M, 116 minutes
5 Stars
Review by Jane © Freebury
In startling opening scenes, a boy trying to escape from police is felled by a boomerang, bundled into a sack and loaded onto a goods train. He is headed for a place where they will train him to wear a shirt, shorts and sandals, comb his hair, eat his meals with cutlery, and sleep atop his bed rather than beneath it.
His journey from country, somewhere in remote Australia, ends at a Catholic orphanage among hills of rich arable land. In the dead of night, the dark-skinned boy with hair the colour of barley (striking newcomer Aswan Reid), is dumped there at the door. The bell is rung and he is assigned a spot in a dormitory with other Indigenous orphan kids.
It could be end-of-story, were it not for the fact that this is a boy who won’t be subdued, whose table manners will be worse than ever by the end and he will refuse to use the English language. The results will not please the Chief Protector of Aborigines in 1940s wartime Australia.
The journey that opens the film is told with elegance and economy in beautifully composed images by the filmmaker Warwick Thornton, in a celebration of the unique beauty of the Australian landscape. Writer-director Thornton, whose outstanding first feature was Samson & Delilah, was, as usual, cinematographer on the shoot that took place near the Clare Valley in South Australia.
Cate Blanchett and Aswan Reid in The New Boy. Image courtesy Roadshow
As luck would have it, the newly arrived nine-year-old is entrusted into the care of Sister Eileen, a nun with an impulse for subversion played by Cate Blanchett, and a pair of kindly Indigenous carers, Sister Mum (Deborah Mailman) and George (Wayne Blair). Baptism will be delayed and he will be just New Boy for now, joining other boys being inducted into the ways of the white community.
When Sister Mum makes a valiant and humourous effort to show the New Boy how to use a pit toilet, he continues to prefer the fields. Who can blame him, really? On the other hand, there are clearly some inducements to behave, like marmalade spread on fresh bread, and the motherly affections of Sister Mum. But it’s not long before George recognises the “lizard eater a long way from home” in the new arrival.
A spinning arc of sparkling light. What to make of this?
Last place in the boys’ pecking order is not the place to be, but the New Boy gets this sorted quite by accident rather than design, because he is fair and he is kind. Not because of the way he can summon an awesome special power into the palm of his hand, a spinning arc of sparkling light. What do we make of this?
Without wishing to be too literal, it seems to vaguely signify the New Boy’s access to his cultural heritage. Though some may baulk at the supernatural scenes or wonder why he is given special treatment by Sister Eileen, while the other boys get their tasks.
Newcomer Aswah Reid is a natural with promise, though he hasn’t a lot to say besides ‘amen’
Newcomer Reid is a natural performer with much promise, though like the two lead characters in Thornton’s Samson & Delilah, he hasn’t a lot to say besides “amen”. The young actors in the roles of fellow wards of the state, undergoing apprenticeship for future induction into the workforce, are very good too.
Blanchett, also one of the producers, is a hoot as renegade nun with a penchant for wine when no one is looking, and letting fly with bad language when it suits. A broad and uninflected Aussie accent is something we haven’t heard much from her for many years.
While some sceptical filmgoers will find the use of Catholic iconography ambiguous here, The New Boy is not tied to naturalism but free to choose its own way. An invitee to Cannes this year, it is a bold, enchanting experience, glorious to look at and enrichened by the atmospheric musical score from Nick Cave and Warren Ellis.
Back in 2009, Samson & Delilah was a 5-star film for me, and now The New Boy reaches similar levels. How interesting to hear that the filmmaker went to boarding school at the age of just 13, a tender age to encounter a statue of the crucifixion, a representation that is disturbing. It isn’t any wonder that New Boy wanted to give it a big hug, like the hug he gives that giant river red gum.
First published in the Canberra Times on 9 July 2023. Jane’s reviews are also published at Rotten Tomatoes