All of us, so the saying goes, can choose our friends but not our family. Australian director Cherie Nowlan taps into that universal grievance in Clubland, a warts-and-all picture of the weird and wonderful Dwights: a bunch of kooky Sydney-siders who you might want to meet but wouldn't want to share the bloodline with. A hit at this year's Sundance Film Fesival, where it was picked up for international distribution by Warner Independant, Nowlan's burbs comedy/drama tells a coming-of-age story, although that description applies equally to young and old. And it applies especially to Jeannie (Brenda Blethyn).
Jeannie is the overbearing mother of Tim (Khan Chittenden) and Mark (Richard Wilson). Before Tim introduces his girlfriend Jill (Emma Booth) to the family he solemnly announces that there is something he simply must tell her about his folks. By the tone of his voice you'd swear he was about to confess that Jeannie and John (Frankie J. Holden) burn flags and recite esoteric racist chants on the weekend, but instead he confesses that they are simply "entertainers."
John is a security guard and a country music never-was-has-been who once had a single that lasted three weeks in the charts. Jeannie is a stand-up comedian who specialises in sex jokes: sleeping with a heavyset man, for example, is like having a wardrobe fall on top of you with the key still inside. The glue that holds the Dwight family together (Jeannie and John are separated) is Mark, a cloddish but likeable fellow who was brain-damaged at birth. Clubland paints a warming portrait of a dysfunctional family; the screenplay, written by Keith Thompson, never simplifies to the common denominator but never feels pretentious or inaccessible either.
Nowlan shepherds her cast away from stereotypes, which must have presented some tempting options: the nervous virgin, the jealous mother, the failed musician. Clubland's story essentially charters Jill's inadvertent influence on the Dwight family, and especially the mother/son dynamic between Jeannie and Tim. In Nowlan's own words, this is a story "about letting go" and a film that lives or dies by the strength of its characters.
Led by a tour-de-force performance from Brenda Blethyn, the cast conjure pathos in the lives of their small-time personalities. This happens in a very Aussie way: the important characters don't take themselves too seriously, and have great propensity for self-deprecation. Jill is quick to point out that her boobs are small. Mark is humorously at ease with his own mental limitations. John is a larrikin security guard but a sharp and weary father. Jeannie, who at times takes herself way too seriously, has flashes of caustic self-criticism. Blethyn, Holden and Wilson dangle absurdity and profundity in the same breaths.
The mood and tempo of Clubland also reflects a tone that can fluctuate quickly between uppers and downers, the funny and the sad. In a bedroom moment of hot-lovin' Tim is determined not to culminate too quickly, so he and Jill exchange a forced conversation about cars, straining through short innocuous observations in panting breaths. It's a way of lightening what would otherwise be a tense and awkward dramatic moment of young virility gone bad, and that approach echoes throughout the film in its treatment of serious issues. You'll laugh one moment and sigh, emotionally engaged, the next. Balancing comedic and dramatic impulses so fluidly is never a small-chips achievement, and Nowlan hangs the sweet and the sour together with heartfelt discretion.
- Review by Luke Buckmaster
