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Clip description
The brother and sister are dying of thirst, camped by a spring that has dried up while they were asleep. The boy (Lucien John) sees a figure on the horizon. He thinks it may be his father but it’s an Aboriginal hunter. The young woman (Jenny Agutter) is fearful after she blinks hard to make sure she is awake. The young black man (David Gulpilil) kills a large lizard to add to several that adorn his belt. He is surprised to see these white people out here, but he is about to leave them there when the boy pushes his sister to stop him. She tries to make him understand they need water, but fails. The boy is more direct and succeeds. The Aboriginal man laughs and shows them how to get water.
Curator’s notes
This extraordinary introduction of David Gulpilil’s character has lost none of its power since the film was made. Roeg uses the long shot very effectively to show his grace and playfulness; his hunting is like a dance. The close-ups of the two children show their amazement with sly humour, and the point at which Gulpilil sees them is equally well-timed.
The sequence is partly about language, and the inadequacy of words as a tool of communication. The young woman has no success in trying to communicate but her brother is much more intuitive. The young black man has already told them where to find the water and what to capture to eat, but his words also fail to register with them. The scene is reduced to absolute essentials, and the settings are chosen for their stark beauty, as we see in the wide shot as the young black man walks away from the tree pursued by the others. This is a perfectly iconic composition, full of strength and simplicity: tree, sky, land, boy, girl, man. The small boy’s impatience with his sister asking the way to Adelaide is perfectly done. She’s missing the point – they need water, not directions. The cultural and linguistic misunderstandings begin from this point and keep on accumulating.
Jenny Agutter was trained in ballet, and had been appearing in films since 1964, when she was 12. In 1967, she starred in a BBC adaptation of The Railway Children, which was subsequently made into a film. She was 16 when Walkabout was shot, in 1969. David Gulpilil (credited as ‘David Gumpilil’) made his film debut in Walkabout. He was 15.
