Kanyini
Director: Melanie Hogan
Rated: PG
Palace Nova Eastend Cinemas
Now Screeening



Uncle Bob is a man you can trust. You see it in his eyes, you can hear it in voice. Dignified, eloquent and never far from a knowing chuckle, he speaks with the knowledge of ancient lore as well as from his experience as a contemporary Indigenous man. We are currently being harangued against romanticising life here before the Europeans, but this documentary film is packed with stunning footage from the early days. It shows beautiful black people, men, women and children, naked and laughing. These striking images of healthy, lean, fit people lorded over by crass station owners and un-Christian missionaries, tell an incontrovertible part of our history, of a materially simple life that was once idyllic in many ways.

Kanyini is a word encompassing four aspects; belief, spirituality, land and family. It gives rise to a natural confidence for the individual, and a freedom disciplined by nature. Uncle Bob (Randall, former Indigenous Australian of the Year) speaks of how this natural law prevailed in the days before the land was taken, before the children were taken. If you want to know what that was like, he calmly says, imagine yourself being taken from your mother and father.

He somehow even maintains his sweetness as he speaks of the killing time during the land-grab. He tells of the many massacre sites he has visited, showing amusement that some would deny that there was brutality on the frontier. He admits that Indigenous people had committed the 'crime' of eating the new animals that Europeans installed on traditional hunting grounds.

So much has changed in 200 years for a people who were not bent on 'progress' but rather on living as part of the environment; nomadic, clever, surely even 'happy' enough. Yes, there is petrol sniffing, now. Uncle Bob, whose people are the custodians of Uluru, says he himself was a sniffer. He does not want non-Indigenous people to feel shame or guilt, and he is not bitter. He merely asks us to listen for a short while; see with our own eyes and shed our ignorance. This is a beautifully crafted film and a great opportunity for us to hear personal insight and learn a gentle, timeless wisdom.

The fifty-minute 'Kanyini' screens with a charming short film about a yuppie bimbo (Sophie Lee) who buys an Indigenous artefact as an investment and soon has to rid her flat of the 'mimi spirit'. Hilariously, David Gulpilil comes to the rescue.

Andrew Bunney