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The Nightingale


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🎙️ EPISODE 316: 02.07.2021

It's fairly early in the film when our protagonist dances with her dead husband (who happens to be wearing an Abe Lincoln hat for some reason) in an all-black dream world similar to the void from Under the Skin. I checked out.

Welcome one and all to the only gratuitous revenge movie that also fixed racism! Perhaps if you know about this movie you know about it because of its multiple, increasingly insane and brutal rape scenes? You'll need all the trigger and content warnings there are to stomach this one, folks. If it had been that and solely that, then I'd have far less of an issue, frankly. But it was an unnecessary dinner scene late in the movie that really pushed me over the edge. Whatever this film's best intentions might be, at its worst it still made a sick attempt to say not all white people are racist you know. Ugh.
My main issue here is that framing this through the lens of a young white woman cheapens what turns out to be the ultimate focus: colonialism and all the torture and death that came with it in 19th century Australia. As if we first needed to see the horrors perpetrated against our (young, white) heroine to fully get onboard with that? Shit. Despite all of THAT, it isn't the worst thing ever made. Baykali Ganambarr gives a great performance as the Aboriginal tracker with whom our star (Aisling Franciosi) learns how not to do racism.

But mostly it's a big fat mess. The only extravagant revenge is played out against the most sympathetic of the bad guys for some reason (the two really vicious guys die relatively quick and painlessly). They could have done more to setup the connection/bond with the horse frankly. Alas, it's no surprise to whiff on the little things when you strike out on the big idea.

CHRONOLOGICALLY
EPISODE 315 - (YOU ARE HERE) - EPISODE 317 ⫸

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