Film & TV Lunch Club: January 2021 - Australia

Baby Teeth, Romper Stomper, The Nightingale

Jan 01, 2021

Hello and happy New Year! Below are our titles to discuss at our first theme and Film & TV Lunch Club meet up of the year! Our online meet up will be on Monday 25th January at midday. If you would like to join in, please contact me. Otherwise, post about your thoughts after watching the selection using the #filmandtvlunchclub hashtag!

This month we've got three feature films all voted for by regular members on the theme of AUSTRALIA. They are all available on Netflix or Prime and two of them are F-Rated, which is brilliant! The theme is inspired by Australia Day (26th January) so if you'd like to read about Australia Day, the official website is here.

🎞 January Selection 🎞

Babyteeth - Official Trailer I IFC Films | Dir. Shannon Murphy

1. Babyteeth (2019; Dir: Shannon Murphy) - F-Rated
Comedy/Drama/Music: Milla, a seriously ill teenager, falls in love with a drug dealer, Moses, her parents worst nightmare. Watch on Netflix.

2. Romper Stomper (1992; Dir: Geoffrey Wright)
Crime/Drama: A group of skinheads become alarmed at the way their neighbourhood is changing. Available on Prime.

3. The Nightingale (2018; Dir: Jennifer Kent) - F-Rated Adventure/Drama/Thriller: Set in 1825, Clare, a young Irish convict woman, chases a British officer through the rugged Tasmanian wilderness, bent on revenge for a terrible act of violence he committed against her family. On the way she enlists the services of an Aboriginal tracker named Billy, who is also marked by trauma from his own violence-filled past. Available on Netflix.

🎬 The Long List: Optional Extras 🎬

Other notable films/TV shows suggested for the theme:

Crocodile Dundee - An American reporter goes to the Australian outback to meet an eccentric crocodile poacher and invites him to New York City. On Netflix.
True History of the Kelly Gang - Based on Peter Carey's novel. The story of Australian bushranger Ned Kelly and his gang as they flee from authorities during the 1870s.
Holding the Man - Tim and John fell in love while teenagers at their all-boys high school. John was captain of the rugby team, Tim an aspiring actor playing a minor part in Romeo and Juliet.
Somersault - A young girl flees her hometown and arrives in the Australian Alps, where new experiences help her learn the differences between sex and love.
Chopper - Chopper tells the intense story of Mark "Chopper" Read, a legendary criminal who wrote his autobiography while serving a jail sentence in prison. His book, "From the Inside", upon which the film is based, was a best-seller.
The Inbetweeners 2 - Jay, Neil, Simon, and Will reunite in Australia for a holiday.
Two Hands - A 19 year old finds himself in debt to a local gangster when some gang loot disappears and sets him on the run from thugs. Meanwhile two street kids start a shopping spree when they find the missing money.
The Castle - A working-class family from Melbourne, Australia fights city hall after being told they must vacate their beloved family home to allow for infrastructural expansion.
Muriel’s Wedding - A young social outcast in Australia steals money from her parents to finance a vacation where she hopes to find happiness, and perhaps love.
Rabbit-Proof Fence - In 1931, three half-white, half-Aboriginal girls escape after being plucked from their houses to be trained as domestic staff, and set off on a journey across the Outback.
Moulin Rouge! - A poet falls for a beautiful courtesan whom a jealous duke covets.
Wolf Creek - Three backpackers stranded in the Australian outback are plunged inside a hellish nightmare of insufferable torture by a sadistic psychopathic local.
Gallipoli - Two Australian sprinters face the brutal realities of war when they are sent to fight in the Gallipoli campaign in Turkey during World War I.
Picnic at Hanging Rock - During a rural summer picnic, a few students and a teacher from an Australian girls' school vanish without a trace. Their absence frustrates and haunts the people left behind.
The Dish - A remote Australian community, populated by quirky characters, plays a key role in the first Apollo moon landing.
Snowtown - Based on true events, 16 year-old Jamie falls in with his mother's new boyfriend and his crowd of self-appointed neighborhood watchmen, a relationship that leads to a spree of torture and murder.
Candy - A poet falls in love with an art student who gravitates to his bohemian lifestyle - and his love of heroin. Hooked as much on one another as they are on the drug, their relationship alternates between states of oblivion, self-destruction, and despair.
Australia - Set in northern Australia before World War II, an English aristocrat who inherits a sprawling ranch reluctantly pacts with a stock-man in order to protect her new property from a takeover plot. As the pair drive 2,000 head of cattle over unforgiving landscape, they experience the bombing of Darwin, Australia, by Japanese forces firsthand.
Ned Kelly - An innocent man becomes one of the most wanted criminals the world has ever known.
The Man From Snowy River - In 1880s Australia, after young Jim Craig's father dies, Jim takes a job at the Harrison cattle ranch, where he is forced to become a man.
Wake In Fright - After a bad gambling bet, a schoolteacher is marooned in a town full of crazy, drunk, violent men who threaten to make him just as crazy, drunk, and violent.
In Like Flynn - The adventurous life of young Errol Flynn in Australia before he became a famous Hollywood actor.
Spear - Djali, a young Aboriginal man journeys through his community to understand what it means to be a man with ancient traditions in a modern world.
Parkway Drive: The DVD - Documentary about the Australian metalcore group, Parkway Drive. It is centered on the formation and beginnings of the band, their record label signings and how they managed to continuously tour from country to country with little time in between.
The Infinite Man - A man's attempts to construct the ultimate romantic weekend backfire when his quest for perfection traps his lover in an infinite loop.
Acute Misfortune - The Film adaptation of Erik Jensen's award-winning biography of Adam Cullen is the story of the biographer and his subject, as it descends into a dependent and abusive relationship.
Sweet Country - Australian western set on the Northern Territory frontier in the 1920s, where justice itself is put on trial when an aged Aboriginal farmhand shoots a white man in self-defense and goes on the run as a posse gathers to hunt him down.
Casting JonBenet - In the months following the unsolved murder of 6-year-old beauty queen JonBenet Ramsey, responses were elicited from her Colorado hometown community, creating a work of art from the collective memories and mythologies the crime inspired.
Mad Max: Fury Road - In a post-apocalyptic wasteland, a woman rebels against a tyrannical ruler in search for her homeland with the aid of a group of female prisoners, a psychotic worshiper, and a drifter named Max.
Mad Max - In a self-destructing world, a vengeful Australian policeman sets out to stop a violent motorcycle gang.
The Babadook - A single mother and her child fall into a deep well of paranoia when an eerie children's book titled "Mister Babadook" manifests in their home.
Strictly Ballroom - A maverick dancer risks his career by performing an unusual routine and sets out to succeed with a new partner.
Shine - Pianist David Helfgott, driven by his father and teachers, has a breakdown. Years later he returns to the piano, to popular if not critical acclaim.
Adventures of Priscilla, Queen of the Desert - Two drag performers and a transgender woman travel across the desert to perform their unique style of cabaret.
Mary and Max - A tale of friendship between two unlikely pen pals: Mary, a lonely, eight-year-old girl living in the suburbs of Melbourne, and Max, a forty-four-year old, severely obese man living in New York.
Dead Calm - After a tragedy, John Ingram and his wife Rae are spending some time isolated at sea, when they come across a stranger who has abandoned a sinking ship.

🔜 Next Month 🔜

The theme for February will be LOVE IS LOVE as an open/alternative take on Valentine's Day.

Any questions, let me know and feel free to share this link with anyone who might be interested in joining in!