Cirrus@Austlit

'This article examines the ways in which the documentary film Two Laws deploys a variety of strategies to represent the historical claim to land made in the early 1980s by the Borroloola people of Australia's Northern Territory. Cross-cultural collaboration between the indigenous people of Borroloola and two non-indigenous film-makers produced a film that combines a vigorous reflexivity with dramatic re-enactment and oral testimony. Importantly, the presentation of evidence in support of the land claim is achieved via a form communally devised by the Borroloola people based on their cultural needs and contingent on Borroloola social structure. In this way the so-called documentary truth claim and indigenous land claim intersect in Two Laws: for the Borroloola people, the filmic evidentiary truth claim functions in a direct way in support of their legal claim to their lands.'  (Publication abstract)

'From The Story of the Kelly Gang in 1906 to the Lord of the Rings trilogy, Australia and New Zealand have made a unique impact on international cinema. This book celebrates the commercially successful narrative feature films produced by these film cultures as well as key documentaries, shorts and independent films. This coverage also invokes issues involving national identity, race, history and the ability of two small film cultures to survive the economic and cultural threat from Hollywood. Chapters on well-known films, and directors, such as The Year of Living Dangerously (Peter Weir, 1982), The Piano (Jane Campion, 1993), Fellowship of the Ring (Peter Jackson, 2001) and Rabbit Proof Fence (Philip Noyce, 2002) are included with less celebrated, but equally important, films and filmmakers such as Jedda (Charles Chauvel, 1955), They're a Weird Mob (Michael Powell, 1966), Vigil (Vincent Ward, 1984) and The Goddess of 1967 (Clara Law, 2000).' (Book jacket)