Made under an Australian Film Commission initiative to develop emerging writers and directors, Stranded is a black comedy about a girl trying to start a new life after the loss of her mother. Claudia (Emma Lung) lives and fights with her loving but inept father and psychotic little sister. Moving into her mother’s abandoned car in the driveway, Claudia plans to fix it and take off—that’s if she can avoid falling in love with the cute kleptomaniac from the local supermarket.
Taking his cue from Kathleen O’Brien’s excellent script, director Stuart McDonald wisely opts for dark humour rather than sentimentality. There are serious themes here—hopelessness and suicide, intimacy and responsibility—but the film-makers resist the temptation to resort to emotional catharsis.
Plus Sexy Thing, director Denie Pentecost’s imaginative portrait of a day in the life of a 12-year-old girl who dives in and out of an underwater fantasy world. (AUSTRALIA, 2006. COLOUR. 14 MIN.)