Australian
Screen

Teacher’s notes

provided by

This clip from the documentary The Balanda and the Bark Canoes (2006) shows the process of making the film Ten Canoes (2006). Director Rolf de Heer explains in voice-over the effect of kinship laws on casting and the subsequent delays in filming. The clip shows the landscape near Ramingining in Arnhem Land and the camp that housed cast and crew. Four-wheel-drive vehicles head to the shooting location. De Heer explains how a scene is to be done to some of the cast. The actors’ joke about being shown naked in the film is translated in English subtitles.

Educational value points

• In the clip, director Rolf de Heer describes some of the challenges he faced in making Ten Canoes in collaboration with the Yolngu people of Ramingining. De Heer found it difficult to fully understand the complexities of the culture, which had implications for casting, script development and the making of props. The film was a collaborative process – Yolngu people determined story development, selected most of the cast and had editorial veto.

• The complexity of Yolngu kinship laws meant that de Heer placed casting decisions in the hands of the community. The kinship system determines the relationships between people and defines their obligations and behaviour towards each other and the world around them. The Yolngu community considered it essential that all roles in the film reflect the actual kinship relations of actors playing the parts in order for the story to be considered ‘a real and true story’.

• The clip shows de Heer’s openness as a filmmaker as he explains the basics of film language to the actors playing the ten canoeists. For most Yolngu people English is a fourth or fifth language. De Heer speaks no Yolngu language, which required him to employ a number of different communication strategies. In the scene in the clip, no written script is used; instead de Heer carefully explains the roles of the characters and how the scene might progress.

• The Yolngu community’s significant collaboration in the filmmaking process is indicated in the way that the actors listen to de Heer’s direction and then discuss that direction between themselves to decide who will and will not climb a tree to collect bark. The cast’s joking about their required nakedness shows an acute awareness of the nature of film – Peter Djigirr jokes that ‘the camera will show it as it is’.

• The filming location seen in the clip is on the edge of the Arafura Swamp in north-eastern Arnhem Land and is home to the Ramingining community of the Yolngu people. The camp seen here was at Murwangi, an old cattle station on the edge of the Swamp about 50 km south of Ramingining.

• The use of subtitles gives the viewer an intimate sense of the interactions and humour of the actors as they negotiate their actions in a scene. There is a tangible change in mood when they speak in their own language, which allows their warmth and humour to come through. The film was the first feature film to be shot entirely in Aboriginal languages, predominantly Ganalbingu – one of many local languages.