South Solitary

Director: Shirley Barrett
Cast: Miranda Otto, Martin Csokas, Rohan Nichol and Barry Otto
Releasing in cinemas: 29 July 2010
Rated: MA 15+

South Solitary is the saga of a small and diverse group of people forced to live together on a remote lighthouse island with resulting conflicts from such confinement. Lighthouse keeping today seems a very 19th century affair, although this story has been set the late 1920s. An ensemble cast of notable actors lead by Miranda and Barry Otto battle overwhelming odds in a rather rambling tale of loneliness and isolation.

The pedestrian pace splutters to life occasionally with a stylish hurricane and a sex scene. There’s also fascinating glimpses of the tough existence of a keeper, and of the inner workings and mystic old-world charm of the lighthouse.

‘Stuck here on the arsehole of the earth’ are Meredith Appleton (Miranda Otto), 35 still single, and her uncle George Wadsworth (Barry Otto), brought in to replace the previous lighthouse keeper who topped himself. Other staff include taciturn Mr. Fleet (Martin Csokas) swho’s suffering from shell shock after the Great War (known today as PTSD).

Poor Fleet sometimes imagines he sees distress flares out to sea - not the most helpful delusion for a lighthouse keeper. But then ships seldom pass this way, just as well since the light is not always reliable.

Also on the island lives cheerfully insolent assistant keeper Harry Stanley (Rohan Nichol) his unfriendly wife Alma (Essie David), and three children including the youngest girl Nettie (Annie Martin), a child of gloom who collects her scabs in a box. Meredith hit with the Pollyanna stick and tries to make the best of everything including her sour disciplinarian Uncle George.

We learn slowly, since the pace isn’t on fire at this stage, why Meredith remains single and sticks with her difficult Uncle. Here it gets a bit woolly round the edges. There’s a missing sheep, a long seduction scene and some rough sex (verging on Dickensian with thunder, lightning, and death) heralding a new era for Meredith. However things are never quite simple and a violent hurricane seems set on demolishing the lighthouse and, more seriously for Meredith, the outside toilet.

The characters belong in the stereotyped box, plucked more from a Victorian melodrama than real life. The implausible scenario of a building passion between the philandering Harry and the timid Meredith seems unlikely. Considering Harry’s family lives right next door, it could hardly go unnoticed in such close confinement. All might have been more palatable if told in 90 minutes, unfortunately the movie meanders for considerably longer.

Not to say the cast don’t try hard, indeed Barry Otto (Three Blind Mice) provides a suitably spiky performance, and Miranda Otto (Lord of the Rings) reminds me of Anna Maxwell Martin’s gentle reading of Esther Summerson in the BBC’s Bleak House. Martin Csokas (The Bourne Supremacy) is surly and gruff making a good foil for chirpy Miranda, while Rohan Nichol (Fool’s Gold) provides your typical outback Aussie bloke.

Written and directed by Shirley Barrett (Love Serenade), South Solitary is well-intentioned if a tad self indulgent, some fine tuning at the editing bench would make a big difference. The feeling of isolation much enhanced by atmospheric cinematography, the haunting images of the sepulchral island are a credit to Anna Howard’s incisive camera. Worthy of mention the appropriate music track by Mary Finsterer using harp so effectively.

Those with patience or interest in lighthouses, may be rewarded by this window on the isolated life of keepers working in difficult conditions to tend those warning beacons.

John Bale