Breaker Morant
1980
Cast
Jack
Thompson……………...Major J.F. Thomas
John
Waters………………… Captain
Alfred Taylor
Bryan
Brown……………….. Lieutenant
Peter Handcock
Charles ‘Bud’
Tingwell…….. Lieutenant
Colonel Denny
Terence
Donovan…………...Captain Simon Hunt
Vincent
Ball………………...Colonel Ian Hamilton
Ray
Meagher……………….. Sergeant Major Drummond
Chris
Haywood………….…. Corporal
Sharp
Russell
Kiefel………………. Christiaan Botha
Lewis
Fitz-Gerald…………...Lieutenant George Ramsdale Witton
Rod
Mullinar……………….. Major Charles Bolton
Alan
Cassell…………………Lord Horatio Kitchener
Rob
Steele………………….. Captain Robertson
Chris
Smith………………….Cameron Sergeant
Bruno
Knez………………… Reverend H.V.C. Hess
John
Pfitzner……………….. Boer Leader
Frank
Wilson……………….. Dr Johnson
Michael
Procanin……………Visser
Ray
Ball……………………..Court Reporter
Wayne
Bell…………………. Lieutenant Reed
Director…………………….. Bruce Beresford
Producer……………………. Matthew Carroll
Screenplay………………….. Bruce Beresford
Jonathan
Hardy
David
Stevens
Novel (The Breaker)
by……. Kit Denton
Original
Music………………Phil Cunneen
Cinematography……………. Donald McAlpine
Film
Editing…………………William M. Anderson
Art
Director………………… David
Copping
Costume
Designer………….. Anna
Senior
Makeup…………………….. Julie Lovell
Sound/Sound
Designer…….. Gary
Wilkins
Production
Manager…………Pamela Vanneck
Production………………….. South Australian Film Corporation
Australian Film Commission
7
Network
Pact Production Pty Ltd
Distributors………………….Star
Video (Australia)
Belle & Blade Studios (video)
New
World Pictures
New
World-Quartet (USA)
Evelyn (2002)
Boswell for the Defence
(2001)
Bride of the Wind (2001)
Ataturk (2000)
Double Jeopardy (1999)
(aka
Doppelmord 2000 Germany)
Sydney: A Story of a City
(1999)
Paradise Road (1997)
Last Dance (1996)
Silent Fall (1994)
A Good Man in Africa (1994)
Rich in Love (1992)
Black Robe (1991)
(aka
Robe noire 1991 Canada: French title)
Driving Miss Daisy (1989)
Her Alibi (1989)
Aria (1987)
The Fringe Dwellers (1986)
Crimes of the Heart (1986)
King David (1985)
Tender Mercies (1983)
Puberty Blues (1981)
The Club (1980)
(aka
Player 1980)
Breaker Morant (1980)
Money Movers (1979)
The Getting of Wisdom (1977)
Don’s Party (1976)
Side by Side (1975)
Barry McKenzie Holds His Own
(1974)
The Adventures of Barry
McKenzie (1972)
Paradise Road (1997)
Curse of the Starving Class
(1994)
Aria (1987)
The Fringe Dwellers (1986)
Breaker Morant (1980)
Money Movers (1979)
Side by Side (1975)
Barry McKenzie Holds His Own
(1974)
The Adventures of Barry
McKenzie (1972)
Curse of the Starving Class
(1994) Executive Producer
A Good Man in Africa (1994)
Barry McKenzie Holds His Own
(1974)
Paradigm (1970)
You’re Human Like the
Rest of Them (1967)
Australia 16
May 1980
USA 16
May 1980
Finland 6
August 1982
Released on DVD 29 June 1999
Best Achievement in
Cinematography – Donald McAlpine
Best Achievement in Costume
Design – Anna Senior
Best Achievement in Editing
– William M. Anderson
Best Achievement in
Production Design – David Copping
Best Achievement in Sound
– Jeanine Chiavlo
Phil Judd
Gary
Wilkins
William
Anderson
Best Actor in a Lead Role –
Jack Thompson
Best Actor in a Supporting
Role – Bryan Brown
Best Director – Bruce
Beresford
Best Film – Matthew
Carrol
Best Screenplay – Bruce
Beresford
Jonathan Hardy
David Stevens
Best Actor in a Lead Role
– Edward Woodward
Best Actor in a Supporting
Role – Lewis Fitz-Gerald
Charles
‘Bud’ Tingwell
Best Foreign Film –
Australia
Best Writing, Screenplay
Based on Another Medium
There were no interviews that
I could find in relation to Breaker Morant, however, there were some
interesting interviews with Bruce Beresford where Breaker Morant is mentioned.
These can be found at the web site below.
http://www.urbancinefile.com.au/scripts/cinefile/Interviews_Archives_menu.asp?letter=b
Reviews could be found
everywhere, but critical reviews
were few and far between. Two of the better ones are listed first while the
ones that follow are reviews from fans of the movie.
http://www.arts.adelaide.edu.au/personal/Dhart/Films/BreakerMorant.html
http://mysunrise.ch/users/mmathis/criterion/indepth-40.html
http://allmovieguide.com/cg/avg.dll
http://oxfordmusic.com/dvd/breaker.html
http://users.mcmedia.com.au/~stocky/ausfilms.html
http://www.smr-home-theatre.org/dvd/reviews/Breaker_Morant.html
http://www.wiu.edu/library/units/av/titlecatalog/avlop_bz.htm
http://www.funk-butter.com/102999.html
http://chromehorse.net/movies/breaker.htm
http://www.largesock.com/writing/wbreaker.html
http://www.medianugget.com/archive/2001101.html
http://www,super70s.com/Super70s/Movies/1979/breaker_morant.asp
http://vietnamnews.vnagency.com.vn/2001-06/27/Stories/23.htm
At first I was a bit
overwhelmed by the amount of information on the web for Breaker Morant. Using the Alta Vista search engine, I typed in Breaker
Morant, and it came back with 1845 pages found. Unfortunately, as I waded
through page after page, I discovered very little in the way of good, critical
information about the film. There are numerous fan sites and people who rate Breaker
Morant as one of their favourite
films, but I was unable to locate much information at the time of the films
release. I imagine this has to do with the fact that all the newspapers I
search rarely archived beyond 1997 and certainly not as far back as 1980. I was
disappointed in Urban Cinefile who although they had the title under their
Australian Films section, didn’t have a review of the film. The Internet
Movie Database was a Godsend and the place where I obtained the bulk of my
information. The rest was taken direct from the movie itself. One thing I did
notice during my search was the discrepancy with the date of the film –
some had 1979 while others had 1980. I could not find this information on the
actual film itself so I’m going with imdb.com and calling it 1980, for
the reason that the rest of their information was spot on.
HERO OR VILLAIN?
HIS EXPLOITS SHOOK AN EMPIRE
…AND MADE HIM A LEGEND.
When they speak of heroes, of villains, of men who
look for action, who choose
between honour and revenge, they will tell the true
story of an Australian they called
The Breaker, Lieutenant Harry Morant.
It is 1901, South Africa. The British war against the
Boers has deteriorated into bitter
guerrilla warfare. A grim precursor of wars to come. A
unit of the Bushveldt Carbineers
made up mainly of Australians, is ordered by the
British High Command to fight the
Boer on their terms and take no prisoners. Orders that
were to prove fatal for
Harry Morant.
This classic Australian motion picture of injustice
and the horror of war, has swept the
world to become one of the most acclaimed Australian
movies ever made.
Harry ‘Breaker’
Morant is an Englishman living in Australia at the end of the 19th
Century. When war breaks out in 1899 between Britain and the Boers (descendants
of Dutch colonists) in South Africa, Morant signs up for duty. He and the other
Australian volunteers are absorbed into the non-regular units of the British
army. When it becomes clear that the British ‘gentlemanly’ way of
fighting is not effective against the guerrilla tactics of the Boers, the
British army forms a unit called the Bushveldt Carbineers, and commissions them
to fight the Boers ‘on their own terms’. The unit is made up of
mostly Australians, who, in the spirit of ‘Australianness’, distil
bootleg alcohol, call their commanders by their first names, only salute those
they like and generally lack the discipline the British soldiers are used to.
Acting under orders from his commanders, Morant oversees the execution of Boer
prisoners. When it comes to light that a German missionary has been killed, the
British agree to court-martial Morant, along with Lieutenant Hancock and
Lieutenant Witton, in order to appease the Germans and prevent them from
entering the war. In a biased courtroom, with the British looking for a
scapegoat, Morant and Hancock are eventually sentenced to death, while Witton
gets a commuted sentence of life imprisonment.
The story is told in
retrospect with flashbacks to relevant events. It starts out in the courtroom
and as evidence is given we are taken back to the event being described,
sometimes twice but from a different perspective. This technique works well for
this movie. It is done quietly without drawing attention to itself and helps
the narrative unroll at a good pace.
The movie makes its stand
against the British from the outset. It shows them at formal dinners in grand
mansions while ‘the colonials’ are out winning the war for them.
The anti-British sentiment helps define the Australian identity of mateship and
masculinity. By using Morant and Hancock as scapegoats, the British proved they
were untrustworthy – they were willing to sell out their mates. Morant,
although English, proves himself as Australian by refusing to escape when given
the chance, not willing to leave his ‘mates’ behind. The British
are continuously shown to be lying. When Lord Kitchener is discussing the case
with Major Bolton, the prosecuting attorney, he tells him that Morant and the
others ‘picked one of their own fellows’ to defend them. In truth,
Major Thomas is picked for them and primarily for his lack of experience in the courtroom. While Major Bolton
has six weeks to prepare his case for the prosecution, Major Thomas arrives the
day before the court-martial is due to start, and is refused an ajournment to
allow him to prepare properly.
Throughout the court-martial
the British have little digs at the Australians. Major Bolton calls Major
Thomas ‘my learned colonial colleague’ and Major Thomas is also
told, ‘this is a British court-martial, not a back-blocks pub.’ The
objections brought up by Major Thomas are over-ruled more often than those
brought up by the prosecution. Most of the witnesses that could give evidence
that would help the defence had been sent to India. At one stage when
Lieutenant Colonel Denny says to Lord Kitchener that Major Thomas is putting up
an ‘unexpectedly good defence’ and that two are the court members
are showing sympathy towards the Australians, Kitchener replies,
‘Can’t they be sent to India too?’
Despite a good defence, the
British are determined to have their scapegoats and find all three guilty.
Throughout the film, Morant, Hancock and Witton face the court-martial
together. However, when their sentences are being given to them, they are taken
one by one to receive them. Witton is taken first and told that he has been
found guilty and sentenced to death; however, Lord Kitchener has seen fit to
commute his sentence to a lifetime of penal servitude. Morant and Hancock are
both sentenced to death. As Morant walks back past the cells, Witton rushes to
the window and yells Harry’s name, questioningly. Morant simply says,
‘shot tomorrow morning’.
One of the best quotes in the
film comes from Major Thomas as he is giving his closing statement to the
court. He says, ‘the
barbarities of war are seldom committed by abnormal men. The tragedy of war is
that these horrors are committed by normal men in abnormal situations.’
As Morant and Hancock are
about to be taken out to the firing squad, they are asked if they want the
padre. Morant says, ‘No thank you, I’m a pagan.’ When Hancock
is asked if he wants the padre he asks Morant what a pagan is.
‘It’s somebody who doesn’t believe there’s a divine
being dispensing justice to mankind’, Morant replies. Hancock turns back
to the guard and says, ‘No thanks, I’m a pagan too.’ Morant
requests Matthew 10:36 as his epitaph which reads, ‘And a man’s foe
shall be they of his own household’.
The most quoted line in the
movie would be when Morant and Hancock are sitting in their chairs in front of
the firing squad and Morant yells, ‘Shoot straight you bastards,
don’t make a mess of it.’
At the end of the movie there
is a sentence or two about some of the men involved in the court-martial and
what happens to them after. Lieutenant George Witton is returned to England
where he serves only three years of his sentence. When he is released he writes
a book called ‘Scapegoats of the Empire’.
Breaker Morant would be classed as a quality film like those made
during the 1970s such as Picnic at Hanging Rock (Weir 1978) and The Chant of Jimmie Blacksmith (Schepisi 1978). It was critically acclaimed around
the world and was a box office success here in Australia. Coming only six years
after the Barry McKenzie movies, Bruce Beresford shows a remarkable talent,
coming from the crass ‘ocker’ movies to a wonderful tale of
Australian mateship that everyone can relate to.
The fact that information can
still be readily found about a movie that is over twenty years old says
something about the quality of the film itself and the message it carries. It
is a good ambassador for Australian cinema and proof that big budgets and great
special effects are not always needed to make a lasting, poignant film.