CASE STUDY: ANIMAL KINGDOM (DAVID MICHOD, 2010)
Animal Kingdom, directed by David Michod (2010), is an Australian crime thriller that examines a dysfunctional crime family, and their existence within a taut suburban landscape. The Cody family is ruled by a matriarchal figure, who provides the audience with a curious juxtaposition of the ‘ocker’ and the maternal. The film is set in suburban Melbourne and presents a fictionalised version of the 1998 Walsh Street Shootings. It presents a contrasting view of the Australian landscape that is presented in commercial films. Australia has a long history of the bushranger figure: the most infamous being the infamous outlaw Ned Kelly, who has since been the subject of a significant amount of creative media. This fascination with the criminal figure has continued throughout history to the modern-day, and is commonly reflected in the contemporary narrative. Many Australian narratives, including Animal Kingdom, feature the disrespect for authority as a significant theme. The bushranger narrative has entrenched itself as a part of our ideology and our history.
"She's like Lady Macbeth via Kath and Kim – kiss moi, kill them” (Byrnes 2010).
It is an apt description: Janine ‘Smurf’ Cody is at once terrifying and sociopathic, with a distinctive Australian twang. The Cody family is headed by ‘Smurf’ – a bottle-blond shark-smiling matriarch. She appears to be friendly, simpering even, but this is an illusion: she is sharp and powerful, and a fearless leader of her ruthless sons. Her penchant for kissing her grown sons on the lips is a sign of affection, but seems steeped with something unerring, and is likely to make the audience uneasy. She is recognizable as a grandmother, but she is foreign to us in most other ways: her cruelty and seeming lack of compassion clash heavily with her introduction as a maternal figure.
Australian films have traditionally contained characters of the ‘ocker’ – jovial, male larrikin types such as Mick Dundee in Crocodile Dundee, who amuse the audience with their cheeky discourse and interactions. The ‘ocker’ character has been an intrinsic part of Australian film over the last century, and it may be that Michod uses Smurf as a means of subverting this stereotype (or perhaps as a means of surprising the audience).
Traditionally, the woman plays foil to the ocker male, providing a comedic aspect in the romantic chase. Smurf does not provide much comedic affect, and neither is she flaky or flirty (except to her sons: but this is not the traditional romance). She is a strong and intimidating female character that has brought up a host of threatening men. She is a distinct female within a patriarchal society.
Ocker Sheilas and Bloody Barmaids, by Diane Kirkby (2007), analyses the 1976 film Caddie, which provides the first on-screen example of the ‘female ocker’ character. “Ocker chic could and did include women but applying the term ‘ocker’ to women, or ‘sheilas’, was problematic because of the masculinity inherent in its very definition… ‘ocker sheila’ was not just a female equivalent of film characters like Paul Hogan’s Crocodile Dundee. Instead she was ‘very complex [with] aspirations, longings, dreams of self-realisation, and …emotional accessibility” (Harris 1974).
While Smurf does not necessarily project the emotional qualities described by Harris, she does fulfill some of the complexities attributed towards the ‘ocker sheila’. She is a multi-faceted character: and represents the juxtaposition between the tough Australian male and the femininity of the mother figure.
Animal Kingdom presents a fictionalised version of the Walsh Street shootings and the Pettingil family. The film does not present itself as a documentary (or any sort of non-fiction work), but contains events and characters similar to the 1988 tragedy. It is significant to note that the prominent crime family involved in the shooting was the matriarch-headed Pettingil family.
The Cody boys, presented as “rough bogan types” (Buckmaster 2010), are distinctive from the typical American gangster. They are obviously Australian: it is not necessary for director Michod to lapse to stereotypical character constructions. They do not strut around as Mick Dundee in Crocodile Dundee (1986) in akubra hats and confront crocodiles, but they are necessarily Australian, especially in their contrast to the familiar American crime character. Their accents and mannerisms are familiar to Australian audience, and are able to be identified as ‘Australian’ by the foreign audience. They are recognizable as ‘the other’.
The use of identifiable Australian actors within Animal Kingdom is also relevant, and reinforces the ‘Australianness’ of the film to international audiences. Guy Pearce, who is one of Australia’s most famous exports, plays Detective Leckie in a powerful and pivotal performance. His face would be familiar to international audiences from Hollywood films such as Memento (2000 dir Christopher Nolan), and LA Confidential (1997 dir Curtis Hanson). His ‘Australianness’ was not touted in these films, but his presence is notable in attracting the American audience to Australian production.
Australia (2010), the Baz Luhrmann fictional-historical extravaganza, used renowned Australian actors to fill the main roles. While the Australian accent may be difficult to master, it is most likely that the reason for the castings was to ensure the definite ‘Australianness’ of the film. The actors and their characters come to stand as indexes or representations of Australia.
“The movies that initially made an international impact dealt with the shaping of national identity, cultural exchanges with the aboriginal population and the mystical relationship with the country and its vast, empty interior. But there has also been a different, parallel tradition about urban or, more particularly, suburban life, harsh demotic prose to the poetry of Weir, Schepisi, Beresford and Armstrong” (French 2011)
Michod’s Animal Kingdom is an example of this parallel tradition: set in harsh, working-class suburbia. Much of Animal Kingdom takes place in the house, which is cramped and seems perhaps claustrophobic, and the characters seem like caged animals – pacing and restless, likely to explode or erupt (attack) at any moment.
It is relevant to consider the role of the landscape and surrounds in Animal Kingdom. The film replicates the Walsh Street shootings that took place in Melbourne in the 1980s, and is set in that time-period. Melbourne in the ‘80s was regarded as a dangerous place (by Australians) – the underground criminal activity occasionally reared a nasty head. It appeared civilized and sedate on the exterior, but there was turbulence happening in the criminal underworld.
The image of Australia as presented in Animal Kingdom is starkly different to that presented in the more traditional or popular internationally-exported Australian film. It does not feature the ‘red land’ seen in popular films such Australia, Crocodile Dundee, or Red Dog that appear to deliberately use location to cement nationality. The ‘red land’ has become a recognizable image or motif for Australian films. It has an indexical relationship with Australia (the country and the people). Animal Kingdom is particular to the suburban landscape, and presents a step away from the Australian film location as only ‘bush’, ‘country’ or ‘desert’.
A reviewer (French 2010) likened the Melbourne in the film to the city of Boston – a familiar urban landscape that is often tinged with undercurrents of crime and menace. The Melbourne in the film is grey and ragged: it is distinct from the glossy tourist image that may otherwise be projected.
“The Melbourne that forms the backdrop to Animal Kingdom is suburban rather than urban, eschewing familiar local iconography in favour of the relentlessly monotonous world of shopping centres, car parks and suburban streets” (Sargeant 2010)
The location is both familiar and simultaneously anonymous: the gloomy streets appear as if you may have visited them before, yet are shrouded with an unfamiliar feeling of unease and lurking danger. Melbourne does not have the same internationally recognizable landmarks as Sydney does, but it is clear that Michod was not intending to create a film based around glossy postcard images. It was necessary for the film to be shot in Melbourne: it was the home of its conception and Michod created the film with the city in mind. The story was unique to Melbourne and required the city for it’s telling.
“What makes Melbourne unusual in its habit of celebrating its criminal figures is that crime works a little differently to other cities,” he says. “It isn’t confined to a particular bad neighbourhood or an ethnic ghetto, it trickles and filters all through the city and happens on streets everyone is familiar with.” (Purdie 2010)
Research carried out by Screen Australia reveals drama genre films to be the most popular Australian features: 51% of Australian films shot between June 2000 and June 2010 were categorized as drama. Thriller genre was in third place, at 14%. (Animal Kingdom arguably being broadly categorized as a drama-cum-thriller film).
“The criminals, however, are not recent immigrants. Violence was there from the start, when convicts settled in Australia, accompanied by their jailers and exploiters. Just to the north of Melbourne is the area once dominated by Ned Kelly and his bushrangers, who fought against the Victorian state police in the 1870s. Kelly became a folk hero, as more recent Melbourne criminals have apparently been, and he was hanged in Melbourne jail on gallows now preserved as a tourist attraction. His last words – "Such is life" – are echoed by the Cody family.” (Buckmaster 2010)
More specifically, the film may be identified as a modern-day interpretation of the bushranger narrative. The bushranger film features as an important Australian historical narrative, and is an integral part of our culture and identification as Australian.
We exist as the original convict nation: Australia being settled by criminals sent by boat from England. It is a history that may have come to exist as a part of our imbedded ideology, and as a result, we see it in many forms of produced media.
“For the umpteenth time, the Australian film has trawled the criminal underclass for colour while portraying elements of the police as murderers with no honour code, unlike the crims that they chase” (Sheehan 2010).
Ned Kelly is upheld within Australian culture and folklore, despite the fact that he was a criminal and law-breaker. He holds legendary status and is entrenched in all manner of historical and modern day media. His phrase, lamenting the fallibility of existence, “Such is Life” has become a catchphrase for many: it is echoed in Animal Kingdom, and is tattooed on the stomach of famous flawed footballer Ben Cousins – a drug addict and lout who is still upheld by many as a sporting hero. Ned Kelly was an outlaw, yet he is remembered like a hero. What does this say about our sense of nationhood, and how does this represent us as a nation?
Australian cinema has a history of lambasting (or perhaps ridiculing) authority and glorifying the achievements or activities of the morally incorrect. The Australian larrikin character, archetyped by Mick Dundee, shows a brazen disregard of authority that is picked up as a key identifier of nationhood.
“On some level, Australia’s criminal past has resulted in deeply ingrained issues with authority and a fascination with people who try to get away with what the rest of society cannot...We have done it since Ned Kelly…I suppose its to do with a deep psychological feeling that maybe the people in positions of power don’t necessarily have it completely right” (Pearce 2010).
Guy Pearce (2010) alludes to ideology, defined as “a body of ideas that reflects the beliefs and interests of a nation, political system, etc and underlies political action” (Collins Online Dictionary). An ideology may be conscious or unconscious: it may have ‘seeped’ into the beliefs of an individual without deliberate learning. Ideology may be picked up from environmental surrounds, from people, from the media. It is possible that Australian bushranger films are created as a result of this existent ideology that has come to permeate Australian culture.
Animal Kingdom presents a step away from the ‘traditional’ Australian narrative – or the Australian narrative that is constructed to necessarily appease international audiences. It is no Dundee or Australia – two films that proffer distinctly Australian stereotypes in an attempt to communicate directly with the audience’s preconceived ideas of Australia. They are Australian films that strive to be Australian (perhaps this is their primary purpose – rather than to necessarily tell a story). For example, Crocodile Dundee does not have an unusual or alarming storyline, but remains the most popular Australian film of all time. This is because the allure of the ‘Australianness’ of the film – and that it abides to archetypes/stereotypes. Archetypes are used so that the character may be instantly recognizable to the audience, and this is what has happened in the case of Dundee. Mick Dundee, presented as the typical Aussie male, is construed as the norm within our sunburnt country, thus creating unrealistic expectations. It is by no means a documentary film, but the violent stereotyping creates some expectations for the susceptible audience. The characters become almost a symbol of our nationhood.
Animal Kingdom presents the viewer with a number of subverted representations of Australia, that challenge the common stereotype. Through the character of ‘Smurf’ Cody, Michod subverts the notion of a necessarily patriarchal society: she is a strong and intimidating matriarchal protagonist. She presents a contrast to the male ‘ocker’ protagonist commonly found in Australian feature film: she is perhaps a combination of the ‘ocker’ and the maternal figure. Her sons lack the humour and larrikin charm of the quintessential Aussie male (as presented to international audiences through films such as Crocodile Dundee and Australia). The landscape of Animal Kingdom is significant to note as it does not feature the indexes with which Australia is often associated. There is no bush (with flocks of kangaroos) and no red earth with Indigenous Australians present in the shadows. The suburban Melbourne landscape depleted of any recognizable icons shows the audience a different Australia – a more menacing and fraught environment. The film’s genre allows a throwback to the history of our country: with convicts as amongst the first settlers, it seems that this disregard for authority may have manifested itself within our ideologies, and, as a result, in our media creation and folklore.