Three Dollars

Although it has been suggested that "Three Dollars" is about the mind of the Australian Male, Melbourne version, (such as it is), it really could be set in almost any large Western city. Eddie (David Wenham), a genial thirty-something, works for a Government environmental testing agency as a chemical engineer. He is instructed to sign off on a dodgy developer's polluted project. He resists, and at the start of the film we see his reward, a forced march out the door. So much for fearless impartial regulators. Eddie is in a spot, no money (three dollars in fact) and his university tutor wife Tanya (Frances O'Connor) has also been laid off. They have a large mortgage and a cute six-year-old, Abby, to feed. Eddie gets a conducted tour by Nick, a derro (Australian for derelict) he once helped, of the mean streets that may await him, but at the end there is hope from a (possible) guardian angel in the form of Amanda (Sarah Wynter), Eddie's childhood sweetheart (and daughter of the dodgy developer) who in a coincidence worthy of Latin American magic realism, manages to pop up in Eddie's life every nine-and–a–half years.

David Wenham can do comedy ("Getting Straight") or drama ("The Boys") equally well, and here he does both splendidly. His Eddie is amiable, a bit of a duffer, but instinctively decent. Thus he cannot approve the dodgy development, despite being aware of the consequences. Wenham, who has great integrity as an actor, has no trouble evoking the pain that can come with doing the right thing. Frances does a fine job as his ambitious but frustrated academic wife, and Joanna Hunt-Prokhovnic (aged nine) as the six-year-old Abby nearly steals every scene she is in. Two minor roles are in the scene stealer category also, David Roberts as Eddie's loathsome boss Gerald and Robert Menzies, unrecognizable as Nick the derro.

The plot leans heavily on coincidence. Not only do Sarah and Nick pop up so providentially, but Sarah is having an affair with Gerald, who happens to have once enticed Tanya away from Eddie with an offer to let her play a female Hamlet while they were all at University together. And of course there is the matter of Sarah's father being the dodgy developer. This all doesn't matter for the story is essentially a fable about keeping one's integrity even when everybody and everything seems to be conspiring to take it off you.

The script is fine though the pace flags at times and one or two of the plot diversions (eg meet the parents) seem unnecessary. There are also some unnecessary flourishes such as the crop-dusting plane attack - an apparent tribute to Hitchcock's "North by North West". Robert Connolly's only previous outing as a feature director was another entertaining modern fable starring David Wenham, "The Bank". It's a long wait between watchable Australian films these days so naturally I hope this does as well. It is a little less slick and a little more tuned to real feeling.

"Three Dollars" is one of the best films I have seen this year. I was not sure what to expect because I had never before seen David Wenham in a dramatic role. I had enjoyed him in comedies especially the television series "Sea Change".

The intricacies of his performance made this movie memorable, moving and fascinating. Other actors are believable and involving. The story is unusual but can easily be identified with. The direction allows the story to flow and makes the most of the emotions.

I can thoroughly recommend this film to anyone who likes to examine the morality behind decisions we make and the effects the decisions have on our futures.

I saw "Three Dollars" today, on a bleak Canberra day. It was not the best Australian movie I have ever seen (my heart belongs to "Picnic at Hanging Rock"). But it was the kind of movie that Australians ought to make (rather than being the location for explosion-based stuff from the US) and that Australians ought to queue to see. It was unerringly about us. Not the flatulent lies of nationalism or the chest-beating idiocies of economic rationalism. It was about how, faced with the second of those two catastrophes, a decent man emerged. He did not win (not in the film, anyway). His professional concern about a toxic land development did not stop it. He did not win Lotto, or write an award winning book. The most he may have done was change the perceptions of Amanda, a representative of those who succeed when goodness is a handicap. Like good men everywhere, since the Biblical Job, he tried throughout to act as a good man should. As is inevitable with screenplays adapted from literature, there were options that could have been taken and were not. One could quibble, but I'll leave that to others. Long scenes may have alienated some viewers, but were uncomfortably real - in my life at least, conversations don't end with the bit that advances the plot and events spill out in several directions at once. (Linearity is a curse!). The performances were uniformly sound. David Wenham showed versatility and a depth that was present in "The Boys". Frances O'Connor underplayed wonderfully, so that the Edam cheese scene became the strongest signal of her character. The child was unusually persuasive and thoughtful direction produced depth and colour from the more peripheral roles (the alcoholic, the creature made manager and Kate, the friend of Tracey). This is a film of lacerating honesty, and a work that asks whether society is advanced by blind progress. Eliot Perlman's book from which the film was adapted was a revelation - an epistle of decency written by a lawyer - and his second book ("Seven Types of Ambiguity") is even more challenging. I look forward to the film and am trying to predict the cast already.

This movie I found to be cringeworthily poor, but it was something that I couldn't look away from and due to its slow pace, fast-forwarded through until the end.

I think it was because I was hoping for some kind of payoff for investing time with these characters and a story that rings true to many adults.

Instead all this is is a purely emotionally manipulative film, catering to the audience's basic fears of unemployment and being poor - the fact that this successful couple could be so under "stress" after 2 days in which (however unlikely in real life) they both lose their jobs despite having family and friend support networks (and like a poster-er above said, Australia's welfare state to rely on) and wind up digging in garbage bins is just laughable. Even as a metaphor it's just pathetic and manipulative.

What was the point of this film? I just wasted 2 hours of my life on it and there was little redeeming quality.

Plus, the flashbacks were very bad in terms of clothes and using the same actors. Also the timeline just didn't work as Joy Division came out in the late 70's until 1980 (bonded over by the 2 main actors couple who looked like they were in university) and the movie takes place in 2004 which would mean they were together for 25 or so years by that point and yet only in their mid-30's?? The movie seemed like a big advert for mental health services as it's supposed to be about the changing nature of society and how it's "okay" to be a little stressed and depressed, just get some professional help.

It's a real shame that films like 'Three Dollars' don't get any recognition in there own countries, because it definitely shows what a great industry we have hear. The premise is quite simple: a tale about an honest man, trying to support a family who loses his job and nearly collapses. Throughout the film, we learn about how he met his wife, and what it really means to be down on luck.

It's hard to explain why this is such a great film, but it is undoubtedly a fantastic story that is well acted and directed, with an as usual great performance for leading man Wehnam. All I can say is that it is well worth seeing, one of the best movies I've seen this year, yet no one will ever know about it. See it if you get a chance.