Critics could debate the merits and subtleties of The Furnace, High Ground (and Sweet Country in 2018) in their stories of the Australian frontier. At this stage, we are seeing Australian filmmakers bring a disciplined, unflinching eye to masculine violence and racist horror. International critics are impressed, but local audiences could follow the thread or ignore the pain. Either way, the films push deeply into the repressed monsters beneath our popular culture view of history.
Roderick MacKay’s film The Furnace was selected by Venice for the Orrizionte strand, prized as one of 19 ‘films that represent the latest aesthetic and expressive trends in international cinema’. It runs in parallel with the mainstream Golden Lion Awards, but it is also a competitive strand which specialises in small, culturally diverse films.
