Le feu sous la peau

Katrina is 19 with a neglected toddler, a lipstick-smeared pout and a bad attitude. Her brother's in jail for murder and her dad's fed up with her bludging off him to finance a life that revolves around the beauty salon, bourbon and blow jobs. Soon she, too, is plotting a murder, which may or may not involve her sweet mechanic boyfriend Rusty or her brother's best mate, Kenny, a dropkick with a sadistic streak. In fact, every man she knows becomes a drooling idiot as soon as she unzips her micro-mini denim skirt. It's a juicy role and Emily Barclay attacks it with relish, making this vile steamroller of a sexpot almost likable. But her brash performance is also the movie's fatal flaw: Hurricane Katrina has it all her own way. Everyone else is too stupid or too nice to stand up to her. We've seen this character before, but Dede Truitt in The Opposite Of Sex and Suzanne Stone in To Die For weren't just bad to the bone, they were better written. Still, like that other wild ride through westie wasteland, Idiot Box, this is a bold, blackly funny picture of the Australia most of us live in, full of noisy energy and visual flair, and for that it deserves a big thumbs-up.

Spoiled suburban girl Katrina turns into a femme fatale monster after her brother goes to prison in this Aussie portrait of a middle class crime wave. The box copy promises more in the way of sex and violence than this picture ultimately delivers, but that is not necessarily a bad thing. The picture cuts back and forth from tell-all interviews to girl-gone-bad flashbacks and the effect, rather surprisingly, is not as jarring as it might be, as the cutaways were well-timed, and the overall pacing was quite slick. A low budget is in evidence, but the creators manage to combine a darkly comic tone with a believable situation and credible characters to create effective drama. Not great by any means but better than many similar films.

This film, directed by Paul Goldman ("Australian Rules", "The Night We Called it a Day"), is not so much Pulp Fiction Australian style as pulp faction; first-time scriptwriter Alice Bell has cobbled together a story inspired by the real-life murder of her father committed by 19 year old Belinda van Krevel in suburban Wollongong (though the film was shot in Newcastle). Cyclone Katrina, as another reviewer accurately calls her, is indeed an elemental force, unrestrained by social conventions and morality. She has a hopeless passion for her brother Daniel (Laurence Breuls) who is locked up early in the movie for taking the head off a convenience store clerk with a samurai sword during an ineptly executed robbery. Katrina is determined to get him out, and the need to get money for Danny's appeal drives her to organizing her blameless father's murder. In the meantime she drives furiously, has sex with practically every young tradesman in the district and neglects her baby, fortunately largely cared for by her loyal boyfriend Rusty (Michael Dorman), who likes to think of himself as the father.

Whatever production defects this movie may have, it passed the watch test. It really is hard to take your eyes off Emma Barclay as Katrina. Kat is vulgar, rude, lewd, and driven largely by emotion, yet she radiates sexuality, the kind that a well-brought up male feels guilty about acknowledging. She knows what men want; hence the long string of "admirers". Interestingly she tends to adopt the superior position during sexual congress, no doubt to stay in control, for she is a controlling sort of person.

Her environment is standard suburban wasteland (well-off blue collar boring) but it is not obvious why she and her brother have turned out to be such poisonous personalities. Mum, it seems, was a drug addict banished years ago from the family home, but Dad (Robert Morgan) is a decent caring person, a builder by trade and maybe not very perceptive. Perhaps Dad was too indulgent and a firmer line with the kids might have avoided disaster, though his girlfriend "Auntie" Dianne (Genevieve Lemon) puts it all down to genes – Grandma and mother both having been mad.

There is an obvious parallel with "The Boys" of a few years ago, which was no comedy but did explain how a truly monstrous crime originated. This is a lighter piece though what Katrina brings about is still pretty nasty. Justice is not done either, which is disturbing.

Even so, whatever is driving Katrina, Emily Barclay makes her totally believable. The rest of the cast are rather overshadowed, but Steve Bastoni is effective as an intimidated policeman and Michael Dorman convincing as Rusty, a moth to Katrina's candle, or rather blowtorch. We know via the mockumentary sections what is coming up, but we still get a surprise. Katrina does rather better than her real-life counterpart, but someone like her is not likely to enjoy a quiet life, or a very long one either.

In some respects, this was quite an ambitious film – it's dark, smart, and edgy – a little bit in the vein of Brick (not as polished but a whole lot better). The music and energy are all there, but there seems to be a few flat spots. It may have benefited from some further editing to keep the momentum up, even though it's already just under 90 minutes in length. It seems like the writer and director had some good ideas, that weren't fully realised.

I think many cinema-goers will find this entertaining, and I certainly recommend it over the bulk of Hollywood releases (not that that's saying much), if that's your taste. For me it seemed laboured and contrived. The performances by the actors were generally (but not universally) OK. Emily Barclay's performance was good, but her character failed to engage – somewhat like Kath and Kim on speed. It's not that her character was nasty (David Wenham's monumental performance in The Boys was extremely nasty), but more that it seemed manufactured. Her brattishness becomes grating after a while.

The mid-film interviews reminded me of 2:37. They were better done in this film, but still detract somewhat from the continuity of the film.

The script seemed a bit clunky and self-conscious and just didn't quite work for me. I think the director depended too much on the sound-track and style over substance. A strength of the film is that it took some risks, but they weren't fully realised.

A darkly comic tale of desperation in the land of discount bourbon and Holden versus Ford. I'm somewhat at a loss to understand the negative reaction in some of the comments posted; understanding the foibles and peculiarities of Australian suburbia is important to seeing the film in its correct context. Emily Barclay sinks her teeth into Katrina with such enthusiasm that as she careens across the landscape with baby in tow over gullible men, naive women, impotent police and her well-meaning father we're tempted more than once to suspend the moral judgement we should be making and simply sit back to enjoy the ride. Questions are asked of the audience as much as of the film's characters, making us uneasy and showing Katrina's real power to manipulate. How much does the need for excitement in our lives stop us from making decisions about what is right or wrong? Is Bailee the get-out-of-jail free card that entitles Katrina to salvation as we find that crime sometimes does pay? A fresh, upfront production that along with recent films like "Kenny" and "Footy Legends" lends confidence to the recovery of the Australian movie industry from the ball and chain of film-school textbook orthodoxy.