Walkabout

Walkabout (Criterion #10).
1971 20th Century Fox & Janus Films.
Starring: Jenny Agutter, Luc Roeg (as Lucien John), David Gulpilil
Director: Nicolas Roeg
Available from Amazon.
(Note: Criterion is planning a re-release of Walkabout, but no release date has been announced yet.)

Two siblings (Agutter & John) from Sydney are taken by their geologist dad into a picnic deep in the Australian outback. Dad actually brought them out there to try and kill them, as he starts shooting at them. The kids run for cover behind the rocks, and Dad sets the car on fire before shooting himself. The girl, who is older than her brother, tries hard to conceal what just happened to him, grabs a few necessities (the boy seems to have a ton of small toys with him that get dropped all over the desert), and they disappear deep into the outback. It doesn't take long to show that the urban children are ill equipped to survive in the wilderness, and they eventually meet an indigenous youth (Gulpilil), who happily shows them how to draw water from a drying oasis bed.

The three kids stay together for several days, wordlessly becoming friends, although the little brother figures out a way to communicate with the indigenous kid using words and gestures. The aborigine also starts feeling attracted to the girl. Along the way, the three children encounter a group of researchers, who try to make contact with the children, but they are ignored.

Finding a farm, and eventually, a paved (or as they say in Oz, sealed) highway nearby, the suddenly sullen aborigine is nearly run over by two white hunters in a truck. He covers himself in white mud and returns to the farmhouse where he pursues her through all of its rooms in an intense, but silent dance. The siblings cannot understand the meaning of the dance, which goes on all day and into the night, when the indigenous youth finally stops, exhausted. The two siblings fall asleep, and find the body of the aborigine hanging from a mango tree nearby. With no reason to stay at the farm, they make their way up the road, where a surly local man tells them of a place they can stay. The kids play at an abandoned mine, throwing rocks against old machinery.

Years later, the girl is now married and living in the city. While her husband relates office gossip, she daydreams back to simpler times, where she, her brother, and the aborigine frolic and swim naked in a deep pool within the outback.

Walkabout contains many images of Australian scenery and wildlife, interspersed with scenes from the modern cities, making it a beautifully shot film. Highly recommended.