Australia Day

I was pretty excited when i herd there was a movie coming out called "Australia Day". I thought it would be a great movie to celebrate one of our great calendar days. However it was not at all an uplifting movie at all, instead a powerful movie set with three stories of three different nationalities dealing with some brutal cultural differences. I did like it and it was great seeing Bryan Brown back on the screen, but it could of done with a different name. Score: 5/10

A brilliantly executed movie set in my hometown, Brisbane, which captures many of the multicultural issues confronting modern Australia. The cast - relatively unknown apart from Bryan Brown - deliver a powerful, complex story which illustrates many of the cultural issues confronting modern societies. It was a real edge-of-the-seat production with completely unpredictable outcomes.

The majority of us (Australians) live in cities and towns where these stories occur. We see the product of Australia Day simmering around us, in differing forms, every day. This movie takes us beneath the surface. We're allowed to follow those people we've taken for granted, dismissed, buffered ourselves against or plain ignored because we can. As sober entertainment and something worth watching, the results are a thing to be proud of.

Stephen M Irwin and Kriv Stenders get the basics right with the writing and direction, and it shows in this movie becoming greater than the sum of its parts. Story telling and performances are solid in that benefit.

Excellent casting, awesome technical and camera unit work pull us into the lives and drama of our everyday victims and protagonists. Uniformly good writing, direction and excellent performances allow us to genuinely care about the strangers lives we're watching, Brian Brown captures the quiet desperation of an older, Australian man caught between a rock and a hard place, trying to do the right thing. Plaudits to the cameraman on his closeups of Brown. The Australian landscape and Brown's face are now synonymous. The people and drama in Australia day will resonate strongly with many Australians. It entertains and confronts us with truths we're usually able to walk past. Foreign audience will enjoy it as something casting a believable, strong reflection on Australian people, and the Australian enigma.

I love Aussie movies, good or bad I'll see them all. (clear bias) I neither liked nor disliked this movie. Acting was patchy and editing failed it miserably. Brown was typically the lynch pin and perhaps without his presence the movie would have been completely lost. My gripe about this movie was the obvious mirroring of the movie Crash. Crash is an extraordinary movie, this movie is not.

The number of reviews here who don't understand why this film is set on Australia Day are exactly the reason this sort of film is so important. Maybe it needs to spelt out more clearly for some. We have a long way to go as a country, and hopefully films like this assist with informing and educating, and have some sort of impact.

Not a perfect film, and yes, some bits very hard to watch. (I agree with another review who said the brother and sister scene was very strange!) But the portraits of these Australians, and the intertwining stories were really well done in my opinion. The flow was brilliant and the performances were great.