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Three Summers ★1/2

by
ABR Arts 30 October 2017

Three Summers ★1/2

by
ABR Arts 30 October 2017

Imagine, if you can, an elderly white man, Michael Caton, stretching his arms wide and performing an Indigenous dance as part of a traditional welcome at a summer, country-town folk festival, before delivering a sermon on the virtues of acceptance and multiculturalism to a smiling, nodding, ethnically diverse circle of music lovers.

The saddest thing about this scene, from writer-director Ben Elton’s new romantic comedy, Three Summers, is that it is not played for irony. The film contains not a smudge of the shadowy humour that made Elton’s early sitcom Blackadder such an iconic and subversive part of Britain’s Thatcher-era cultural landscape. Rather, Three Summers is an ensemble comedy set across three consecutive instalments of ‘Westival’, a hippy enclave to which thousands of summer holidayers escape every year. It’s here that Queenie the community radio host (Magda Szubanzksi in sharp comedic form) narrates the events. There is a misfit romance between sassy fiddle-player Keevey (Home and Away’s Rebecca Breeds) and folk-shunning theremin devotee Roland; Keevey’s dad Eamon (John Waters), who is battling with his alcoholism at AA; a family struggling to absorb adoptee Baktash (Mahesh Jadu), just out of a detention centre; and grouchy Henry (Michael Caton), who glare across the campsite at a bunch of Indigenous kids, including Jack (Kelton Pell).

From the New Issue

Comments (3)

  • Hmmm. Gosh, what to write about Three Summers. I thought it was okay until I read other reviews. Funny thing is my biggest question about this movie can be asked in four words - What about Cultural Appropriation? There were so many cultures, sub cultures and nationalities depicted in this film it surely had to be considered when cultural appropriation is the big new thing. Isn't it?
    I'm not afraid to write that I liked it. The acting was exquisite. More so if the film was as bad as every one else seems to think. It was, on the surface a very simple storyline with heavy topics portrayed lightly. Maybe in an effort to ensure brainless cinema goers would get it. Maybe I've just outed myself as brainless! I can't be bothered restating the plot but I feel Ben Elton probably was trying to attempt to portray aussie issues within a film where he only had one and a half hours to do so. Or otherwise the editing was manic. Maybe both.
    My main question is; were all those cultures depicted asked to give input into the story which described them? If they were and they are happy, I'm happy.
    Posted by Gay Lorenz
    07 December 2017
  • Ben Elton is an outsider (and probably will be for at least another 20 years) but his gentle comedy is an accurate portrayal of the shallowness with which Australians deal with each of the many issues. Australians also don't appreciate being held up to scrutiny by outsiders and this film does that accurately but in a kindly way. Sure, the film has flaws but it has all the hallmarks of a crowd-pleaser like The Castle. I enjoyed it and am seeing it again, this time with my partner.
    Posted by Stephen Cronin.
    09 November 2017
  • Lauren, I clicked on your review because I have seen the trailer for THREE SUMMERS and I thought it looked like good fun, so I was surprised to see you'd given it just 1 & 1/2 stars - by the way, many people would not read beyond such a star rating! What I read though, is less of a 'review' and more of a comment on Australian films and whether any of them at all deserve a cinema release. The more I read on, the more I felt that what you were really saying is that the cinematic experience is for the big super hero movies, and that our little Australian stories should be left to our smaller television or computer/tablet screens. On that topic, we all have different reasons for going to the cinema. Not all of us only want to see the latest super hero offering, or thought-provoking human drama. Sometimes a light-hearted Australian film is actually quite appealing. I just wish I'd read a review that had given me a little more insight in the film, rather than a commentary on distribution options.
    Posted by Sal
    02 November 2017

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