The Turning

Beautiful filmically. Poetic. So local it hurts. Love the short film format - clever - no final scenes or answers. Life? Made a whole lot of sense to me.

This film has the look and feel of Tree of Life. Moments of beautiful imagery, mixed with numerous ponderous scenes for an overlong three hours, makes wonder why it wasn't edited better. Seventeen separate movies ranging from ten to fifteen minutes make up the one hundred and eighty minutes. The beach is a recurring theme throughout, with frequent narration with contemplative music in the background. The storyline is simply the harshness of everyday life, told with a realistic and mundane tone. There are no happy endings at anytime; just a gritty seriousness with very little humor thrown in, with the exception of Kate Blanchett and a swimming pool at Christmas. Otherwise, this is a long and depressing ride. The acting is superb, but the length is a definite drawback in what could have been a contender.

Most movies with multiple stories are shallow even if well acted. The script, acting, and stories are all emotional - sharing life at a precipice of sorts, a turning point, where emotions and feelings change. As those of us who have lived a bit, those turning points are often revealing and emotional, and change our outlook.

Some reviews of this moving denied the reality of life's challenges - this is not a film of Disney characters or where a Marvel character saves the world - just super acting by many superb actors in emotional scenes.

Whether it be seeing a divorced dad with a son he doesn't know or reliving painful memories or living painful lives, I applaud the directing of diverse stories with a similar tenor : life's challenges being shown and felt.

I loved the Turning. It showed me the way to write my life story. I had been in turmoil as to how to write it all down. When I discovered Tim Winton's, The Turning, I knew what I had to do. I am currently doing Honours at university with my thesis being my life story. Yes I agree that some of the stories are sad with no real solution but unfortunately that is how life is sometimes and for some people. I wish we all could be happy but that is a fairy story for children. We just have to get on with it as best we can. Tim shows up that saying "it is what it is". When I was completing my Arts degree with creative writing we had to read, "The Art of the Tale" edited by Anthony Halpern. This is a good set of short stories not necessarily happy ones either but again showing what life is.

This is a collection of short films in Australia about various aspects of life that presents with some kind of turning point.

I watched this for the big names such as Cate Blanchett and Rose Byrne, Ann's I knew I probably wouldn't enjoy this film anyway. Indeed, the first segment is already not so good, it tells a story of a family spending Christmas together but they go to the wrong house. I can't quite work out what is so special about this story, apart from Cate's performance. The Rose Byrne story is the best out of the whole film, it tells a distinct change in life because of a significant turning point. The rest of the stories are not very good. The sand story is just ridiculous. I couldn't even understand it!