The movie's remaining revelations build slowly into a set of surprisingly powerful emotional beats.
Jindabyne (2007)
Tomatometer
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Reviews Counted:93
Fresh:61
Rotten:32
Average Rating:6.5/10
Consensus: Jindabyne's disparate themes may not quite cohere, but the film features fine performances from Linney and Byrne.
Rated: 15 [See Full Rating] for disturbing images, language and some nudity.
Runtime: 2 hrs 3 mins
Genre: Dramas
Theatrical Release:25-05-2007
Synopsis: On an annual fishing trip, in isolated high country, Stewart, Carl, Rocco and Billy ('the Kid') find a girl's body in the river. It's too late in the day for them to hike back to the road and... On an annual fishing trip, in isolated high country, Stewart, Carl, Rocco and Billy ('the Kid') find a girl's body in the river. It's too late in the day for them to hike back to the road and report their tragic find. The next morning, instead of making the long trek back, they spend the day fishing. Their decision to stay on at the river is a little mysterious — almost as if the place itself is exerting some kind of magic over them. When the men finally return home to Jindabyne, and report finding the body, all hell breaks loose. Their wives can't understand how they could have gone fishing with the dead girl right there in the water — she needed their help. The men are confused — the girl was already dead, there was nothing they could do for her. Stewart's wife Claire is the last to know. As details filter out, and Stewart resists talking about what has happened, she is unnerved. There is a callousness about all of this which disturbs her deeply. Stewart is not convinced that he has done anything wrong. Claire's faith in her relationship with her husband is shaken to the core. The fishermen, their wives and their children are suddenly haunted by their own bad spirits. As public opinion builds against the actions of the men, their certainty about themselves and the decision they made at the river is challenged. They cannot undo what they have done. Only Claire understands that something fundamental is not being addressed. She wants to understand and tries to make things right. In her determination Claire sets herself not only against her own family and friends but also those of the dead girl. Her marriage is taken to the brink and her peaceful life with Stewart and their young son hangs in the balance. --© Sony Pictures Classics [More]
Starring: Laura Linney, Gabriel Byrne, Deborra-Lee Furness, John Howard
Starring: Laura Linney, Gabriel Byrne, Deborra-Lee Furness, John Howard, Leah Purcell, Stelios Yiakmis, Alice Garner, Simon Stone, Eva Lazarro, Sean Rees-Wemyss, Tatea Reilly, Betty Lucas, Chris Haywood
Director: Ray Lawrence
Director: Ray Lawrence
Screenwriter: Beatrix Christian
Story: Raymond Carver
Producer: Catherine Jarman
Composer: Paul Kelly, Dan Luscombe
Studio: Sony Pictures Classics
Reviews for Jindabyne
For all the pains it takes to establish mood and character, Jindabyne hides under its own uneasy surfaces; it never allows enough sense of what this community really is, of what’s to be grieved when it comes apart.
Jindabyne is not about just one murder but about the death by a thousand cuts that happens in its aftermath.
A tense and spare examination of how these married people relate to each other after years of pain, mistrust and secrets have taken their toll.
The frustration here is that none of this leads anywhere. Perhaps that is the point, that some mysteries are never solved, but Jindabyne could give us a little more to work with.
So slow, cold and aloof that it's almost off-putting. As a result, it's hard to care much about what happens to any of these characters.
Thanks to Beatrix Christian’s beautiful screenplay, what was once a story about the way men and women communicate has grown into a haunting study of Australian race relations and gender dynamics.
With its cold brilliance and delicate aloofness, this is a movie you can hold aloft to recognize and examine its many intellectual facets in hard light, but it will never make you feel anything.
Jindabyne uses Claire and Stewart's increasingly visible and vicious upset to get at broader social and political upsets.
Clearly, in his bid to repurpose Carver's story, Lawrence misses the writer's prevailing ethos: the sense of self-contained internal misery and that haunting quality of being hopelessly human.
The solid performances and central conflict keep the film consistently, if not constantly, compelling.
An affecting character study, anchored by scraped-bare and often heartbreaking performances by Laura Linney and Gabriel Byrne.
A rich, unsettling film that gives us insight into all sides and forces us to wrestle with conscience and our own brand of right and wrong. It polarizes us to make us united.
[Director] Lawrence's compelling little film pursues a deep question: why people make the choices that they do - and how they then live with those decisions, right or wrong, weak or strong.
The resolution Jindabyne eventually offers feels small and safe. The movie goes out with a whimper.
Latest News for Jindabyne
April 28, 2007:
Trailer & Poster review ![]()
More...
April 26, 2007:
Critical Consensus: This Film Is "Condemned"; "Next" Vexes; Guess "Invisible," "Kickin' It" Tomatometers!
This week at the movies, we've got clairvoyants ("Next," with Nicolas Cage and Julianne Moore), cons ("The Condemned," starring Steve Austin and Vinnie... More...
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