Fed: The blood bath of film Noise hits Aussie's close to home

AAP General News (Australia)
04-20-2007
Fed: The blood bath of film Noise hits Aussie's close to home

By Erin McWhirter, National Entertainment Writer

SYDNEY, April 20 AAP - Melbourne teenager Lavinia Smart scans the bloody mess of dead
bodies surrounding her while a wayward killer points a gun to her temple.

The McDonald's worker is the last surviving passenger of a murder spree on a Melbourne
suburban train and is overwhelmed by the scene that confronts her.

But almost as quickly as the rampage began, it's over. The killer flees and the mentally
scarred teenager is left to pick up the pieces.

This is just one of many twisted tales entwined to make the Australian film Noise,
directed and written by Matthew Saville.

At the centre of the story is Graham McGahan who is a cop - almost by default he thinks.

Self-centred, beset with doubt and afflicted with tinnitus - a sensation of noise (as
a ringing or roaring) in the ear - he is sent by his boss to man a police van in a suburban
shopping strip after the violent murder spree rocks the local community.

Portrayed by Love My Way star Brendan Cowell, McGahan is forced to push through the
vulnerability of his medical condition to arrest the communities fears.

Saville, the director behind television dramas The Secret Life of Us and The Surgeon,
as well as sketch comedy series Skithouse, Big Bite and We Could Be Heroes says the most
chilling aspect of the script is the world in which it takes place.

"Noise is prosaic. It supposes that the horrors that unfold do so not in some cinematic
facsimile of an urban dystopia, but in a place that is ordinary, familiar and unremarkable;
a place that we instantly recognise as our own," he told AAP ahead of the flick opening
nationally on May 3.

"So it is into our world that a monster has arrived. Just as startling is how familiar
both the protagonists and antagonists seem. They are people we see in our everyday lives."

While Saville says a director is "never totally satisfied" with the finished product,
he admits he's proud of Noise, which screened in the world cinema section at Robert Redford's
Sundance Film Festival in January.

He says the cast and crew pulled together to stay true to the original script he began
writing eight years ago, a rarity in the film world.

"I am very proud of it and grateful for the opportunity to make it and make it largely
on our own terms," the Melbourne based director said.

"Quite often it's like root canal work that lasts over eight years (to realise the
vision as closely to the script as possible), but this was a really blessed project. The
more it created steam the more we found people that were like minded in spirit."

Saville is at a loss to explain from where the idea for the $3.9 million budget film
sprung, but says the strength of Lavinia Smart, portrayed by Maia Thomas, played a big
part in the plot.

"You don't wake up one morning and go: 'Here it is'. It's kind of like cooking, you
gather the ingredients and experience, try this and that and see what works and what doesn't,"

he said.

"So there were things there like the germ of an idea in the fascination of exploring
a girl in distress. She gets onto a train and what does she do? Does she just lay down
or does she fight back? What she shows is extraordinary strength and she does so throughout
the course of the film."

One thing the director was sure of though, was Cowell's ability to morph into the character
of McGahan.

"It suited him down to a tee," Saville said.

"I think he (Cowell) was consumed by the role in a sense. He very much took on the
persona of Graham McGahan. He had a very laid back, easygoing presence on set."

Saville's films have screened in more than 200 festivals around the world.

In 2003, his short feature, Roy Hollsdotter Live, screened at the Melbourne, Sydney,
Brisbane, Adelaide, Locarno, Cork and Montreal and the Commonwealth International Film
festivals.

The film, also shown on SBS, won Saville the Dendy Award for best short film at the
Sydney Film Festival and best original script for television at the 2003 Australian Writers'
Guild awards.

It was also nominated for a Film Critics' Circle of Australia and two Australian Film
Institute (AFI) awards.

While juggling the post-production process for Noise, Saville was filming the Foxtel
telemovie, The King, a biopic about television legend Graham Kennedy.

Saville says it was chaotic, but he finally feels like he's cracked the big time.

"Both projects were great, but I am not going to try and do two long-form films in
a year again," he said.

"It was tiring and the Kennedy gig was the perfect gig at exactly the wrong time. But
how could you turn it down?

"This (Noise) was a film I wanted to make but knew it would be impossible to make until
I got some more runs on the board. So I made smaller films and worked as extensively as
I could in television. Now I apply those skills to film."

Noise will open on 12 selected screens across the country and Saville hopes it engages
the public.

"We got a modest sale when we took it to Cannes and I am glad we got the sale in America,"

Saville said.

"It's opening in a really highly regarded art-house cinema in New York and will grow
on that. In Australia we are not opening wide on 200 screens, we carefully selected 12
across the country and with a little luck will build from there to 30 or 40 screens. With
luck.

"We don't all have to be McDonald's. We can sometimes just open a smaller restaurant," he grins.

AAP em/cjh/cdh

KEYWORD: NOISE (AAP FILM FEATURE, PIX AVAIL) RPTG

2007 AAP Information Services Pty Limited (AAP) or its Licensors.