Most Helpful Customer Reviews
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16 of 18 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
depressing and unpredictable - 2 of my favorite things in a movie, July 23, 2006
I saw this dvd in the previewed section at Blockbuster, not knowing what it was really about. But my admiration for Blanchett and Neill compelled me to buy it, and I'm glad that I did.
Blanchett's character, Tracy, is trying to get her life back together post drug addiction, but society is slow to forgive a bad, broken-down history. One of my favorite scenes is when she's at the bank and shoves the loan officer's photographs of her children onto the floor, smashing the glass all over the place. Another time she breaks something is at the restaurant, where she finds Jonny with his family. The violent outbursts are certainly in line with her character (understandable, I mean - not excusable). She's frustrated, trying to get money for her business, and turned down (though it is very understandable why the bank would do that, as most financial institutions aren't too keen on the risk of lending to someone who's on their "second chance" at anything). Also, she gives her old boyfriend Jonny a second chance, but he ends up deceiving her.
I appreciated how the movie as a whole was unpredictable with great character studies (although I wish Sam Neill's character had a larger role). In the dvd special features section, Blanchett says that she loved how the movie centered on 30 year olds who weren't "cool" because they didn't know what they were doing with their lives, still living with parents - and most movies ignore those kind of people and the struggles they face.
The end kind of leaves you hanging. The beach part was beautiful, though I hated seeing the bug near Lionel's eye.
Really sad music, too. I loved the karaoke bits, and the song that was playing in the beginning at the reunion dance party, as well as the song that the children sang. I don't think I can reproduce the lyrics here, but the song is quite intriguing and fits with the movie so well. It's called "Flame Trees."
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13 of 16 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Another Superb Film From Australia, April 13, 2006
Writer Jacqueline Perske and Director Rowan Woods chalk up another successful Australian film in LITTLE FISH, an intense, very personal drama about how illegal drugs affect communities, families and individuals. The story begs patience from the viewer as it is gratefully one that does not spell everything out for the viewer, but instead introduces the characters slowly and with hints of backgrounds that bring them to the moments of crisis the timeframe of the film uses.
Taking place in the Little Saigon area of Sydney, Tracy Heart (Cate Blanchett) is a recovered junkie who lives with her mother Janelle (Noni Hazlehurst) and partial amputee brother Ray (Martin Henderson), each trying to make ends meet in a life previously destroyed by drug addiction. Tracy has been clean for four years, works in a video store but has dreams of owning her own business, dreams that are thwarted by banks refusing to give her business loans solely on the basis of her previous addiction. Ray, his amputated leg the result of a car accident somehow connected with drugs, still sells heroin in 'little fish' containers, occasionally calling upon Tracy to make pickups and deliveries. The now absent stepfather Lionel (Hugo Weaving) fights his own addiction both to drugs and to his dealer Brad (Sam Neill) with whom he has been in a gay relationship since his divorce from Janelle. Tracy tries to support Lionel's attempts to kick his habit, but the attempts are failures. Everything comes to a head when 1) Tracy is desperate without her needed bank loan, 2) Tracy's Vietnamese ex-lover Jonny (Dustin Nguyen) returns from Vancouver where his family sent him to avoid the persecution of rehab in Sydney, 3) Brad retires leaving Lionel without a source of drugs or love and Lionel is replaced by a quasi-normal Steven (Joel Tobeck) who kicks the last part of the film into a spin. There are no solutions to anyone's problems: things just happen and the characters respond in the best way they can with the ominous cloud of drug addiction shading their lives and futures.
The script is terse and smart and the direction is relentlessly realistic and well paced. Cate Blanchett gives a sterling portrayal of the very complex Tracy, and Hugo Weaving, Noni Hazelhurst, Sam Neill, Dustin Nguyen, and Martin Henderson are superb. This is a tough little film that does not fear to examine the truth about the effect of drugs on people's lives and spirits. It is a very fine film. Recommended. Grady Harp, April 06
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10 of 13 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Another astounding performance from Australia's Queen Kate..., April 11, 2006
Sydney is awash in illegal drugs, at least that's the impression one gets when watching the difficult new Cate Blanchett film Little Fish. Directed by Rowan Woods, the film is not only a vehicle for showcasing the wonderful Queen Kate at her very best, but shows a very gritty, desperate side of the Sydney drug scene, far from the glamorous party world of the inner-city.
The story centers on Tracy Heart (Blanchett), a 32-year-old recovering drug addict who manages a video store in the working class Western Sydney suburb of Cabramatta. Tracy's an insecure, restless and watchful girl, who is anxious to get on with her life. After four year working as the manager of the video store, her boss wants her to buy it and expand it by offering Internet access.
But her druggie past constantly haunts her and because of her record of credit-card fraud during her days on heroin, her applications for a bank loan are summarily rejected. And although Tracy has been clean for a number of years, the physical and emotional detritus from the bad old days surrounds her. She refuses to break her connections to bad-boy Lionel Dawson (Hugo Weaving), a former Australian football star and family friend who introduced her to heroin in the first place and who is still using.
Lionel is ex-lover of the local drug kingpin, Brad Thompson (Sam Neill). Brad is also Lionel's supplier and the local resident evil bad boy. After announcing that he's about to retire from the business, Lionel is thrown into a panic and in desperation turns to Tracy to supply him with his fix. But Tracy also has to contend with the arrival of former boyfriend and co-junkie, Jonny (Dustin Nguyen), a lithe and deceptively charismatic Vietnamese Australian who has ostensibly returned to Sydney from Vancouver to work as a stockbroker, but has darker motives and a hidden agenda.
Completing the foursome is Tracy's brother (Martin Henderson), who lost his leg in a mysterious car accident, and has begun selling vials of heroin, "little fish" in local pubs and clubs. Tracy's mother Janelle (a fabulous Noni Hazlehurst) is fiercely protective of her daughter and is concerned that she might start using again, and she becomes even more concerned when Jonny turns up at their house, re-igniting the old romantic spark between them.
Little Fish is an opaque, enigmatic and cryptic film, which at first glance is not easily accessible - like the pool where Tracy constantly swims, everything is hidden under the surface and it takes awhile for the plot to kick in. In the meantime, we are introduced to this eclectic cast of characters that populate Tracy's bedraggled and fractured world. Obviously whether Tracy will start using again is part of the dramatic intent, but the film is also interested in exploring the often complicated and conflicted relationships existing amongst the characters.
While all the performances are superlative - particularly Hugo Weaving as the emaciated, and beaten-down Lionel - Little Fish is really Ms. Blanchett's film. She fully embodies Kate's frustrations and anger at the world and her impatience to remake herself - to get the break that she so desperately craves for. And her portrayal of a damaged and highly-strung woman so desperate to live a "straight" life, free from the temptations of heroin is formidable.
Little Fish is a sober and beautifully played film. It's honest and uncompromising and it doesn't offer any easy answers to the problems of heroin and the day-today struggles of ex-junkies. The urge to use is always there for Kate, and the fact that she's willing to lie on her bank loan application indicate that old habits die-hard.
The cycle of secrecy and deceit is still there and can remain long after the actual habit has been kicked, proving that the drug can still have a vice-like grip on those who stay around it long after they've stopped using. Mike Leonard April 06.
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