Australia drama
1971
color 100 min.
Director: Nicolas Roeg
CLV: $49.95 - available
1 disc, catalog # CC1502L
DVD: $29.95 - available
1 disc, catalog # WAL120
VHS: available from Home Vision Cinema
For the first time ever released in the U.S.!
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"SISKEL & EBERT" - Transcript of "WALKABOUT" Review
As it appeared in show #1122, Taped 1/29/97, aired 2/1/97.
ROGER EBERT: For many years now one legendary film has appeared on every list of fine movies that are missing from distribution and home video. And that film is Nicolas Roeg's "WALKABOUT," the 1971 drama about a 14-year-old girl and her little brother, who are lost in the Australian outback and are saved by a young Aborigine who is, indeed, walking about as his rite of passage into manhood. No one who saw "WALKABOUT" has ever forgotten it, and now it has been restored with some additional scenes in a new director's cut that is playing in theaters.
Nicolas Roeg was a cinematographer before he was a director, and this is one of the best-photographed films ever. It's also a meditation about living on earth, which finds beauty in the way mankind's intelligence can adapt to harsh conditions while civilization just tries to wall them off or pave them over. "WALKABOUT" is one of the great films. See it on a big screen if you can, during its limited national release.
GENE SISKEL: Well, it is exceptional. And I want to focus on one word in your review, and that is "wall". Because the payoff of this film is spectacular.
ROGER: Yes.
GENE: And that's I think the emotional kick of what this film is; it's a serenade of physical beauty, and it's so well done.
ROGER: It sure is.
THE CRITICS' JOINT COMMENT FROM THE SUMMARY PORTION OF THE SHOW :
ROGER: And two very enthusiastic thumbs up for the restoration and re-release of the director's cut of "WALKABOUT," a great film.
CREDITS
Directed and Photographed by Nicolas Roeg
Starring Jenny Agutter, Lucien John, David Gumpilil
Screenplay by Edward Bond
Music by John Barry
Based on the novel by James Vance Marshall
TRANSFER
This restored director's cut of Walkabout has been digitally remastered in letterbox format. Includes original promotional trailer and closed captioned sound.
