Red Hill

A good film. for cinematography, story and performances. for preserve the rules and atmosphere of old fashion western. proposing a not new but well made story about past traces, revenge and a young officer in a small town front to its crime. one of good motifs for see "Red Hill" is the admirable job of Ryan Kwanten who gives a vulnerable, honest and brave character in precise details of each virtue. and that is the start point for enjoy a film proposing more than a story but being a pledge for small fundamental virtues defining us.

Red Hill is written and directed by Patrick Hughes. It stars Ryan Kwanten, Steve Bisley, Tom E. Lewis and Claire van der Boom. Music is by Dmitri Golovko and cinematography by Tim Hudson.

Young city cop Shane Cooper (Kwanten) gets a transfer to Red Hill, a place he hopes is a quiet enough town for himself and his pregnant wife to successfully raise a family. But his arrival at work coincides with the escape from prison of aborigine Jimmy Conway (Lewis), who is heading into town with revenge firmly on his mind.

Jimmy Conway has escaped and he's bringing hell into town.

Utterly splendid Neo-Western out of Australia. For his feature film debut, Patrick Hughes has crafted a loving homage to the Western genre whilst also imbuing his film with its own suspenseful blood. Blending Ozploitaton thriller values with Western genre staples of the past, Red Hill unspools on narrative terms as a gritty and rugged revenge piece.

Red Hill the town is fronted by gruff sheriff Old Bill (Bisley), he leads a pack of scuzzy characters who consider it their town and god help anyone who stands in their way. Into this maelstrom comes fresh faced Shane Cooper (yes the name is Alan Ladd and High Noon purposely spliced together), a genuine and honest copper harnessing a tragedy as well as a moral code that's not for shaking.

After quickly finding out that Old Bill is lacking in human graces, Shane finds himself coming face to face with Conway, who is all the horsemen of the apocalypse rolled into one. Face badly scarred and adorned with weapons and duster, Conway seems to have supernatural resources to go with his expert tracking skills and knowledge of the surrounding outback terrain (so think High Plains Drifter & Chato's Land then).

How come, though, that as he callously goes about killing off members of the scuzzy crew, each time he meets up with Shane, who is in full tilt survival mode, Conway refuses to kill Shane? And just what is that symbolic Panther doing stalking the edges of the landscape? One and the same, perhaps? It will of course all be revealed, and in truth it's no great surprise, the beauty is in how Hughes has toyed with our perceptions about Conway, this in turn makes for a cracker-jack finale.

Performances are superbly in tune with the material, Cooper, Lewis and Bisley really manage to steer their respective characters away from being histrionic or cartoonish. Musically it features stabs of delightful grungy rock blending in with Golovko's mournfully ironic score. The widescreen photography is most interesting, in that there's often smart shifting between a washed out palette to emphasise the remoteness of the setting, to opened up capturing of the beautiful vistas (filmed on location in Omeo, Victoria). The Blu-ray is a must for anyone interested in the film.

The sparse location is matched by sparse dialogue, there is no need for extraneous conversations or pointless filler, Hughes knows what he is doing. It's made with love and respect to one of the finest of film genres, and hooray to that! 8/10

Shane Cooper has just moved to the small town of Red Hill. On his first day as a constable, he must try to stop a very dangerous convict who just escaped and is coming back in town for unfinished business.

In a nutshell, this is Red Hill and those few lines alone are sufficient to understand this plot contains classic western elements. Director Patrick Hughes seems to understand the genre very much and seamlessly blends it to the somewhat modern context.

Taken as a very serious film, Red Hill might not score very high but thankfully, Hughes doesn't take it too seriously and has written a smart script that has great ingredients and builds up the tension gradually. His direction is likewise efficient, mixing contemplative scenes with straight up action/thriller. Overall, it's got some mood to it while never forgetting it's first and foremost a piece of entertainment.

At the heart of the film are the main characters. Hughes doesn't offer much exposition for and still succeeds in giving a lot of life to most of them. This is in part good writing and direction but also due to the very talented cast. Ryan Kwanten stars as young constable Shane Cooper and he conveys very well the "main hero" vibe by being human and vulnerable rather than just a squeaky clean superhero. Steve Bisley plays Bill, his boss who represents the law in town and pretty much seems to run it. Bisley is amazing to watch and steals many of the scenes he is in with great charisma and a domineering personality. When he talks, people listen. Finally, Tommy Lewis plays Jimmy Conway, the convict on the loose. Lewis succeeds in giving his character a brutal, menacing aura without uttering a single word, which I find very impressive.

One of the very impressive element of Red Hill is the stunning music score. Absolutely wonderful work by Dmitri Golovko, who has very few credits to his name. The script shifts through different tones and moods and Golovko is always right on target, never overdoing it. Expect to hear more from this guy in the future.

Despite all the praise, Red Hill is not perfect. The surrounding characters in the story (other officers of the law, various citizens and Cooper's wife) are too sketchy. The cinematography is cool but few scenes are really memorable and absolutely nothing will make your jaw drop. The action scenes range from "pretty cool" to "lacking". The western genre is cleverly revisited and transposed to our times but Hughes doesn't bring anything new at all. What you have a cool film that partly reminded me of classic Walter Hill movies. I wish Hughes had given just another pass to his script, fleshing out some characters and situations just a little more and given slightly more thought to some scenes, including the conclusion which I feel was slightly anti-climactic the way it was shot.

But if you're a fan of classic western or old school action thrillers that do not sacrifice a smart script just to string one action scene after another there is no doubt Red Hill should at least entertain you. Australian cinema keeps on expanding in all directions and I keep on loving it!

For his first full feature, Patrick Hughes has done very well and I am looking forward to more films written and/or directed by him.

Red Hill could best be described as an Australian take on the American Western. It centres on a young policeman who moves to a remote town to work with the local police department. The town is immediately laid under siege by an escaped Aboriginal convict who appears to have a grudge against the local police officers and their lackeys. Dark secrets from the past are gradually revealed.

This is a very well put together film. Cinematography, music and acting are all of a very high calibre. Ryan Kwanten is particularly good as the young policeman with insecurities and fears of his own; Kwanten makes for a very likable lead and injects some moments of humour into the suspenseful narrative. Tommy Lewis is also highly memorable as Jimmy Conway, the silent escaped convict with grimly burned face. The Australian landscape is captured nicely and the score compliments proceedings well.

It has to be said that the storyline is a little predictable. There isn't really anything overly new here. But this is not a significant problem as it really is a very well put together film. It's a solid thriller, and along with Wolf Creek proves that the Australian film industry is more than capable of delivering superior product in this genre. This one is well worth your time.

For quite some time now, amongst the 1000's of movies I have watched, I noticed a certain ennui to my movie watching, as other people have said, this has been done before, most notably in American westerns. The wronged man comes back to reap his vengeance on the evil-doers. If this had been strictly formulaic and badly acted and filmed i would not have seen it all the way through to the ending. However, I was pleasantly entertained, I don't think it was too obvious a plot, it had me guessing for a while. The escaped convict looked suitably elemental and Ryan Kwanten as the young cop on his first bloody day in the outback played it well. Yes, there were some strange parts to the movie, although I just found the inclusion of the wild animal an amusing aside, and not to be taken too seriously. The score was good, the atmosphere was suitably bleak and a lot of it filmed at night to add to the tension. I think people expect too much these days, no this was not Unforgiven, but for a low budget movie out of Australia I thought this was a good remake of the classic revenge western. Certainly worth a viewing if you love westerns, or if you like revenge plots. For a Sunday afternoon, you could do a whole lot worse.