Listonixio Fresh and Exciting

Afouotos Although it has its amusing moments, in eneral the plot does not convince.

Dynamixor The performances transcend the film's tropes, grounding it in characters that feel more complete than this subgenre often produces.

CrawlerChunky In truth, there is barely enough story here to make a film.

Goingbegging A mother pleads for her son's life in Malaysia, a country sensitive about its reputation for hanging Chinese drug-smugglers while reprieving clean-limbed young Anglo-Saxons who are mostly Australian, as in the present (true) story.Kevin and Geoff are a couple of layabouts with too little to do, partly because both are unattached after Kevin's partner suffers a miscarriage and Geoff has driven off the road while canoodling with his girl at the wheel, killing her, but claiming that she was the driver.Geoff, the dominant character, drifts into smuggling and recruits the docile Kevin as his sidekick. When Kevin asks "Why me?", Geoff just flashes a sunny smile and says "Why not?" Both are brilliantly cast. Hugo Weaving's Geoff is the smoothie whose charm can suddenly turn to thunder under provocation, which is not long coming, while John Polson's Kevin is highly convincing as a young man out of his depth, insecure and jittery, as the airport police are quick to notice.About half the story is devoted to Kevin's mother (Julie Christie) trying to save him from the rope, utterly blind to his guilt. This is certainly a tale of our times, full of the scrambled ethics of cross-border justice. Heroin-profiteers - arguably murderers - are suddenly turned into martyr-victims. And all manner of people presume to impose their own stamp on the due process of law, against the sickening background of corruption in the courts and the jails.Principal of these is the Julie Christie character - or perhaps the actress herself hoping to wangle a free plug for her human-rights agenda. By this time, Christie had generally given up films in favour of political campaigning, notably against the death-penalty. But she disappoints here. To carry conviction as a desperate slum-mum, she of all people would need to camouflage her glamour better than this. And her undeniable acting skills do not extend to accents. Kevin's mother had an English background, but Christie seems to start with a touch of strine, before moving into a vague attempt at Lancashire. Also, there is surprisingly little crusading oratory, just bits and pieces - unless some of it has been edited-out in the version I watched, which was cut from the original four hours to under three. This could also explain the arrival of Sarah Jessica Parker in a role that seemed to me poorly-defined, and Kevin suddenly getting a visit from a shapely hooker, allowed into his cell on the eve of execution, in the style of 18th-century Newgate. This is weak editing, as is the over-use of establishing shots featuring airport signs to signal location. Yet the anti-drug street-posters announcing 'Dadah is Death' are barely referenced.

NonEgo1 Fantastic stuff ? Tragically realistic ? Sensational ? You have all gotta be kidding !! 1)The settings were totally incongruous with Malaysia (where it all is supposed to take place) I'd say ludicrous as the background-extras looked like some typically cheap Australian back-lot instead of the multi-cultural, multi racial Malaysia. There were hardly any faces which might even pass for ethnic Malays. Has the Director even been to Malaysia? 2)The movie was also supposed to be a documentary-drama of sorts but the producer-director could not resist spicing things up a bit. So he created a plot to bribe a prison guard to allow an escape. When you consider that there a few, if any, escapes at all from Malaysian prisons and to think that some low-level local prison guard could actually arrange an escape for 2 high profile, Caucasian convicts, is all incredibly naïve.3)But then again the producer-director was making a film set in Asia so anything is possible and passable isn't it? So he introduced a further scene of the same guard bringing a prostitute into the prison for a convict's pleasure. Was the Director thinking of Thailand perhaps or just trying to live out his own fantasies on film.4)The actors, most noticeably Julie Christie and Hugo Weaving, valiantly did their best, I suppose, what with a miserable script and all. Incredibly it was made into a painful and tediously 3 hours long "mini-series"! Australia in the 80's suffered a terrible inferiority complex and tried to glorify themselves with a mini-series on almost any stupid event where Australians are involved. A piece of advice, avoid Australian mini-series like the plague.5)Of this whole sad enterprise I can only pity 2 things. One would be the parents/families of the 2 convicted drug traffickers. And the other would be any TV network actually stupid enough to buy this terrible Australian farce. Really this movie isn't even fit to grace the toilet seats of a cheap curry house.6)I'd recommend "Return to Paradise (1998)" as a far superior film on the subject.On a more serious note, this movie tried to set a human face on the very inhuman drug trafficking trade. The movie of course failed miserably but what is annoying is 1)It's inaccuracy over the events themselves 2)It's failure to portray Barlow & Chambers as the cynical opportunists that they were and who got exactly what they deserved.3)The Australian press naivety that they can somehow force their view unto other countries through extensive media coverage. In this the Australian media likes to fancy itself to be like the American media which has U.S politicians dancing to their tune. Trouble is of course that no one pays any attention to Australian media except Australian politicians.4)The then Prime Minister Bob Hawke stupidly fell in with this mob and was snubbed & humiliated accordingly. His outburst that hanging was "barbaric" got a response from the Malaysian Government "that if hanging drug traffickers was barbaric, then drug trafficking must be a very civilized trade". Hawke should instead reserved this adjective in describing Australian films such as this.Incidentally "Dadah" means illicit drugs, in the vernacular, not Death.

Michael_Grech This is a sensational movie/mini series. It was released on VHS although you would be very lucky to find a copy anywhere.ALthough it is great and the acting is fantastic, there is one problem with this show. It is very bias towards Kevin Barlow and it constantly makes Geoff Chambers look like the bad guy.I think that someone forgot to tell Barbara Barlow (his mother) that it is against the law to traffic drugs !!! I mean did she really think that because he is her son, they should change the rules for him and not everyone else ?? That is the sad part of this film, other than this it is sensational and if you are lucky enough to see it then you will enjoy it, i can assure you.

Trevor Johns ***SPOILERS*** ***SPOILERS*** I don't know if anyone will ever see this telemovie again. Who knows where it has disappeared to. But just in case there are *SPOILERS* ahead.I remember the events behind this film very well. I recall looking at my watch waiting for my bus at the exact time that the two convicted drug smugglers were due to be falling thru the gallows trap door....7am Sydney time. It is the dramatised true story of two Australian men caught, tried and convicted for heroin smuggling in Malaysia in the mid '80's. One is entitled to think that they got their just deserts, as many did.However the film shows them to be real people and despite their crimes, it demonstrates that once you start to get to know someone's character it becomes difficult to conveniently pigeon hole them under "Criminal", "dreg of society" or whatever. Also demonstrated is how the Malaysian Government were determined to use the case as a show trial, to prove to the West that they were indeed independent and not afraid to execute westerners. All appeals for clemency fall on politically astute but humanely deaf ears.The acting is very good, Hugo Weaving who has gone from strength to strength since this is the more urbane, professional drug smuggler Chambers inadvertently caught by police because his accomplice, Barlow, gives himself away at airport security by being nervously suspect. John Polson as Kevin Barlow makes him believable,a likable, harmless rascal. Barlow was in reality a drug addicted semi down and out.The movie belongs to Julie Christie portraying his working class English born mother, fighting like a tigress for her son. I remember seeing the real Mrs Barlow on television and Ms Christie does her justice, which is the best accolade I can give for an extraordinary display of acting. She IS Mrs Barlow, a most memorable woman. Victor Banerjee is also good as the men's defence lawyer Karpal Singh. But I expected him to be expert having seen him directed by David Lean who knew talent when he saw it. And yes, that is Sarah Jessicah Parker playing an American romantic pen pal to Kevin Barlow.The movie uses flashbacks and follows the meanderings of the case to it's conclusion and then contrives to leave on an upbeat note. One that does not go astray in a story that shows that some countries still use people's barbaric deaths for their own political ends rather than simple justice.