Rating: 
Summary: "Tone Poem" is a pretty good description.
Review: Walkabout (Nicolas Roeg, 1971)Okay, I admit it. I rented it because Jeff, the chronically oversexed character on the British sitcom Coupling, loves it. "Jenny Agutter! Her name on a film is like an advertisement for nudity!" Be that as it may, her film career has not really been an advertisement for good moviemaking; not that she's a bad actress, but I'm sure most involved want to forget such disasters as The Survivor, Child's Play 2, and the execrable Amazon Women on the Moon. In that light, there was a lot more to this movie than I expected. (Unfortunately, Jeff, the commentator from the preceding paragraph, is a bit too oversexed. If you're renting it for the nudity, fast-forward. A lot.) Agutter and her onscreen brother (Jon Roeg, son of director Nicolas), neither of whom are ever named in the film, begin on a picnic with an older man. He could be their father; he could be Agutter's much older husband. Critics seem to differ on this point. (For no apparent reason, I assumed the latter.) He is obviously not a happy, or stable, man, and he proves this by taking the family out to the desert, trying to kill them both, killing himself, and destroying the car in the process, leaving them stranded. The two attempt to make it back to civilization, and during their trip they meet an aboriginal boy (David Gulpilil, recently seen as Moodoo in Rabbit-Proof Fence) on walkabout, the traditional aboriginal coming-of-age ceremony. There are many layers to this movie, and Roeg (who studied under Truffaut; it shows) presents them as subtexts, for the most part. The obvious race-relations tack is at the forefront, but there are other oppositions in the film; man/woman, civilization/desert, etc. Roeg does a fine job of expressing the ineffable throughout, highlighting the things he want sot highlight with good camera work and then letting the viewer decide what's what. There is much to be enjoyed in Walkabout, but many viewers are going to find the pace of the movie to be, well, glacial. It is a very slow movie, as is to be expected with Agutter and Roeg being the film's only characters for a good portion of the time (and Gulpilil being the only other one for about 90% of the rest). The fiml's failings have to do with the introduction of civilization into the middle of the film (some haunting montage scenes at the beginning and end would have done the job well enough); they make me want to seek out James Vance Marshall's novel to see if they come off as intrusive there as they do in the film. Worth a rental, certainly, especially if you're a fan of Truffaut-style art-for-art's-sake filmmaking. Roeg gives it a solid base. *** ½
Rating: 
Summary: A Look at the flaws of civilization!
Review: In his first movie outting as director.Nicholas Roeg gives us all a moody and cynical look at the flaws of civilization and being unable to communicate with our inner feelings.As we travel thru The Austraillian outback with a teenage girl named:"Gwen"(Jenny Auguter),her little brother(Lucein John/John Roeg) and a teenage black man(David Guilpilli)trying to deal with the harsh atmoshpere of the bush and the girl fighting off the young man's sexual desires for Ms.Auguter.Using his skills as a visual expert.Mr.Roeg shows us the cruelities of the unrelenting heat and the brutalities of man against animals.As we see Hunters killing off waterbuffaloes,Ms.Auguter's brother getting sunburned and the heat almost driving the pair mad from the heat.We also see them surviving the harsh aspects of the bush with the help of Mr.Guilpilli's tactics and Mr.Roeg enjoying the natural beauties of the bush country.While his sister,has trouble coping with the new surroundings and the fact.That she cannot part from her strict upbringing and fall in love with the teenage aboriginine.The film ends with the two kids returning to Sidney and Ms.Auguter finishing school,marrying a hardwork but thoughtless business exec.Who cares more about the almighty buck than for his wife's needs.And in a bit or ironic daydreaming.Ms.Auguter fantises about what would have happed? If both she and her little brother had stayed in the bush with Mr.Guilpilli and learned to enjoy the simple pleasures that the bush had to offer? Like the three of them skinny dipping in the clean,cool waters of an outback lake? The film depeneds more on visual techniques than on a concise storyline.But despite this flaw."Walkabout's"photography and the acting of Ms.Auguter and her two young co-stars making this an enjoyable screen journey.Kevin S.Butler.
Rating: 
Summary: Dated and dreadful.
Review: This was a movie I was actually looking forward to seeing. Even though I think Nicholas Roeg has been responsible for some of the most pretentiously "arty" films ever to have been released, everybody I knew who'd seen "Walkabout" said that in this particular case he'd struck a good balance between dialogue and non-verbal storytelling and created a cinematic "tone poem." Well, Roeg is as tone-deaf here as he is in his other films. He's so hot to get to the "meat" of his tale--two English children are stranded in the Australian Outback and struggle to survive with the help of a young aborigine in the midst of a vison quest, or "walkabout," of his own--that he leaves loose plot ends all over the place and when he doesn't think that the audience has "gotten the message," he clubs us over the head with it any way he can. The three leads, to be fair, are great, especially David Gulpilil as the questing aborigine. But there is simply no story here. The circumstances surrounding how the children got into their plight in the first place are so poorly drawn right from the start that you're never engaged with who THEY are. They're reduced to being stick figures in a landscape. And after about the 15th wide panaramic shot of the Australian desert at sunset, sunrise, midday, whenever, after seeing the 22nd dead animal carcass on the desert floor swarming with maggots, after the 3rd or 4th contrasting vignette showing "pure" nature juxtaposed with "crass" civilization, I was ready to scream, "Get those poor kids out of the sun and BACK HOME!!" Beautiful cinematography and noble intentions don't necessarily make good movies. "Walkabout" is a good case in point.
Rating:
Summary: AN ALTOGETHER SURREAL STORY
Review: Beautiful, with hypnotic power, "Walkabout" is an altogether surreal story. This is a masterpiece by Nicholas Roeg from the producers of "Clockwork Orange." An aborigine is on 'walkabout'for his initiation into manhood. He rescues a lost English teen and her young brother (played by the director's enchanting son) who have been abandoned in the Australian desert by their psychotic, suicidal father. The starkness of their surroundings and necessity of eating fresh kill to survive is contrasted by flashes of 'civilized' behaviour in the cities, and by idyllic scenes which end in tragedy for the splendid native. Jenny Agutter's talent is obvious, as is her beauty,in an electric atmosphere permeated by an evocative score. The whole production is memorable; the conflicts universal & perhaps never to be resolved. BUT, you don't really want to get lost in paragraph after paragraph telling the whole story, do you? Why should reviewers express their egos and leave NOTHING to the imagination? This is a film you should not miss; it has staying power.
Rating:
Summary: Great!
Review: Set in Australia in the 70s, it's actually filmed by a Brittish Director, so it has a view of Australia as seen by an outsider. A very young David Gulpilil lends a hand to Jenny Agutter & her brother (played by Luc Roeg; son of the director) who are left to die by their father in the Australian outback. This film is an excellent cross-cultural study as the young Aboriginal boy first saves, then tries to woo young English rose Jenny Agutter. I read another customer review where someone was upset with the slaughter of animals - well that's what hunter/gatherers do! They hunt & eat their catch! Did this person think that Australian Aborigines all gather their meat at the local supermarket? Trivia #1: David Gulpilil was mis-credited in the titles as David Gumpilil. He is also the winner of the AFI (Australian Oscars) for best actor for 2002 for his part in the film "The Tracker". David Gulpilil also appeared in "Storm Boy", & "Crocodie Dundee". Trivia #2: This film is also well worth it for seeing a very young, and very beautiful Jenny Agutter in the nude. She also appeared later in "An American Werewolf in London", "The Riddle of the Sands", & "Logan's Run".
Rating:
Summary: Animal slaughter fest
Review: One of the most reprehensible movies I've ever seen. And I've seen lots of reprehensible movies. For so many years, I waited for this movie to be available on home video. I saw it when it was originally released to theatres, and remembered it with such fondness. I was giddy with joy when I finally got a copy. The film now has that vaunted five or so many minutes of footage restored to it. None of the critics, who went on and on about the film and the great new footage, bothered to mention what that addition consists of. So I will tell you--it consists of animals being brutally killed, skinned, cut apart, devoured. Which totally changes the aspect of the movie. One of the previews before the film has a clip from a review saying the brief amount of violence is necessary. Thus, the review does not apply here at all. It is an ugly, barren, cruel in the extreme film. Nicholas Roeg has managed to destroy the novel, "The Man Who Fell to Earth" and the story, "Don't Look Now." He is equally superb with this movie. The film itself is pretty lame as well. I must have lost some of my idealism since I first saw it. Or I must have grown past movies like this. To have Jenny Agutter moaning at the end, remembering the great days of her youth and the walkabout and how nostalgic it all was and better than the humdrum life she is now leading, is laughable. I'll take humdrum any day of the week over almost dying in the wilderness, almost starving and thirsting to death, with flies eating the moisture out of my eyes. Come on! You'd have to be a moron to miss that. The movie tries to be profound, symbollic. The native finally decides his ultimate fate because, partially, he is sickened by hunters killing animals, without allowing them dignity in dying. This same native who just murders animals all over the place with such gusto and joy and bloodlust like I've never witnessed before, is just slightly hypocritical about the whole thing. Agutter is a wonderful actress and is the only reason to see the film at all. I sat through the thing, looking, I imagine like Cletus the Slack Jawed Yokel, with my jaw dropped throughout. I couldn't quite believe what I was seeing. It is, I feel, the job of the critic to warn us about certain movies, so we will know what we are getting into. John Canby did it years ago about a film involving extreme violence. It should have been done here as well. Believe me,if there was a choice of rating this no stars, I would do so.
Rating:
Summary: Lost.
Review: *Walkabout* produces in me the same feeling I get whenever I re-read Shakespeare's *Troilus and Cressida*: a "what's-the-use?" feeling uneasily combined with a feeling of awe before its artistic rigorousness. It's no wonder some writers here actively dislike the movie. Of course, they dislike it for the wrong reasons, but they accurately sense the unremitting negativism, the bleakness, the hopelessness herein. Which, in fact, is a more truthful response than from those who dreamily term the movie "beautiful" and leave it at that. (Certainly more truthful than those who are satisfied that it's a Nature-Is-Better-Than-Society picture.) Finally, to those reviewers who hated the movie because it "didn't follow the book", I have 2 words for you: *The Godfather*. At any rate, the movie's about two English schoolkids, one a nubile teenage girl, the other her 6-year-old brother, who become stranded in the Australian outback. HOW they get stranded is obviously a matter of some controversy: their father, suddenly and inexplicably deranged, drives them out to the middle of nowhere, ostensibly to have a picnic, then commences firing shots at them. He misses, probably not on purpose. Finally, he simply torches the car and shoots himself, leaving his progeny to the mercies of the desert. As the kids are about to keel over after a few days of fruitless wandering, they happen upon an aborigine adolescent boy undergoing his ritualistic explusion from his clan: a "walkabout", a rite-of-passage lasting for 6 months or so wherein the young male must learn how to fend for himself in the wilderness. The little boy quickly learns a pidgen of communication with the native, but the Girl (Jenny Agutter) reserves her godgiven right to be aloof, as all insolently beautiful young women have done since the beginning of time. Naturally, the native falls in love with the girl, even favoring her with a courting dance that shocks and overwhelms me every time I see it. (It's one of the great sequences in all of film.) But it does no good. There can be no possible "happy ending" for the 2 teenagers. How can the Girl, completely disassociated from nature and instinct, have a real relationship with the Native, who is completely removed from the tradition of the gradual liberating of the human mind from superstition and fear, which has been Civilization's greatest gift? Director Nicolas Roeg has created a supremely reductive masterpiece, a story that makes brutally clear the limitations of our natural heritage as well as our civilized progression. (The father suicide comes to seem the only proper response to Roeg's world.) Paradoxically, Roeg refutes his own rather cowardly hopelessness about the human condition by making the movie in the first place. The photography, as beautiful as any ever seen on film, goes a long way toward restoring the consolations that only art can provide.
Rating:
Summary: Hauntingly Beautiful, Profoundly Insightful
Review: One thing I like about movies where cultures and worlds collide is that they're often very effective at shedding light on what it truly means to be human. "Walkabout" does this as brilliantly as any other movie I've seen. The film tells a great story, but more importantly, it creates just the right mood within us for pondering and absorbing the issues it explores. The plot centers around a teenage girl and her younger brother who get lost in the Australian Outback. Unable to survive on their own, they are luckily happened upon by a teenage Aborigine boy, who is wandering the outback on his own, as part of a customary initiation ritual into manhood. The boy saves the girl and her brother from certain death by using his survival skills to provide them with water, food, and shelter. The relationships that grow out of this encounter are poignant, yet realistic. This easily could have been a film about the evils of civilization, but it's too smart for that. Anyone interested in Aboriginal culture, philosophy, anthropology, communication, or even just plain great movies is sure to get something out of it. My experience has been that anyone who is or has been a part of an older sister/younger brother relationship has particularly enjoyed the scenes involving the girl and her brother.
Rating:
Summary: Expressive cinematography
Review: There were a few scenes in this movie that were absurd, to say the least, if not totally non-sensical. A couple of times, I was half-expecting to see Rod Serling pop up on-screen & tell me how so & so has just entered the twilight zone. I'm not talking about the behavoir of the Aborigines, either. I'm referring to the other Australians. A few of these scenes don't seem to "fit" at all with the rest of the storyline. The balance of the movie, however, is simply breathtaking. The plot centers around a boy and his big sister who are lost in the outback & trying to find their way back to civilization. Along the way, they must combat the austere elements of desert-like landscapes and must cope with unforgivingly harsh environments. Luckily, they come across a 16 year old Aborigine male who is undergoing his isolated rite to prove himself as a man (known as the walkabout). Jenny Agutter has a very natural screen presence, which is more than a little refreshing in this day & age. Too many times, actors these days "try too hard" to do a good job & their performances come off as stilted. Agutter is young, tender & innocent and is everything she's supposed to be. If you're looking for an aesthetically pleasing panoramic spectacle, this movie is for you. The exotic wildlife, lush scenery, gorgeous sunsets, the music of John Barry & the lithe, nude form of Agutter all combine to create a visually stunning film. There are many parts that have a very surreal feel to them. The thrust of the movie is the importance of being at one with nature in a more-or-less Taoistic sense. It is ironic that, at the end, all Agutter's character can think about is how pleasant it was to live in the wild with her Aborigine friend. It's a trenchant commentary on the nexus between innocence and living peacefully with nature.
Rating:
Summary: Impressions From an Initial Viewing
Review: I remember first hearing about this film on Siskel (rest in peace) and Ebert when it was first released on DVD. Ebert made such a big deal about the Criterion release that it stuck in my mind...wow...a little Australian film about an aborigine and 2 white brats made him gush! Since then , this movie has always been on my list of to-sees...I never heard too much about the film itself, just that it was on so many critics favorites lists and that it was not merely a film, but an experience... Well, I finally clicked the "Proceed to Checkout" button and went for it. And here is, in one line, my feelings on Walkabout after one viewing: ~I cannot wait to go home tonight and watch it again and again to discover the secrets hidden in its layers~ This is a movie that will be a pleasure to watch over and over...but also painful as it delivers a harsh look at the so-called civilized world that we live in...how it cripples us and restricts us and makes us miserable, non-communicative and helpless creatures. The emptiness of the Girl's eyes...very much like the eyes of the creatures in the outback. The Boy, in his innocence and joys, doomed to ultimately become Civilized Man... And the aborigine...able to see life only thru his aborigine eyes...unable to change...unable to comprehend... Nobody is primitive or reduced to the Noble Savage here..the characters are realistic...parallels are drawn between them and chasms separate them as well... Beautiful outback cinematography only underscores this exploration of the human heart and the cracks and crevices of the human psyche... Budding sexuality covers the film like a sheen...have trees ever seen so erotic and suggestive? On the technical side, this film has beautifully restored color, but could have been fine tuned a little more in the scratches and dust department. All in all, a keeper....and I am looking forward to many hours of re-viewing this...I want to unlock the secrets of this film...but can they be unlocked? I can only attempt and see...
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