Australian
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Heatwave (1982)

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clip Truth and lies

Original classification rating: M. This clip chosen to be PG

Clip description

Kate (Judy Davis) and Steve (Richard Moir) have become allies and lovers, united by the disappearance of Mary Ford. In bed, Kate tells him she blew up the bulldozers on his building site a year earlier. Before he can work out if she’s serious, the police raid her flat and find explosives. At the police station, the two detectives concoct a fake record of interview, as Kate contemplates her dire circumstances.

Curator’s notes

by Paul Byrnes

Ambiguity reigns – possibly one of the reasons that audiences were ambivalent about the film. Steve doesn’t know if she is really a bomb thrower and nor do we. The expression on Judy Davis’s face as they find the explosives could be taken as surprise or resignation. Similarly, her tears in the cop station might be because she’s in trouble, although it seems unlikely. She may be crying because she believes Steve thinks her capable of firebombing for political ends. And in the end, she’s not sure if she’s capable of it, either. This much moral ambiguity was unusual in Australian film at the time, and still is. It made it difficult to establish a strong emotional connection with the characters, to the film’s commercial detriment.

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