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Lisa Flanagan on "Look Both Ways".
"The film's absolutely amazing," enthuses local actress Lisa
Flanagan. "Right from the start I had no idea what I was getting
into. I met Sarah and she said that she'd love me to be a part
of it. So I said, 'Yeah, just send me the script,' knowing that
she was going to do it in Port Adelaide and I had the chance
to work close to home and close to my family. To be a part of
such an amazing script and to work with some amazing actors
as well was just a bonus."
The film we're discussing is 'Look Both Ways', the debut feature from Melbourne writer and director Sarah Watt, which has definitely earned a place amongst the best releases for 2005. "So far it's been very widely respected," Flanagan says of the immediate response from the media and other industry peers. "So we're now hoping that it all continues and it goes very well in the cinemas. 'Bad Boy Bubby' was also shot in the Port Adelaide area but I reckon that may have given Adelaide a bad name," she adds with a laugh, "being there's lots of weirdos that live in the Port Adelaide area. But that's a great film and I love it."
Centred around an incident where a man is hit by a train one Saturday morning, 'Look Both Ways' takes into account the daily troubled lives of its characters and the collateral effect this single event has on them all. Meryl (Justine Clarke), having just returned from her father's funeral, witnesses the tragedy and is interviewed by Andy (Anthony Hayes), an ill-tempered newspaper journalist who is about to learn that is casual girlfriend Anna (Flanagan) is pregnant. Julie (Daniela Farinacci), the dead man's partner, approaches the scene and is photographed by Nick (William McInnes) for the newspaper's front page. Meryl and Nick end up sleeping together and - with the astute use of catastrophe-filled animation and fast-flicking photographic montages to depict the regrets and fears that they harbour - they guiltily begin a relationship. Then there are the mostly unseen, largely forgotten victims: the train driver (Andreas Sobik) and his family. "Exactly," shudders Flanagan (as I too feel a recurring bout of goosebumps). "Him and his teenage son, by them not saying anything throughout the movie, just broke my heart every time I saw them on the screen. That was just a great piece of work. And there's that scene where the son hands dad a beer and dad fills the glass and gives it back to him. He's sort of about to say something then, but nup... That was just excellent," she sighs.
Flanagan, an Indigenous actress who's already chalked up an impressive CV since taking up full time acting (including playing Clarence in 'Australian Rules' and a six-week tenure in television's 'All Saints'), agrees that much of what remains unspoken or cleverly blended into everyday ordinariness is what adds so much more depth to the film. While 'Look Both Ways' certainly isn't a walk in the park topic-wise, it definitely ain't no trudge up a sand hill either. This is due to the naturally-placed traces of humour which help audiences to relate to the characters' coping mechanisms, along with plenty of tacit hinting towards much wider stories. "No, she wasn't cast as anything or stereotyped at all," Flanagan says of Anna's Aboriginality and the onscreen relationship with Andy. "She was just Anna. Mid-twenties, a nurse who lives with her friend, has a relationship with Andy and has just found out she is pregnant. That was pretty much it. And that's what I absolutely loved about her: she was probably one of the only roles I've played in my four years in acting that wasn't an Aboriginal girl. I mean, I'm sure people will look at me and know that I'm Aboriginal but she wasn't cast as being aboriginal, she just happens to be aboriginal. When I did 'Australian Rules' [my character] had a relationship with [white] Nathan Phillips and that what that was all about - the town not liking the friendship he had with his aboriginal mates and the relationship he had with me - so there was that racism thing, but I don't see this role like that at all."
Goosebumps, I tell you... goosebumps.
Steve Jones
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'Look Both Ways ' is now showing at Palace Nova Cinemas.
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