Siam Sunset (1999)

Absolutely the worst movie.

Good films always raise compelling questions, whether the format is fiction or documentary fact.

There is, somehow, an interesting story here, as well as some good acting. There are also some good scenes

A great movie, one of the best of this year. There was a bit of confusion at one point in the plot, but nothing serious.

It's been over a decade since I first caught this film and I've got to say that in spite of playing with stereotypes, it still has a rare quality; something quintessentially Australian entirely devoid of our renowned cringe factor. Linus Roache, Danielle Cormack and Ian Bliss bring each of their characters to life with great craft and humour. Two Hands is the Sydney experience, Animal Kingdom is the Melbourne experience but Siam Sunset is the completely Oz experience. John Polson and the writers Max Dann and Andrew Knight did a wonderful job in highlighting many of our quirks and mores (for better or for worse) in a thoughtful and funny as hell way as we follow Perry (Roache) - the hapless disaster magnet from England through the shockingly funny death of his wife, his suburban London life crippled by the memories, and on to the tourist trip from hell as he sets off from Adelaide into the red heart of Australia. Grace (Cormack) and Martin (Bliss) are two of the most original cinema characters I've seen in years. In fact, these two characters remind me of many people I've known over the years, so in spite of comments of this movie playing to populism or stereotypes, I can't help but watch it and see the opposite. Alan Borough shines as Stuart - the Stratocaster-mangling singer songwriter and Bill Leach (Roy Billing) who still sticks in my mind not so much as the bus driver from hell, but rather as a ubiquitous bureaucrat of the worst order. Overall a surrealist but highly accurate and well observed ninety minute odyssey that will keep you laughing years after you've experienced it.

Anyone who has seen John Polson acting - in Blood Oath, Idiot Box or Raw Nerve, to name a few - knows that he's every bit the equal of his more famous aussie acting pal Russell Crowe. This, Polson's first film, betrays some of the weaknesses of the first-timer but wins out thanks to a fast-moving plot, great scenery and good central performances from Linus Roache and Danielle McCormack. Roache plays Perry, a floppy-haired industrial chemist who designs paint colours. Still mourning the loss of his wife who was killed by a falling refrigerator a year earlier (a darkly surreal scene somewhat out of step with the rest of the film), industrial chemist Perry inadvertently wins a bus tour to outback Australia. Seeking to recover from his loss and discover an elusive colour he can imagine but not create - the Siam Sunset of the title - Perry takes off for Oz. There he encounters a variety of characters, among them the bewitching Grace, who is fleeing her psychotic Doctor boyfriend Martin. As a series of bizarre accidents occur around him, Perry realises that the malignant force which led to the death of his wife is still pursuing him. In the dazzling wasteland of central Australia he has to come to terms with his grief and fight to establish a new life (or something like that). As stated, Siam Sunset suffers from some typical first-timer faults: the plotting is uneven, there's some bizarre non-sequiturs and not all of the jokes hit the spot. The energy of the film, however, wins you over. Cleverly written by Max Dann and Andrew Knight, the plot hurtles along the highway, stopping only for character development or greasy breakfasts cooked by Roy Billing's over sensitive bus company operator. Cinematographer Brian Breheny - who proved his skill at capturing outback Australia when he shot Priscilla Queen of the Desert - does a great job of bringing the film's dark humour to life. There are some darkly beautiful images in this film, such as when the busload of adventurers discover a hanged man circled by a swarm of butterflies, or when Perry, lookin gloomily out the back window of the bus, sees a massive storm in the distance, pursuing him like the manifestation of his ill-fate. The supporting cast - particularly Deidre Rubinstein and Terry Kenwrick as a suburban couple whose marriage is on the skids - are also excellent. Overall this is a great first effort and anyone who gives it a hard time should try looking at the first films of some 'great' directors and see how they compare. This is heaps better than many of those. So see it, and stop wingeing! Now, would someone please get Roache a haircut.

This movie had me laughing from start to finish. I saw it at the Ft. Lauderdale Film Festival, and I can't believe it wasn't their closing night feature. It was far more enjoyable than the other films I saw there. Great comedic performances and a very funny script make this a film not to be missed.

When you know some of the people behind the making of Siam Sunset, you will know what to expect from this film. It is co-written by Andrew Knight who is the creator of some of the most successful comedy on Australian TV in recent times including Fast Forward / Full Frontal and SeaChange. There's Al Clarke, who produces Siam, who was also the producer of The Adventures of Priscilla, Queen of the Desert as well as Nineteen Eighty-Four (now there's an odd paring). Most tellingly though is that it is directed by John Polson - the man behind Tropfest - the fun and popular short film festival in Sydney.Looking at those names should tell you that they will make a fun film with comedy slightly on the dark shade, some unglamorous characters who are realistic in some respects yet totally absurd in others, plus . . . er, a big bus in the middle of Australia's outback.And that is what you get with Siam Sunset.Perry (Linus Roache) an English industrial chemist for a paint company (he makes colours) has his life going just the way he wants it with his wife and work. This is turned completely upside down (or should I say crushed) after a freak accident and begins to feel that he is a curse for everything and everybody around him. From being happy and content, he is now a wreck. He wins a trip to Australia and uses that as a kick start to regaining some of that inner peace that he so dramatically lost. This is expressed in his search for a colour that he calls siam sunset.He joins up with a bus tour in Adelaide and soon wishes he hadn't. Well, at least until he meets up with Grace (Danielle Cormack) who is on the run from her drug dealer boyfriend. Grace helps Perry to find his siam sunset. The help partly involves some very dangerous sex (it involves a bed on the verge of collapse, a ceiling fan that is set to fall onto the bed, some dangerously protruding steel coat hooks, dodgy electrics and a taipan snake sleeping underneath the bed just for good measure - the sex scene had to be coordinated by the stunt people).John Polson is unashamedly a populist as demonstrated in Tropfest and in the fact that this film won the audience award at Cannes. So with Siam he gives us an amusing and entertaining 90 minutes, but it is by no means going to strike up post-film conversations on it's stunning originality or whether it's OK to have an open marriage. This is Polson's feature directorial debut and he has relished the use of the wide screen format. He captures plenty of beauty of the Australian landscape.Roache is suitably fish-out-of-water without slipping into English stereotypes. Cormack (who was in Topless Women Talk About Their Lives) as Grace is an enticing addition to the film and the rest of the cast are great fun to see.Siam includes all of the ingredients of recent successful Australian films - that's a good and bad thing at the same time, but if you enjoyed movies like Priscilla, Muriel's Wedding and Two Hands then you should enjoy this film - just don't expect it to change your life.