Cinema
Stir
Stephen Wallace · 1980
Synopsis
Beaten in the past by the guards of a prison in New South Wales, China Jackson, a habitual offender, returns there three years later, after some time outside. The guards hate him for having tried to report the ill-treatment; one of them nevertheless seeks to help him and to make up for his past brutalities. The violence that the management tolerates against the inmates keeps growing, and tension mounts in the yards and cells until the revolt.
Context
The screenplay is by Bob Jewson, an inmate at Bathurst during the 1974 riot; it was first titled Bathurst and draws on the facts established by the Royal Commission into New South Wales prisons. Shot in five weeks, in October and November 1979, mostly in the disused prison at Gladstone, in South Australia, for 485,000 dollars, the film was shown at Cannes in 1980 and released on 23 October of the same year. Its language brought it difficulties with the financiers and the censors; according to its director, it nevertheless turned a profit.
Who it is for
A film in English from Australia, very harsh, carried by Bryan Brown and Max Phipps, with crude language.
Prizes and reception
Eleven AFI nominations without a single award; for Australian Screen, one of the most revealing films about prison in Australia.
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