Snowtown (film)
| Company type | Film |
|---|---|
| Industry | Motion picture |
| Founded | 2011 |
| Founder | Justin Kurzel (director), Shaun Grant (screenwriter) |
| Headquarters | Australia |
| Products | Crime drama film |
Snowtown—also referred to as The Snowtown Murders'—is a 2011 Australian crime drama rooted in real events, marking the directorial debut of Justin Kurzel with a screenplay by Shaun Grant. The narrative draws from the actual Snowtown murders case.
Plot
Set in Salisbury, a struggling suburb of Adelaide, 16-year-old Jamie (Lucas Pittaway) resides with his mother Elizabeth Harvey (Louise Harris) and siblings, including his abusive half-brother Troy (Anthony Groves). After law enforcement fails to intervene when Elizabeth’s boyfriend Barry (Richard Green), a gay cross-dresser, takes inappropriate photos of the boys, Elizabeth is introduced to John (Daniel Henshall). John, who harbors intense disdain for paedophiles and homosexuals, confronts Barry until he leaves. Subsequently, John assumes a paternal role in Jamie’s life.
Barry supplies John with details of alleged paedophiles, leading John to assemble a wall cataloguing his targets. Jamie becomes increasingly influenced by John's violent and homophobic ideology. To harden Jamie against his own abuse, John forces him to shoot his dog. John also propagates his extremist beliefs throughout the community and separates Barry from his younger partner Robert (Aaron Viergever). Troy openly resists John's control. Barry vanishes shortly after, leaving a note indicating he has moved to Queensland. John enlists Jamie into his group known as the "men who bury."
Jamie accompanies John to visit Gavin (Bob Adriaens), a friend struggling with addiction whom John dislikes. One evening, John and Robert reveal to Jamie the bodies of Barry and Gavin concealed in a garden shed. Despite his shock, Jamie remains under John's influence. Later, John and Robert subject Troy to torture; Jamie ends Troy's suffering by killing him. Numbed by violence, Jamie assists John in further murders, hiding bodies in barrels inside an abandoned bank vault in Snowtown.
John convinces Jamie to deceive his stepbrother Dave (Beau Gosling) into coming to the bank vault. Jamie drives Dave to the location where John and Robert await. Text on screen informs that on 20 May 1999, South Australia Police discovered eight bodies stored in barrels within Snowtown’s bank vault; John Bunting and Robert Wagner were apprehended the following day.
Cast
- Daniel Henshall as John Bunting
- Lucas Pittaway as James "Jamie" Vlassakis
- Aaron Viergever as Robert Wagner
- David Walker as Mark Haydon
- Louise Harris as Elizabeth Harvey
- Keiran Schwerdt as Thomas Trevilyan
- Bob Adriaens as Gavin
- Frank Cwiertniak as Jeffrey
- Matthew Howard as Nicholas
- Marcus Howard as Alex
- Anthony Groves as Troy
- Richard Green as Barry
- Beau Gosling as Dave
- Craig Coyne as Ray
- Brendan Rock as Marcus
Production
In March 2010, Screen Australia announced financial backing for the project, complemented by a $245,000 contribution from Film Victoria. The production was handled by Warp Films Australia, a partnership between Warp Films and distributor Madman Entertainment.
Peter Campbell of Warp Films Australia successfully obtained the removal of suppression orders to permit the film’s debut.
Snowtown represents Justin Kurzel’s first full-length feature after his short film Bluetongue was showcased at the 2005 Cannes Film Festival.
Apart from Henshall and Green, much of the cast comprised local residents from the region where the crimes took place, mainly from Davoren Park, South Australia. Kurzel, himself raised nearby, selected mostly inexperienced actors aiming to shift away from sensational horror towards a poignant human drama highlighting social hardship. Contrary to initial assumptions, recruiting cast members required considerable effort due to their hesitance.
Principal photography occurred in Smithfield Plains, South Australia, a suburb on Adelaide’s outskirts.
Release
Snowtown made its debut at the 2011 Adelaide Film Festival, where it secured the "Audience Award." It was also one of seven films featured during Critics' Week at the 2011 Cannes Film Festival, earning a Special Mention.
The movie's distribution in the United Kingdom was handled by Revolver Entertainment, while IFC Midnight managed its release in North America.
Box office
The film's earnings amounted to $8,452 in the United States, $1,133,435 within Australia, and $207,500 combined from France and the United Kingdom.
Critical reception
Receiving mostly favorable critiques, Snowtown holds an 83% approval rating on Rotten Tomatoes from 65 reviews, with an average rating of 7.5 out of 10. On Metacritic, it achieved a score of 66 out of 100 based on 13 critic assessments, signifying "generally favorable reviews."
Peter Bradshaw of The Guardian awarded the film four stars out of five, characterizing it as a well-crafted yet highly violent work that presents a social-realist horror interpretation of the murderer as a distorted family patriarch. Fiona Williams from SBS gave it three and a half stars, highlighting director Kurzel's emphasis on the conditions facilitating violence rather than graphic content.
Conversely, Channel Nine correspondent Richard Wilkins assigned zero stars, describing it as "as close to a snuff movie as I ever want to see." His critique faced backlash from cultural commentators and was publicly rejected by director Justin Kurzel and actress Louise Harris.
In 2013, GamesRadar+ included John Bunting among the "50 Creepiest Movie Psychopaths," underscoring the film’s powerful depiction of its central character.