Three years ago, writer-director Ivan Sen stood in front of a sold-out crowd at Sydney’s State Theatre, where his latest movie, the outback noirMystery Road, had been selected as Sydney Film Festival’s opening night film.
In just a few short weeks, he’ll return to the venue for the very same occasion – as will his Mystery Road protagonist, hard-edge indigenous detective Jay Swan.
“After making Mystery Road I felt like the character Jay Swan had a lot more to offer,” Sen tells the BRAG in the lead-up to this year’s Sydney Film Festival. “He’s someone who is in a very complex situation as an indigenous police officer who’s upholding white laws and working for the Crown. He’s walking between these two different worlds, and I just felt like there was an opportunity to show another layer of Jay – a certain emotion that I felt like I didn’t quite tap in to with Mystery Road.”
Although not a direct sequel, Goldstone sees Sen reunite with actor Aaron Pedersen, whose compelling performance as Swan proved one of the original film’s most memorable elements. This time he’s working a missing persons case, one that takes him through a small mining town populated by a who’s who of Australian screen talent, including David Wenham, Jacki Weaver and acclaimed indigenous actor David Gulpilil, as well as veteran Chinese actress Cheng Pei-pei.
“I don’t quite consider it a sequel, but there are certain areas which lead in from where Mystery Road left off,” says Sen. “There are elements which connect to Mystery Road, which you don’t really need to know about, but if you have seen Mystery Road there is a connection.”
Once Sen had decided to move forward with the project, things came together extraordinarily quickly. “I sat down and made the first draft of the screenplay in ten days, and then it was funded a few months after that,” he says.
The writer-director also worked closely with Pedersen in shaping where Swan’s story would go. “Aaron was very keen to do another project with Jay. We spoke a lot about Jay’s state of mind in this film. It’s a journey for all the characters, but for Jay it’s a spiritual journey to reclaim his cultural identity.”
As one of the more prominent indigenous filmmakers working today, cultural identity – and indigenous identity in particular – is a major theme in Sen’s work. His debut feature, Beneath Clouds, followed a pair of indigenous teenagers making their way across the country, while 2011’s Toomelah told the story of a troubled ten-year-old living in a remote community in New South Wales. Both films were critically acclaimed, receiving praise for their frank, unflinching depiction of the hardships faced by many indigenous Australians.
“With the rise of indigenous filmmakers, obviously [indigenous perspectives] have gained a lot of weight, and have attracted more and more of an audience,” says Sen. “But in saying that, if you look at the amount of Australian films being produced, they’re still only a very small percentage.”
At the same time, Sen doesn’t see Goldstone as offering an exclusively indigenous point of view. “It’s about what happens when the indigenous perspective crosses with a white perspective, and then crosses with a Chinese perspective,” he says. “So you get this cross-section of cultures, and that’s why I think I really wanted to continue with this character, because he walks between cultures, and give audiences a chance to get a sense of what it’s like. But there’s a pain that comes with that, because in the end you don’t fully belong to any of them.
“In all of my films, I’ve never left the main character,” Sen continues. “They’ve always had this one line, this one plot structure, where you stay with a character and you experience the world through one person’s eyes. I didn’t want to do that with Goldstone. I wanted to present different cultural perspectives, and allow the audience to see the world through different eyes. [I wanted] audiences to walk in the shoes of different characters and to see this collision of worlds from the perspective of each different character … to feel what they feel.”
To that end, Sen approached some of the most talented actors in the country, writing several parts with specific casting choices in mind. “When you do that you can feel a little bit anxious, because if you don’t get those actors then you feel like there’s something missing,” he admits. “I always had the idea of casting Jacki Weaver as the mayor in the film. I wrote that character with her in mind, and basically I felt like I couldn’t make the film without her.
“There’s a kind of major scene in the film, where her character talks about life to Aaron Pedersen’s character. I remember writing that scene in this café one day, and then the day Jacki came out, hearing her speak the words I had written specifically for her, that was pretty special.”
Special too is being selected not once but twice to open one of the country’s biggest film festivals. It’s an honour that certainly hasn’t been lost on Sen. “We know that it’s a really exciting screening,” he says. “I’ve had some screenings around the world which have been very exciting, but this one’s just as exciting as Cannes or Berlin. There’s a lot of enthusiasm and a lot of positivity in the air.”
Goldstone shows at theSydney Film Festival Opening Night Gala at theState Theatre on Wednesday June 8;Casula Powerhouse Arts Centre on Friday June 10; theState Theatre on Saturday June 11; and Hayden Orpheum Cremorne on Sunday June 12.
