I had a schoolmate who was nicknamed "Oyster", but I never understood how he got the name until I saw this movie. The oyster is very hard to get anything out of. It is susceptible to viruses and pollution, a shy breeder, changes its sex and doesn't like loud noises. Here, oyster farming provides a suitably off-beat background to a pleasant romantic comedy. Young, hunky, tattooed and not terribly bright city boy Jack Flange ("it's not a joke") comes to the beautiful Hawkesbury estuary to be close to his sister Nikki who is slowly recovering from a serious car accident in an expensive private hospital nearby. Short on readies to pay the hospital Jack carries out a robbery at the Sydney Fish Markets, posting the money to himself. But the money never arrives and Jack starts to suspect one or more of the locals has filched it.
There are plenty of suspects. There's his boss Brownie, grumpily separated from his wife Trish who is working on the lease next door, and Brownie's Irish father Mumbles (actually the most articulate character in the picture). There's Slug, the not very sanitary septic tank cleaner whose beautiful daughter Pearl (what else) Jack takes a fancy to, the entire staff of the local post office and Skippy (no, really) the Vietnam veteran who lives up the river at Utmost Mangrove with a few crazy mates, all deranged by Agent Orange. For a while I thought we were in for an Aussie version of "Deliverance" or perhaps a re-make of the closing scenes from "Apocalypse Now". We know of course the money thing doesn't matter very much; the real questions are will Pearl and Jack get it on and will Trish and Brownie get back together. When Pearl and Jack do get it on we actually get a genuine bucolic, nay, erotic moment.
While the recent "Peaches" choked on its own earnestness, writer-director Anna Reeves succeeds here in a modest way by keeping things simple. At times I found myself muttering "nice scenery and fey characters does not a romantic comedy make" and Alex O'Laghlan (at 28 almost too old for Jack), though a great looker, is no Russell Crowe. Diana Glen as Pearl is just all right but there is some great acting from the old pros, David Field as Brownie, Kerry Armstrong as Trish, Jack Thompson as Skippy and above all Jim Norton who as Mumbles makes an incredible character quite believable. Kerry has a scene in which she tends to Jack's wounds in a way the late Anne Bancroft would have admired.
One amusing minor detail is that the postal service portrayed is not the corporatised but very public service Australia Post but an organisation called Allied Post with even ruder and more unfriendly operatives. I guess the producers either asked Australia Post to help and were knocked back when the PR people saw the script ("Australia Post does not lose mail") or they decided it wasn't worth asking. New Zealand actress Sarah Smuts-Kennedy who contributes a very believable rude postal clerk is inexplicably not in the credits as shown in IMDb.
The Australian Film Finance Corporation handed out $3 million for this film and in contrast with most of its recent investments might get a reasonable proportion back. But I can't help thinking it's all a make-work scheme. Serious commercial films are made in Australia because there is a pool of talent here and it's cheap hence "Moulin Rouge" and "The Matrix" series. As moviegoers do we really need these nice small inoffensive derivative pictures funded by the taxpayer which hardly anyone goes to see? Like Oyster, it's very hard to get anything out of them. It must be admitted there is the occasional pearl ("Three Dollars" wasn't bad), and this film is well made. I still can't help feeling my tax dollars could be better spent.
There are plenty of suspects. There's his boss Brownie, grumpily separated from his wife Trish who is working on the lease next door, and Brownie's Irish father Mumbles (actually the most articulate character in the picture). There's Slug, the not very sanitary septic tank cleaner whose beautiful daughter Pearl (what else) Jack takes a fancy to, the entire staff of the local post office and Skippy (no, really) the Vietnam veteran who lives up the river at Utmost Mangrove with a few crazy mates, all deranged by Agent Orange. For a while I thought we were in for an Aussie version of "Deliverance" or perhaps a re-make of the closing scenes from "Apocalypse Now". We know of course the money thing doesn't matter very much; the real questions are will Pearl and Jack get it on and will Trish and Brownie get back together. When Pearl and Jack do get it on we actually get a genuine bucolic, nay, erotic moment.
While the recent "Peaches" choked on its own earnestness, writer-director Anna Reeves succeeds here in a modest way by keeping things simple. At times I found myself muttering "nice scenery and fey characters does not a romantic comedy make" and Alex O'Laghlan (at 28 almost too old for Jack), though a great looker, is no Russell Crowe. Diana Glen as Pearl is just all right but there is some great acting from the old pros, David Field as Brownie, Kerry Armstrong as Trish, Jack Thompson as Skippy and above all Jim Norton who as Mumbles makes an incredible character quite believable. Kerry has a scene in which she tends to Jack's wounds in a way the late Anne Bancroft would have admired.
One amusing minor detail is that the postal service portrayed is not the corporatised but very public service Australia Post but an organisation called Allied Post with even ruder and more unfriendly operatives. I guess the producers either asked Australia Post to help and were knocked back when the PR people saw the script ("Australia Post does not lose mail") or they decided it wasn't worth asking. New Zealand actress Sarah Smuts-Kennedy who contributes a very believable rude postal clerk is inexplicably not in the credits as shown in IMDb.
The Australian Film Finance Corporation handed out $3 million for this film and in contrast with most of its recent investments might get a reasonable proportion back. But I can't help thinking it's all a make-work scheme. Serious commercial films are made in Australia because there is a pool of talent here and it's cheap hence "Moulin Rouge" and "The Matrix" series. As moviegoers do we really need these nice small inoffensive derivative pictures funded by the taxpayer which hardly anyone goes to see? Like Oyster, it's very hard to get anything out of them. It must be admitted there is the occasional pearl ("Three Dollars" wasn't bad), and this film is well made. I still can't help feeling my tax dollars could be better spent.