CASE STUDY: WOLF CREEK (GREG MCLEAN, 2005)
Film critic Margaret Pomeranz stated in her review of Wolf Creek (Greg Mclean, 2005) that the film was one of the factors “contributing to the new confidence in our local film industry” (2005), given that it was produced on such a low budget. Greg Mclean’s Wolf Creek is “the quintessential Australian horror movie” (Ryan 2011) that gathers most of the terror it elicits from its subversions of the stereotypical “ocker” character, and also of the idyllist nature of the Australian landscape. These subversions of our expectations result in the unsettling feeling that the film relies upon in terms of generating fear. Out of all of the 358 Australian feature films (including films that were under foreign creative control with a substantial portion of the film shot in Australia) shot between July 2000 and June 2010, only 5% of these were classified as a “horror” genre film (source: Screen Australia). During this time, Greg Mclean’s low-budget horror film Wolf Creek (2005) was released. Made on a budget of approximately USD$1million, the film garnered approximately AUD$6,080,571 in the Australian box office after its release on November 3, 2005. Surprisingly, the film was even more financially successful in the US market, making approximately USD$16,188,180 in box office revenue (source: Screen Australia). While it must be acknowledged that the success of Wolf Creek could be attributed to the fact that the film was relatively unique and original, the film’s financial success could also demonstrate that there is a relatively un-tapped market for lowbrow genre films that Australia could be producing.
The film exploits the vastness of the Australian outback and “what that means to the national imagination” (Blick 2009). The film contains many sparse, static shots exploiting this immense landscape and thus aids in building an uncomfortable tension between the characters and the overwhelming landscape. Blick argues that the setting “thrusts the viewer into a largely unknown abyss of terror” (2009). Scott & Biron (2010) argue that Wolf Creek takes the iconic rural landscape of the Australian outback and turns it into “a source of fear – a space of abjection” (p.308), and in doing so it simultaneously appeals to the unknown-ness of this area and its inhabitants to the country’s coastal population, as well as to international audiences. In contrast to the imagery used in Wolf Creek, Scott and Biron draw upon an example in the form of Baz Luhrmann’s Australia (2008), stating that Australia “draws on the mythologised terrain and eccentric characters of rural life to construct a sentimental and nostalgic account of the country” (p.307), wheras Wolf Creek offers a “counter-narrative to the rural idyllisation of Australia” (p.308). While films like Australia present romanticised representations of rural Australia, films like Wolf Creek represent the idyll as excessive – “inbreeding, insularity, backwardness and sexual perversion” – and Scott & Brion argue that “Wolf Creek, more than any other Australian film, manifests rural horror by way of our familiarity with aspects of a specifically Australian rural idyll” (p.311).
Another way in which Wolf Creek subverts the usual representations of Australia’s cultural imagination lies within the representation of the main antagonist, Mick Taylor, who is an obvious subversion of the well-known Paul Hogan character from Crocodile Dundee (dir. Peter Faiman1986), Mick Dundee. Taylor immediately situates himself within the “harmlessness” of the ocker stereotype, both with his vernacular – referring to the girls as “sheilas” and using relatively unheard expressions such as “bob’s your sister” – and with his appearance, complete with stubble, a flannel shirt and a bushman’s wide-brimmed hat. Blick argues that “the villain [is] distinctly Australian… a sort of bushman gone ‘wacko’ and a ‘Crocodile Dundee’ with more than just a few screws loose’” (2009).
The scene most useful to analyse when comparing the similarities between the two Micks (both Taylor and Dundee) is the scene in which Ben, a soon-to-be victim of Taylor’s, directly quotes Dundee’s line “that’s not a knife… THIS is a knife”. Blick summarises the effect of this, stating:
“To understand this scene fully, we must examine what the character of Mick ‘Crocodile’ Dundee signifies both locally and internationally as an Australian icon. To many Australians, he is a charade and a patronising confection marketed to international viewers. To the bushman of Wolf Creek, his characterisation smacks of the patronising attitudes city folk often hold towards rural folk. In the world of cinema, this character and its ubiquity pinpoints our comfort in placing each region or country in the world into a convenient and hard-to-shake stereotype. Wolf Creek raises all these issues in this two-minute scene”
(2009)
Therefore, the character of Mick Taylor obviously and purposefully poisons the well-known character of Mick Dundee as a way of further destabilising the nuances behind the Australian cultural imagination. In doing this, director Greg Mclean clearly appeals to the comfort in the stereotypical portrayal of Australians, and in subverting this portrayal, generates the terror the film relies on. As Scott and Biron argue, “Wolf Creek, more than any other Australian film, manifests rural horror by way of our familiarity with aspects of specifically Australian rural idyll” (2010, p.311).
As discussed in our introductory discussion of Crocodile Dundee, Lucas (1998) argues in Australian film there is an ever-present tie between the notions of being Australian and the masculine, and that these notions are tied to the Australian cultural experience (p.138). Lucas’ argument uses Crocodile Dundee as a catalyst for discussion, and states that it presents a “conventional, phallocentric perspective of masculinity… this version of masculinity… is one of singularity, of physical and heroic superiority” (p.139-141). Lucas argues that this perpetuates the notion of man being in control of his landscape and those who inhabit it; the prize of “territorial domination” (p.142). Many parallels can be drawn between Lucas’ argument and the versions of masculinity presented in Wolf Creek. The film itself presents two very different images of the masculine: Ben’s city-boy sensibilities, versus Mick’s physically dominating alpha-male presence. Ben’s character actively rejects the “ocker” stereotype and in doing so refuses to align himself with those sensibilities; in one of the first scenes of the film where Ben is purchasing the second-hand car to take on the roadtrip, the car salesman makes a flippant remark about how girls are “easy” on roadtrips. As Harnett notes “[Ben] won’t respond and thereby align himself with the salesman, and in his refusal to do so we see him for who he is: not the outlaw he presents as, but someone with a cultivated soul” (2011, p.7). This “outlaw” appearance Hartnett is referring to is Ben’s appearance as a “muscular young man with shorn hair, who is outwardly tough and confident” (Ryan 2011).
As the Australian male chaperone of two female English tourists, Ben automatically assumes the role of protector over these two women. However, it is not until these two girls are propositioned by a repugnant man in a rural bar that Ben “is revealed, for the first time in the film, to be more or less completely powerless” (Clayfield 2006, p.132). Indeed, this powerlessness comes to a head when he cannot protect these girls from the horrors that threaten to consume them, and his own self. Clayfield argues that both Ben and Mick’s masculinity is a “performance”; “Ben drops his mask only begrudgingly, when compelled on penalty of personal harm, whereas the dropping of Mick’s mask is completely within the bounds of his personal control” (2006, p.133). The two engage in a somewhat uneven battle of alpha males; Ben’s inability to keep up the “toughness” that his rough exterior would seem to project leaves him helpless to the brutish, dominating persona of Mick, who is in “strategic” control of his performance of his masculinity (Clayfield 2006, p.133). As Clayfield argues, “from the moment Mick arrives on the scene, Ben behaves as though he perceives a threat, adopting what seems like a policy of implicitly belittling Mick’s larrikinism wherever possible, as evidenced by his simultaneously disrespectful, territorial and competitive ‘that’s not a knife’ comment… these girls, to him, are still his to do what he pleases with, not Mick’s” (2006, p.133).
The girls represent the “prize” for the most masculine of the two men, however different their intentions for the girls may be. Going back to Lucas’ analysis of the masculinity performed in Crocodile Dundee, it is argued that Mick Dundee’s “territorial dominance is indicated through the prize of the woman” (1998, p.142). Therefore, Mick Taylor truly reigns supreme in terms of the performative masculinity duel he has with Ben; not only does he remain completely in charge of his own space – the outback – but the women are both his, however unfortunate that may be. Wolf Creek’s subversions of our expectations go beyond pure psycho imitations of Mick Dundee; the viewers do not see Mick Taylor as a “hero”, and yet this is technically what he is in terms of his performance of “ocker” masculinity. It is therefore fitting that his challenger, Ben, is the lone survivor of the horrors of this road trip, who flees back to his hometown only to be accused as the girls’ killer. Even when not present, Mick has managed to tear down any shred of power that Ben may have had. Furthering this notion of the unexpected, or rather unwelcomed hero, Ryan (2011) notes that the film “challenges traditional representations of Australian masculinity and the ‘ocker larrikin’ to show a negative image of the rural ocker”. In terms of it’s resonance with popular Australian culture, Ryan notes that the film not only “taps into unique cultural fears” but also oscillates “debates around national cultural identity and popular movie genres, [and] it foregrounds the changing nature of Australian masculinity and how traditional representations of Australian masculinity so celebrated in the 1970s and 1980s are in decline”.
As Blackwood (2007) further notes, another subversion of the Crocodile Dundee story is “Mick Taylor’s contrasting attitude towards international visitors… Mick Taylor sees international people as expendable and subhuman vermin” (p.494). Mick’s xenophobic hatred of “otherness” first somewhat innocuously reveals itself in his flippant comment that kangaroos are “everywhere out here – like tourists”. His profession as a roo-exterminator takes on a horrific duality as he clears out tourists just like he clears vermin, thereby emphasising the notion of his racism. Blackwood further notes that “these aspects of Mick’s identity work to emphasise his connection to the traditional masculine representation of the bush legend” (2007, p.494). Mick’s presentation as this typical Aussie “bloke”, and his vague mimicry of Mick Dundee, a classically “Australian” figure to an international audience, invites a certain trust in such a familiar and seemingly harmless character. By twisting his persona into that of a psycho murderer is the cruellest prank he could play on his victims: unsuspecting tourists that buy into this imagined version of the Australian image. Furthermore, there lies a certain irony in Mick’s despising tourists, and yet himself he collects souvenirs from them, thereby assuming the role of an almost tourist in their lives. This seemingly simple gesture speaks volumes about the ignorant, brutish alpha male persona that Mick Taylor represents.
Wolf Creek takes the popular mythology of Australia and turns it on its head; the result is a truly unsettling portrait of rurality gone askew.