of humour? Sounds like paradise to me.

The story is, of course, quite ridiculous, but the performances from a good ensemble cast are so engaging that the unlikely plot can be excused, especially if you have taken enough 'flu meds to knock out a cart-horse. Lewis – rather blandly played perhaps by Ben Mendlesohn – is drifting between jobs and college and obviously irritating his highly focused and perky girlfriend, Lucy (gorgeous, leggy, Rachel Griffiths) He accepts a job at the local psychiatric hospital to provide drama therapy to a group of inmates, led by opera fan Roy (the marvelous Barry Otto). Now what the hospital authorities and Lewis are envisioning is an unambitious variety show. But what Roy has in mind is no less than a production of Mozart's Cosi Fan Tutte, and he's nothing if not determined. No one can sing a note or speak Italian, but by a combination of bravado and insult, Roy talks Lewis into it and the patients start auditioning. Badly. Really badly.

For those of you not familiar with Cosi Fan Tutte, basically it's Mozart's take on the perceived perverseness of the female character (it translates as "It's like that" or "Woman are like that" or something similar. You get the idea?) and it explores the idea that when let off the leash of fidelity by the absence of their lovers, women are straight after the nearest thing in trousers like a rat up the proverbial drainpipe. Alongside the main story of Mozart's opera, and the inmates' "let's put the show on in the barn" attitude, there runs a sub plot of whether or not Lucy can be faithful to Lewis, which is not terribly subtle, and given that the temptation on offer is the total plonker Nick (Aden Young - don't take it personally Aden), the outcome is not a complete surprise.

The movie explores the themes you might expect from a film centered around a psychiatric institution; are the inmates any madder than the people outside, how do we deal with people who don't fit into our neat patterns of what is and isn't normal, how much liberty can you allow people who might be a danger too themselves as well as to others etc ? But the reason to watch this movie is to see the characterization of the patients. I'm not going to get into the ethics of whether it's moral to use psychiatric patients as fodder for humour in a movie, let's just accept that it is, and take it from there. Pamela Rabe is utterly moving as depressive Ruth, Jacki Weaver is wonderful as Cherry, a very anorexic and yobbish looking David Wenham is priceless as the pyromaniac cat burner Doug, and Paul Chubb grabbed my attention as mild mannered Henry. But the total stand out for my money was Toni Collette. I had no idea she could sing like that! She gives a marvelous performance as Julie, who is almost, but not quite, ready to leave the institution and face life and its temptations outside. Every performance I see of Toni Collette just reinforces how wonderful she is. I thoroughly enjoyed this movie. Not great, but well worth a couple of hours of anyone's time. Especially if you have 'flu.

Funny and touching. An unusal blend of Mozart's Cosi Fan Tutti and the life of an unemployed stage director who takes a job out of desparation with a mental institution as rec director. Must see scene occurs at the end of the final credits.

A well-written, uniquely Australian film. Skillfully handles an ensemble cast, and has many touching moments, while avoiding over-sentimentality.

While the film is a light comedy, there are tragic elements in some of the more disturbed mental patients. You come to care about each of them, but thankfully, the film doesn't try to give any simplistic "answers" to mental illness.

Ben, Toni & Rachel all give good performances. Toni also sings a nice version of a Crowded House song over the end credits.

A small film that deserves a big audience. Worth ten Hollywood blockbusters.

When it comes down to it, Così is a film about the right to dream and the tragedy of dreams being lost. The characters outside the institution, Lewis included, are a pragmatic lot. They have pragmatic views on life, pragmatic humor, and are cynically short of ideals. Nick, in particular, suggests that doing away with loyalty in a relationship is a valid concept, not because of any devotion to an ideal of 'free love' but simply because it does away with all the complications over infidelity.

The actors, however, are far less restrained in their grips on reality, (however clichéd that may sound, trust me, these characters are not) and thus are allowed to dream. It isn't so much that they are delusional, (none really are) it's simply that they don't seem to have been indoctrinated with a grim view of reality. Roy doesn't just lie about his childhood to others, he allows himself to dream that he really did have a childhood that was remarkable and marvelous. More subtly, Henry is permitted to idolize his father in a way Nick never could. And sure enough, when the two's views on life collide, there are sparks, with Henry delivering most.

Lewis, of course, must gradually progress from one to the other, but this is done in a way which is subtle and beautiful. His dream is the play itself, and he progresses from dreading his own misfortune in getting the job of making these nutcases perform a play successfully; to dreaming of making a perfect play with beautiful costumes and wonderful responses. What matters is that they dreamt of it and had the lack of sense to follow that dream.

The film has a sterling wit and proceeds nicely, following the course of the patient's dreams and the friend's pragmatism and lack of dreams. (For a good contrast showing this message, check out the overdone, amazingly clichéd and unimaginative performance by Nick, and compare it to the dream laden performance of the patients.)

In the end, the film is delightfully unrealistic in its applications. Plot devices do appear to be coming out of left field. But in a film about dreaming, surely that can be excused?

I agree with most of the reviews already posted, but would like to add that I found the characterizations to be what endeared me most to this production. I'm a recent explorer of opera and have seen movie versions of some of them. This can stand toe to toe with any movie version of an opera in terms of its ability to reach gut level. I cried when the house lights went down and the curtain up as the six on stage were transformed into something bigger than themselves and so participated in the healing mystery that mankind has been experiencing since the first dramatizations and plays were enacted.