Four stars. Rated PG, for dramatic intensity
By Derrick Bang
This lovingly mounted, deeply moving Australian drama brought back memories of The Snow Goose.
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| When Mike (Finn Little) is accompanied by his three foundling friends during a visit to the nearby village, folks can't help staring. (Wouldn't you?) |
I was 15 when director Patrick Garland’s poignant adaptation of Paul Gallico’s 1941 novella aired as a Hallmark Hall of Fame special in November 1971; the final scenes left me shattered for weeks. Seeing it again, decades later — much better able to understand the Dunkirk element — I was moved anew, identifying more this time with Richard Harris’ Philip Rhayader, than with young Jenny Agutter’s Fritha.
All this came tumbling back while enjoying director Shawn Seet’s equally sensitive handling of Colin Thiele’s 1963 children’s book. Storm Boy — both the original story, and this beautifully structured film — has the magical, slightly other-worldly atmosphere of a fairy tale, while at the same time being grounded in real-world disputes as relevant today, as they were half a century ago.
Seet and scripter Justin Monjo have added a framing device, to bring the story into the modern era; this liberty doesn’t detract at all from Thiele’s original narrative, and in fact serves as a reminder that the battle between industry and environment — even now — too frequently favors the former.
Successful retired businessman Michael Kingley (Geoffrey Rush) has returned briefly as a senior director on his company’s board, for a meeting that will determine whether a mining company can base its operation in Western Australia’s Pilbara. The vote seems a foregone conclusion, much to the dismay of Michael’s environmentally impassioned 17-year-old granddaughter, Maddy (Morgana Davies).
But then, an odd — almost supernatural — event: A sudden, massive storm shatters one of the board room windows, delaying the vote by a day. Michael returns to the house he’s temporarily sharing with Maddy’s family; perhaps more eerily, he briefly sees a trio of pelicans that … well … aren’t there. Sensing his unease, Maddy questions him: Michael obligingly relates the story of his quite unusual childhood.
And, thus, we’re transported back to the late 1950s, where cinematographer Bruce Young so gorgeously captures the sweeping majesty and isolation of South Australia’s Coorong, and its 90-Mile Beach: a coastal wilderness where young Mike (11-year-old Finn Little, in a winning feature debut) lives in a rustic bungalow with his reclusive father, known as Hideaway Tom (Jai Courtney). He keeps them in supplies by catching fish and selling them in the nearby village; young Mike — whom everybody calls “Storm Boy” — helps as best he can.
Schooling is limited to reading aloud from William Golding’s Lord of the Flies, with Mike’s father gently correcting pronunciation errors.
The boy is deeply lonely, but still wary when approached, one day, by an indigenous Ngarrindjeri man who introduces himself as Fingerbone Bill (the marvelously regal Trevor Jamieson). They bond after a couple of hunters indiscriminately blast away at shorebirds, leaving dozens of dead pelicans — and three now-motherless pelican chicks — in their wake.
Distressed by such callous cruelty, Mike carefully takes the chicks home. He invites Fingerbone Bill inside, but the Ngarrindjeri man demurs, explaining that he must wait until being formally introduced to Tom. We tense when the two men meet a bit later, wondering whether this will be that sort of story, but — fortunately — no. His withdrawn nature notwithstanding, Tom is kind and thoughtful.
He therefore shares his son’s fear that the chicks are unlikely to survive the night, particularly the smallest, which resists the eyedroppers of food that its siblings greedily devour.
But they do survive, and subsequently thrive. Mike names them Mr. Proud, Mr. Ponder and — after the “littlest of the littluns,” in Lord of the Flies — the smallest is christened Mr. Percival.
An end credit acknowledgment of a “Pelican Stuffy Handler” (Dan Carlisle) leads me to suspect that at least some of the chick sequences involve puppets, but it’s sure difficult to tell. And there’s no question that actual birds are used once the “three Mr. P’s” reach their full size, at which point their interactions with the boy are flat-out astonishing. A spontaneous round of beach soccer, with a little red ball, is jaw-dropping.
Pelican trainers Craig Bullen, Paul Mander and Julia Burey performed miracles. Or maybe pelicans are naturally incredibly smart and adaptable. Doesn’t matter which; the on-screen action is too precious for words, particularly when Tom, Mike and their feathered friends visit the local village together.
Which introduces this saga’s environmental element. Steps are being taken that might transform the Coorong into a protected sanctuary, much to the annoyance of those — typified by the two hunters — who wish to keep it open for game shooting. The latter view Mike and his three birds as “provocative,” and the implied threat is crystal clear.
That aside, by this point the three Mr. P’s are eating too much of what Tom catches; it’s time to release them back into the wild. Mike reluctantly understands, so they take the boat to a safe distance, and sadly — yet proudly — watch the birds fly away.
But Mr. Percival comes back. And therein lies the rest of the story, which — of course — resonates in the older Michael Kingley’s soul, when we return to the present, with Maddy hanging on every word.
Rush deftly conveys the regret and resignation of a man who has forgotten the crucial lessons he learned, so long ago, from the beach, the birds and — most notably — the wise counsel of Fingerbone Bill. Davies is spot-on as a fervent teenager who simply can’t understand why adults are missing the bigger picture, and she’s equally convincing as a girl who nonetheless loves her grandfather.
Courtney has perhaps the toughest role; Hideaway Tom is gruff but not unfriendly, reserved but still affectionate. He shows his love not with words, but with actions: as with the clever gadget he builds so that Mike can quickly puree fish into a more easily digestible mash, while the birds are still young.
Jamieson has presence, and a manner of speaking that grants weight and wisdom to every syllable of Fingerbone Bill’s brief observations. Little, in turn, is adorably scruffy as a beach-going wild child with a bottomless well of emotions, ranging from giddy jubilation to quiet misery and devastated anguish.
Monjo has taken a few liberties — not counting the framing device — with both Thiele’s book and the initial 1976 film adaptation. The environmental messaging is more blatant, as is the third-act climax, and a key line — spoken by Fingerbone Bill in the first film — has been reassigned to Rush’s Michael Kingley (which might bother purists more than any of the other modifications). None of this dulls the story’s impact.
As a strictly serendipitous sidebar, I was amused to note that Fingerbone Bill was played by David Gulpilil in the 1976 film, and he pops up fleetingly here as Bill’s father. Aside from that respectful bit of casting, it will be recalled that Gulpilil made his acting debut alongside Jenny Agutter, in 1971’s iconic Walkabout. So there’s a pretty direct connection to The Snow Goose after all.
Seet’s film is unapologetically sentimental, and there’s nothing wrong with that. A tale well told rises above accusations of emotional manipulation, and this one’s very well told.
But do bring plenty of Kleenex. You’ll need ’em.
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