Australia Day

Kriv Stenders’ Australia Day depicts our nation in a state of emergency, popularising every moral panic and exaggerating every social tension currently swirling around the rhetoric. Starring Bryan Brown, Shari Sebbens and Sean Keenan, the film takes place over a 12-hour period on our controversial national holiday, weaving the fascinating stories of three Australians from diverse backgrounds.  

Set in humid Brisbane, the film opens with three characters running for their lives, trying to escape a yet-to-be revealed danger. After much running – and there is a lot – we learn April (Miah Madden), a fourteen-year-old Indigenous girl, has fled a police chase resulting in a car accident that kills her elder sister; Sami (Elias Anton), an Iranian-Australian teen, has left an unconscious girl in a car after giving her party pills the night before; and nineteen-year-old Chinese tourist, Lan (Jenny Wu), is fleeing from her ‘uncle’ and runs into bankrupt farmer Terry (Brown). 

As the film unfolds, April tries to track down her drug-dependent mother but encounters many dangers, including a heroin-abusing paedophile who holds her captive in his house. Sonya Mackenzie (Sebbens) – the police officer who caused the car accident – desperately tries to right a wrong and manages to rescue April, ultimately convincing the terrified teen she will be safe. April’s narrative feels the most real, and her harrowing circumstances expose how helpless and disadvantaged people in the community are. 

Not a dazzler by any means, Australia Day has few charms, presenting a disillusioned view of our nation – one that is fractured, factional and fragile. Any complex thought regarding current tensions that do exist are let down with implausible plot points, and we never truly learn about the characters’ motivations. Brown’s character Terry is a huge let down when the narrative nose dives into the absurd and although he ultimately saves Lan from an illegal sex ring, his image is tarnished.