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Three kids, Molly (Everlyn Sampi), Gracie (Laura Monaghan), and Daisy (Tianna Sansbury) are three “half-caste” girls, half Aborigine and half “white man”. A.O. Neville (Kenneth Branagh) is in charge of all Aborigines and tries to wipe out their culture and making them have Western culture. Gee, that doesn’t seem at all like the United States’ plan to a certain Middle Eastern country at all. Anyway, Molly, Daisy (who are sisters) and Gracie (who is their cousin) are sent to a reservation, but they decide to run off back to their home with no water, no food, and just a rabbit-proof fence to guide them, while Neville is trying to capture them.
For a supposed bad guy to not be bad, or to have heroines not be heroic, that’s never a good sign. Relating back to Iraq, President Bush is revered by many and is trying to influence other cultures, while Neville had everyone against him. I didn’t find Neville to be “evil”, he did just what he thought was right, and he certainly wasn’t cruel or anything. He didn’t want the kids dead. The three girls were foolish to think that they could survive for two months without any aid from anyone else.
Branagh was very good, but he needed more screen time. How long can you keep attention on three girls walking? The girls have much to learn in acting. “Wide-eyed cuteness” can only get you so far. Great acting isn’t just reading, it’s emotion, and if these kids work again, they’ll need to know that.
Rabbit-Proof Fence has booming music in the middle of the desert where there shouldn’t be any noise. Sure, Philip Glass’ score is excellent, but there isn’t any for a lot of the time, so the unnecessarily booming score was wasted. One part that seemed odd was that eagle, that, in the beginning, was told that it brings us hope, and we don’t hear of it again for one hour or more, and then it comes up again. It should have been kept in our minds for the time.
On the contrary, it was solid entertainment. Of course, I did know that because of the narration with Molly, she was going to live (unless it was American Beauty-esque, but I digress), and there was going to be a final confrontation, but I wasn’t sure of exactly how it was going to turn out, which kept me interested and not focused on the flaws of the film. It is a tremendous true story, but the way it’s presented isn’t that great.
It seemed to have been dramatized just for movies, since everything seemed so intense and overdone. Also, if they were out in the sun for two months, wouldn’t they be sunburned and the whole nine yards? Rabbit-Proof Fence is just another “remarkable true story with one big star in it and many unknowns who will never work in films again.” It’s not worth seeing unless you’re really into this type of film.
Rated PG for emotional thematic material.
Review Date: April 20, 2003