In the early 1800’s, Van Diemen’s Land (now known as Tasmania) was at the end of the world. To the British, it was an ideal place to transport their overwhelming prison population. Over 165,000 convicts were sent to this remote colony in the 18th and 19th centuries, and it was a site of immense suffering and hardship for individuals who were often being punished for crimes as petty as stealing a loaf of bread. Such is the case of the protagonist, Clare (Aisling Franciosi) in “The Nightingale.”
Clare is Irish, not “British,” an important distinction in this film as those who suffer at the hands of the British soldiers are not only the prisoners, but the aboriginals who also inhabit the island. Clare has been imprisoned for seven long years for stealing food to survive as an orphan on the streets. Under the Probation System enacted in the early 1800’s, Clare is allowed to work for wages in one of the surrounding districts serving food and drink to the troops in a local tavern. She has also married a former convict, Aiden, and together they have a baby and live on the outskirts of the soldiers’ camp.
If you’ve ever read Thomas Kaneally’s “The Playmaker,” or seen Timberlake Wertenbaker’s play “Our Country’s Good” based on that novel, “The Nightingale” pick up right where those works left off. Prisoners and aboriginals are treated with contempt. All of the women, regardless of race or ethnicity, are brutalized and preyed upon by the sex-starved soldiers.
Clare has caught the eye of Hawkins (played with demonic relish and aplomb by Sam Caflin), a British lieutenant charged with overseeing the remote outpost and who holds the proverbial keys to her release. But while she has served three months past her sentence, Hawkins refuses to sign her papers, and continually strings her along while forcing her to sing in the tavern and repeatedly raping her. When Clare’s husband decides to plead for her release, things go south fast. Hawkins and his troops decimate all that Clare holds dear and leave her for dead. Fueled by her rage, Claire enlists the help of an aboriginal tracker (Baykali Ganambarr) to help her hunt down her attackers and exact revenge.
This is Jennifer Kent's second film at Sundance, the first being the terrifying horror flick Babadook. "The Nightingale" is not a horror film, it is a thriller, but Kent doesn't hold back on showing the vivid, brutal, and very realistic acts of barbaric violence such as murder, infanticide, and rape. (This is actually the first film at Sundance where I've been required to show my ID in order to see a film.) In the beginning, Clare might seem like a sweet little bird of a girl, but she turns into a serious bad-ass in the face of incredible adversity. This is a chick hell-bent on a mission, and I like it! Kent seems to take the rage felt by so many women who have been oppressed through the ages and packed it all into this little slip of a girl who unleashes hell on her oppressors.
That said, the dramatic action of this movie is intense and compelling. Kent has done her research on the historical elements of the movie. She has also said that this movie was her response to the violence she sees in the world today. It was her hope to explore the possibility of there being "love, compassion and kindness in the darkest of times." While Clare retaliates with vengeance, it comes from a wellspring of sorrow and loss for her child, her husband, and the life she might have had. In ridding the world of evil, intolerance, and oppression, there is the hope in the end that Clare can find some sense of peace and move on.
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