Wish you were here is arguably the best Aussie film to come out since Animal Kingdom. It’s wildly unique in it’s editing, plot and the way it shows events, constantly changing between the past and present. It also feels disturbingly real and shows the dangers of travelling.
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Starring Joel Edgerton as Dave Flannery and Felicity Price as his wife Alice, they go on a holiday to south east Asia with Alice’s sister and her new found man. The opening scene of partying (featuring a great track from Aussie hip-hop band Hilltop Hoods) could not be more opposite to what follows in this movie.
The movie flashs back to the present, and we quickly see that not all is well back home. The mood is set really well by Director Kieran Darcy-Smith, and we are only given little hints of information. This kept me guessing the whole time as to what has happened, what went wrong in Asia and what’s going to happen to the couple and thier sister Steph.
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Any more information is probably a spoiler, but the answer to the questions above are worth the wait as the twist in this movie is fairly awesome. The first hour is really a build up to to the piecing together that is done in the final third of the movie and it’s the unique way we get to the climax that makes it a movie I really enjoyed.
If there were any flaws in this movie it would be the final 5-10 minutes which doesn’t really wrap up as nicely as I would have liked. Also, the emotional connection between to the characters isn’t as strong as desired, but Joel Edgerton is still great and so are the other cast members.
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Overall, Wish You Were Here was a refreshing movie with an awesome storyline. The flow of the movie was something I really liked with there being numerous times that it takes you a couple of seconds to work out what phase of time we are in. Edgerton has his usual brilliance and it’s a movie I’d definitely recommend. B+
Good review, agree probably a B+, was Very good!
Cheers James, glad you liked it too!
This review states incorrectly that the film is Directed by David Leland…… Shame you couldn’t get your facts right.
So that should solve you question”Interestingly the 1987 movie of the same title is directed by the same person, and while I haven’t seen it I’m interested to see if there’s a similar theme.”
Thanks for that Ange, IMDB did have Leland as director, I should have double checked another source. Thanks for stopping by!