163: The Chant of Jimmie Blacksmith

I can see why this film wasn’t received well in its native Australia.  The 1001 text notes that at the time it was made, The Chant of Jimmie Blacksmith (1978) was the most expensive picture ever produced in the country, which seems hard to believe considering the controversial nature of its subject matter.  At the core of this story is the racial conflict between Aborigines and the white colonists who inhabit the outback at the turn of the last century, and a man who finds himself torn between the two groups.  Jimmie Blacksmith is the son of a native woman and a white man, and as such is fully accepted by neither culture.

            As a boy, he is the ward of a white minister and his wife that hope to educate him enough that he might win the hand of a white farm girl, and produce children that will be less ostracized.  He is punished for the interludes he takes from the “civilized” culture to boomerang hunt with his uncle and participate in tribal rights of passage.  By the time he grows to be man he knows that he will never wholly belong with either faction.  An outcast almost everywhere he goes, he is forced to find manual labor jobs, building fences to stay fed, working for low wages paid by racist farmers.  When he wins the affections of a white servant girl the two are married after she becomes pregnant.

            He hopes to start a life and a family from the small makeshift shack he has built on the grounds of his labor, but is dismayed when the child is born completely white.  Realizing that the baby is not his son, he decides to carry on regardless.  However, when the wife of his cruel boss encourages his spouse to leave him, he flies into a rage.  In an unexpected scene of brutality Jimmie bludgeons the woman, her daughters and a niece to death with a wood axe.  The remainder of the film then becomes an extended chase sequence chronicling the protagonist’s life on the run from the authorities.   

            The depictions of racism, in all of its forms both overt and subtle, as well as violence in this movie are startling.  Initially, it was to be restricted in Australia to only 18+ audiences until it won a controversial appeal.  In all, it is a well made film, and certainly scandalous for its time I’m sure, but this far into the list, and with contemporary hindsight, it didn’t have the shock factor that it once might have held.  Where it failed to shock, it also failed to awe.  The opportunity for such beautiful cinematography surrounds this picture, and yet only once or twice does its director, Fred Schepisi, show us the vastness of the Australian landscape.  Jimmie and his various cohorts are confined too often to full and medium shots.

            It seems odd to me that in a span of not even fifty films, I’ve covered two Australian pictures which focus on class conflict at the turn of the twentieth century.  The first, My Brilliant Career (1979; # 183), was an inspiring romantic commentary on Victorian social values, which as I noted was the type of movie my mother would love.  This picture, made a year earlier, is a rather cynical and violent commentary on Victorian social values that I’m sure my mother would hate.

             The Chant of Jimmie Blacksmith legitimized Australian cinema in the estimation of the Cannes film festival, making way for the selection of My Brilliant Career the following season, but I don’t think it has aged well.  Since its release, so many other pictures which center on racial conflict have bravely tackled the complex issue from any number of standpoints.  While Jimmie’s story, based on true events, is compelling, it seams to pull its legitimate punches, while showing its grittier teeth, losing the poignancy of its massage amongst its violent flourishes.  All in all, these missed opportunities add up to a “so-so” movie.

Grade: 2 Hats Off