Wake in Fright, 1971.

Directed by Ted Kotcheff.
Starring Gary Bond, Donald Pleasence, Chips Rafferty, Sylvia Kaye, Jack Thompson, Peter Whittle, and Al Thomas.

SYNOPSIS:

After a bad gambling bet, a schoolteacher is marooned in a town full of crazy, drunk, violent men who threaten to make him just as crazy, drunk, and violent.

When you think of the weapons that have been used in thriller and horror movies over the years, you can probably name a few titles that have used said items, like chainsaws, knives, machetes, gardening tools, woodchippers and even vehicles. However, there aren’t many that use friendliness, or – as the lead character in this movie puts it – ‘aggressive hospitality’.

That character is John Grant (Gary Bond), a schoolteacher in the remote town of Tiboonda in the Australian outback, who is working there as part of an employment bond that he cannot afford to pay his way out of. During the Christmas break he is flying to Sydney to see his girlfriend but on the way he stops off in the nearby mining town of Bundanyabba – or The Yabba to the locals – so he can catch a flight.

Once at The Yabba he goes for a drink in the local bar and meets policeman Jock Crawford (Chips Rafferty), who is extremely friendly and starts buying the beers, downing his and expecting John to do the same before buying another. After a few rounds they move onto another bar where the locals are engaged in a game of two-up, an illegal coin tossing game where lots of money is changing hands. With several beers in his system John bets his travel money and wins quite a bit, almost enough to buy himself out of his employment contract so he can be with his girlfriend permanently, but when he takes the fatal last bet it all goes wrong. Stranded with no money, John meets locals Tim (Al Thomas) and his lonely daughter Janette (Sylvia Kaye), his mates Dick (Jack Thompson) and Joe (Peter Whittle), and local alcoholic/occasional medical practitioner Clarence ‘Doc’ Tydon (Donald Pleasence), and that is when the serious drinking starts, leading John into a dark place where his masculinity, morals and even his sanity are stretched to the limits.

What makes Wake in Fright so frightening is that if you were to put yourself in John’s position and went to the police to report what you perceive as a crime against you, there isn’t really a lot you could actually say to them. The characters that he meets in The Yabba aren’t villains or evil people, just regular rural folk who have a way of life and they stick to it – they hold down regular jobs, get paid and then go out of an evening and spend their hard-earned wages on beer, because that is all there is to do in The Yabba. This is basically laid out for you when Jock Crawford introduced himself to John and shows him where to get a steak and how to play two-up; yes, he’s a little bit pushy and forward, but he is the local law enforcement and wants to know who is in his town and why (and with that in mind, it isn’t difficult to see how director Ted Kotcheff landed the First Blood gig over a decade later).

But while Crawford is only in the film for a few memorable scenes, it is Doc who makes the biggest impression, mainly thanks to an overly chummy but somewhat sinister performance by Donald Pleasence. Again, Doc isn’t inherently a bad man but he has a drink problem, a strange outlook on life and, in one of the movies darkest moments, his intentions towards John may not be just about drinking and manly men doing manly men things. The movie never shows it and the script never addresses it, but both Donald Pleasence and Gary Bond do brilliant ‘what happens in the outback stays in the outback’ acting, and ultimately Doc becomes the hero – or saviour – of John’s story.

And John’s story is a fascinating look at how toxic masculinity and isolation can break down the male psyche, where men don’t want to look like wimps in front of the other guys, and Wake in Fright is absolutely terrifying in how it delivers it hostility, the arid desert almost tangible in 4K, so much so that you can nearly feel the heat coming from the sand and smell the sweat that seems to be permanently pouring from Donald Pleasence’s head. The close-up shots of men drinking and laughing, the surreal dream sequences that flash through John’s mind and the quick-cuts as the men toss back the beers all add to the madness, helping to create the swirling atmosphere that envelopes John and sends him off the deep end. Even the scenes of kangaroos being shot – which are real as the crew filmed a genuine hunt and mixed in the footage – don’t seem as intoxicating or nasty as Dick or Joe cracking open another beer and mocking John for not keeping up, and that takes serious filmmaking skill.

Coming backed with crew interviews, audio commentaries by Ted Kotcheff and composer John Scott, plus an appreciation of the movie by author/critic Kim Newman, Wake in Fright is a true cult classic that has stood the test of time – in some ways it could be more relevant today than it ever has been – and still manages to get under the skin more than most traditional horror movies, although you can never really pinpoint why, as all they’re doing is just being friendly, mate.

Flickering Myth Rating – Film: ★ ★ ★ ★ / Movie: ★ ★ ★ ★ ★

Chris Ward