Film Review: Children of the Revolution (1996)

Certain film makers who are willing to take risks and try something different should be commended even when their efforts end with less than satisfactory results. One of them is Australian film director Peter Duncan whose feature debut, 1996 black comedy Children of the Revolution, was a little bit overambitious for its own good.

Film is framed by mockumentary that tries to explain how Australia few years earlier barely avoided civil war. The plot explores the background of those events and goes back few decades earlier, in 1951, when Australia was, like the rest of Western world, participants of Cold War. Some of its citizens, however, were on different side, like Joan Fraser (played by Judy Davis), young and militant member of Australian Communist Party who worships Soviet dictator Joseph Stalin (played by F. Murray Abraham). After writing countless letters, she finally gets invited to Moscow where she will be supervised by mysterious David Hoyle (played by Sam Neill) who might or might not be quadruple agent. She catches Stalin’s attention and spends the night with him. Upon a return to Australia she gives birth to a boy who might be Stalin’s or Hoyle’s son. The boy grows up to be rebellious young man Joe (played by Richard Roxburgh), who would rebel both against his mother’s unrepentantly Stalinist politics and mainstream of Australian society. His protests actions would get him to prison where he would learn about Stalin’s crimes and later marry Anna (played by Rachel Griffiths), woman whose Latvian parents came to Australia in order to escape Stalin’s persecution. Due to bizarre set of circumstances Joe finds his true calling as labour union activist and gradually proves to be extremely talented politician and becomes one of the most powerful people in Australia. Very few people seem to notice Joe’s physical resemblance to Soviet dictator, or similarities in character and aesthetic tastes.

For some, making fun of Communism seemed pointless in 1990s, after the end of Cold War appeared to end history and make that particular ideology and its adherents nothing more than one of its permanently closed chapters. Duncan, however, found inspiration for the film within his own family, apparently modelling character of Joan Fraser on his own grandfather, die-hard and unrepentant Stalinist. Duncan wanted to use bizarre and surreal plot about Stalin being reincarnated as modern-day Australian labour activist as a pretext for biting satire on Australian politics and society in general. In doing so, he had excellent cast at his disposal, made from some of the finest actors from Down Under. Judy Davis is formidable in the complicated and somewhat thankless role of a woman who would spend lifetime clinging to an idea at the expense of her family and common sense. But even better is Richard Roxburgh, actor who is best known for playing villain and who here uses opportunity to show great range. He is aided by Rachel Griffiths, Sam Neill as some sort of proto-James Bond and Geoffrey Rush as Joan’s long-suffering husband.

While Children of the Revolution features good acting, Duncan’s script leaves much to be desired. This is mostly due to Duncan not being sure whether he should go for more focused political satire or broaden it with some more serious elements that deal with enormous sufferings millions of people endured during Stalin’s rule. Many jokes and gags are, however, intended for Australian audience and could be properly understood only by those who were familiar with Australian politics in 20th Century (the same problem was encountered by Croatian film maker in similarly themed Marshal Tito’s Spirit few years later). Because of that Children of the Revolution could be seen more like a curiosity than as proper film. The film, internationally distributed by Miramax, nevertheless got decent reviews and Duncan continued his career, reuniting with Roxburgh on long-running television series Rake.

RATING: 4/10 (+)

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Movie URL: https://www.themoviedb.org/movie/6-judgment-night
Critic: AA