Oh Ambassador, With this review you are really spoiling us (& the end of the movie) (Walkabout (DVD))

Member Name: pert_abacus

Product:	Walkabout (DVD)
Date:	20/09/09 (64 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Art over plot

Disadvantages: Art over plot

We were all immensely saddened by the recent death of Philip Schofield but I'm sure that you, like me, were incredibly intrigued by what was found by Andi Peters as he took charge of the house clearance. As we all know from the Daily Mirror Schofield had been secretly hoarding cans of luncheon meat but Peters also discovered some old radio tapes which are the only record of many shows that went unbroadcast.

I'm pleased to announce that due to a favour that Andi Peters owed me (see my review on how to curry favour with TV producers) I now have one of those tapes.

I'd like to share the transcript with you:

Ernest Bagley : Hello, you're listening to Radio 3 and Art / Wank. It's the 6th December 1986 and I'm Ernest Bagley. In tonights show I'll be talking to Arthur Scargill about his decision to perform as Widow Twanky at the Gloucester Playhouse for the ninth season running, Felicity Kendal about her new book on solving the middle east crisis and Brian Blessed who will reminise loudly about Flah Gordon.... But first noted academic Sir Walter Trousersnake and star of ITVs The Abacus Chronicles Pierre Nastique are joing me to talk about their love of Nicholas Roegs 1971 offering Walkabout.

Good evening Sir Trousersnake, Mr Nastique.

Nastique: Yes

Trousersnake: Good Evening.

Bagley: Now, for any of our listeners who may not be familiar with the film or who may well have altered their minds in unusual and exciting ways in the years that have passed since the movies release would you be able to explain what the film is about, how does it move you?

Trousersnake: Well, the film is made in Roegs usual style, the movie is more of an experience than a liner plot driven narrative. The audio, the imagery, the mise-en-scene, if you will, evokes feelings rather than just reaction from the audience. Although there is a loose plot, children taken to the Australian Outback by their father who promptly commits suicide then embark on a journey back to civilisation and encounter an aborgine who changes them. The film is a thing of beauty, civilisation spliced with nature, science with art, life with death.

Bagley: Quite, quite. And Pierre...

Nastique: Yeah, there's these kids right, and like how the Sir says they get abandoned in this desert and have to walk home. And they meet this black lad who doesn't say much who runs round in a loin cloth killing stuff for them to eat. And there's like these strange folk in the desert letting off balloons and stuff and I never really got why they are in it cos they don't do anything. And then Jenny Agutter, who flashed her pants in the Railway Children, she goes and gets her trout out...

Bagley: Excuse me?

Nastique: Aah, she gets her kit off. Does it all the time in most of her movies but I think this was the first time and that's what makes this a memorable movie.

Trousersnake: I think you'll find there's more to the film than that...

Nastique: You try telling Vinegar Jenny that! Every time I try to watch the movie she gets all like ' you staring at that young girls tits again' and I have to explain that it's like art and that. Plus, not that I tell Jenny this, she's got her arse out as well.

Bagley: Well, moving on...

Nastique: And her bits.

Bagley (clearing throat): So ... What elements of the score stand out for you?

Trousersnake: John Barry does his usual excellent job whiost scoring quite difficult subject matter. He keeps the music unintrusive whilst having to convey a sense of loss, of nature, of savagery. There are quite graphic moments in the film of animals being cut down in their prime juxtaoposed by the flesh of the innocent children. There's..

Nastique: I have to watch it with the sound down these days, cos of Vinegar Jenny an' all.

Bagley: Moving aside from the art and the direction, how do you feel the young cast handle quite a difficult film? Roeg obviously used his son Lucien the part of the boy, used another unknown in David Gulpilil and even Jenny Agutter only had a few roles under her belt at this point.

Nastique: Well, the little boy ain't the best really, I work with actors every day who could run rings round him, but he's willing I guess. The black lad, what did you call him, David right, he did bloody good I thought and he made the part his own. Shame he dies at the end really. And Agutter, I like her body of work and this is up there with the best of them.

Trousersnake: Strangely I find myself concuring with the TV oaf on this one, not the language one would use but the basic points are correct. I also thought that the film stretched the childrens talents somewhat and imagine that Roeg had to trim the footage considerably which is why the film is relatively short when compared with his other work.

Bagley: Yes, I believe it's about 95 minutes.

Nastique: Nah, it's about 10.

Trousersnake: Ten minutes, are you quite insane?

Nastique: Look mate, I stick the tape in, after a couple of minutes Agutter gets in that pond, she swims around a bit with her kit off, the movie ends. Ten mins maximum.

Trousersnake: You idiot pervert! We're trying to hold a discussion of...

Unidentified smashing noise.

Natique (shouting): No-one calls Monkey Peter an idiot you fu

**************Tape ends******************

So there we have it, a true gem from the late great mans secret stash.

I hope you enjoyed it as much as I did.

Summary: Is it art or simply a good film for Monkey Peter to get his thrills?