'What chance has this country got? What chance has this country got?' asks missionary Fred Smith (Sam Neill) in the closing scene of Sweet Country (Warwick Thornton, 2017). Even though Fred is walking towards a rainbow - a symbol of hope - viewers cannot help but despair. They have just witnessed the vengeful, fatal shooting of an Aboriginal man by a white pastoralist, despite a judge having acquitted the former of a killing committed in self-defence. In 2017 - nearly a century after the true events that inspired the film took place - Indigenous Australians make up 28 per cent of prisoners nationwide, yet comprise just 3.3 per cent of the total population.'
Source: Publisher's blurb.
'The energy is palpable. When the four members of 1960s Aboriginal Australian girl group The Sapphires step onto the stage of a Saigon nightclub in front of a crowd of expectant marines, they know the stakes: an unconvincing show will cost them their Vietnam gig and put them back on a plane to Australia. Before this, the four women - Gail (Deborah Mailman), Julie (Jessica Mauboy), Cynthia (Miranda Tapsell) and Kay (Shari Sebbens) - have been told that they need to clean up their act for the show. Manager Dave Lovelace (Chris O'Dowd) has ushered them to various Vietnamese street vendors to purchase the sparkly new dresses that add the gloss necessary to meet international expectations. It's no surprise that The Sapphires pull it off, winning over their American audience with an intimate, soulful rendition of Dave Crawford's 'What a Man'.'
Source: Publisher's blurb.
