Fair Game (1986)

Overrated

Good story, Not enough for a whole film

This is a small, humorous movie in some ways, but it has a huge heart. What a nice experience.

The movie is made so realistic it has a lot of that WoW feeling at the right moments and never tooo over the top. the suspense is done so well and the emotion is felt. Very well put together with the music and all.

This Australian Outback tale of the standoff between a brave, beautiful woman and a trio of bullying hunters is notable for two things.1. How many times people DON'T get killed. 2. The way its conflict is grounded in normal human behavior gone awry, instead of being spawned by abnormal evil.Jessica (Cassandra Delany) runs a ramshackle animal sanctuary in the Australian wilds. Her husband is away and the local cop refuses to help as she's harassed by three men hired by local farmers to shoot kangaroos. In their tricked-out jeep, complete with shooting perch and a handlebar mustache front bumper, the handsome Sony (Peter Ford), frantic Ringo (David Sandford) and chubby Sparks (Garry Who) begin bothering Jessica as an act of boorish bravado. The more Jessica stands up to their taunts and manhandling, however, the more aggressive and violent the hunters become until what began as almost a form of roughhouse flirting turns into a life-or-death struggle for dominance.Fair Game is an enjoyable little thriller, for its effective execution, wonderful Down Under scenery and for its different spin on the classic female revenge story. The whole "woman being set upon by men until she fights back" is one of the foundations of the American exploitation film. The U.S. version is almost always about the victim turning the tables on her victimizers. These Aussie filmmakers take that concept in a refreshingly interesting direction. Jessica is never just hapless prey and the hunters aren't psycho killers. Jessica is a frontier woman defending her home and her dignity. The hunters are never monsters. They're unthinking, adrenaline-seeking jackasses who simply don't care how their behavior bothers or even endangers others. It's only when Jessica refuses to back down and accept their crude, schoolboy torments that their behavior lethally escalates.Redefining this conflict as a battle of wills makes for a much more entertaining film. The fact that at certain points in the movie, Jessica is the one who actually elevates her fight with the hunters to a new level of intensity gives depth to an otherwise basic plot. Making the woman a proactive participant in her clash with these men enlivens all of the characters and engages the viewer on a different level. When the hunters repeatedly have Jessica at their mercy and decide not to harm her, it makes them more than just avatars of our brutal voyeurism.The dialog here is nothing to write home about and there are a few moments where something happens that doesn't seem to be possible. That's more than compensated for by the, at times, startling nudity of Cassandra Delaney.Fair Game is a thriller that's more intellectually intriguing than emotionally gripping, but it's still worth watching.

Australia's answer to "I Spit on Your Grave"? Maybe, except this is actually a much better (and more watchable) film. A woman who owns an isolated vast wildlife reservation realizes that her Roos and other animals are being illegally hunted by some local hooligans. When she tries to set the perps (one of whom thinks he's Crocodile Dundee) straight, they start messing around with her. After a few days, things get out of hand and she finds herself their new prey on her own property. Dubbed an action/thriller by most, I was expecting this to be a cheesy laugh-fest. The only thing about it that resembles an 80s action/thriller is the often light-hearted score (which morphs into more appropriate horror music at times.) Otherwise, this is filled with tension and a humane heroine that you want to root for. This follows the typical rape/revenge formula of the 70s, but it isn't as difficult to watch. A totally fun flick that's one of Australia's better horror offerings.

A woman in charge of a wildlife sanctuary in Australia is terrorized on the road by two men in a beastly pickup truck and another man in a truck with a shark painted on the back doors. They continue to harass her, and she keeps asserting herself against them, even fighting back. They're intent on killing animals and having cruel fun.Some who've watched the movie think that if she left them alone, they would have left her alone. I doubt it. At a minimum they would have gone on killing more animals, which she would have found intolerable. But I think they were as intent on tormenting her as killing kangaroos.The woman is played by the beautiful Cassandra Delaney (the future Mrs. John Denver!), who sadly has not done many other movies. She spends the first part of the movie barely dressed in a long shirt and belt and nothing else, or a wrap and belt. Hot outfit for a hot environment.Essentially follows a rape-revenge sort of plot, although it isn't clear if they rape her. As the video box indicates, they strap her to the hood of their pickup and drive her around. She's later dumped and she takes a shower, so a rape could be inferred, but it isn't integral.A well-made film, well acted, though not especially deep.

Watched this as an idle rental and was amazed by the erotic nature of the showdown scene where Cassandra Delaney is tied to the bonnet of the truck. I watched the UK version and I reckon most of the juicy bits have been edited out compared to journeyman's comments, (it was released in 1985, probably wouldn't be touched now) but it was still a surprise when that scene played. The rest of the film was pretty good too, but it's that one scene that sticks in my mind.