Film Review
Director Brendan Cowell, cast includes Patrick Brammall, Alex Dimitriades, Abbey Lee, Robyn Nevin, Jack Thompson, Aaron Bertram.
Ruben Guthrie, a notable on-stage success, is one of four plays to become Australian films this year, not always an easy transition, although settings like Bondi and Randwick racecourse seem central to this quintessentially Sydney flick.
The man of the title is an acclaimed, hard partying advertising creative who comes to grief when he jumps off a balcony during an alcohol fuelled party at his glamorous lower North Shore house.
While his swimming pool helps cushion his fall, his Czech model fiancée Zoya (Abbey Lee), decides not to, and roundly damns Australia’s drinking culture before storming back home. The only way she may reconsider the split is if Ruben (Patrick Brammall, seen recently in the ABC series Glitch) can give up the grog for a year.
So begins a round of AA meetings, equally awkward confrontations with Ruben’s well lubricated friends, and a predictable tumble off the wagon that becomes a descent into hell.
The script is tight, and Brammall’s performance excellent, at times reminding me of those marvelous declamations by DiCaprio in The Wolf of Wall Street.
The film’s happy-ish ending should not be revealed. More important is the cringe-making journey to get there, one that says much about the role of alcohol in our national life, and not just on the screen, as actor Aaron Bertram outlines in his companion article.
- Robin Osborne
