You might wince at the stab toward contemporary relevance when Yadaka speaks of being persecuted for “existing whilst Black,” but Collins is sufficiently excellent as an actor to sell the line anyway. While the children are away from the remote homestead, Yadaka and Molly gradually - and, on her part, begrudgingly - forge a wary friendship based on their shared memories of abuse and marginalization.
(Note how Louisa survives influenza seemingly by wiling herself to do so.) But they are strangers in a strange land, and they remain ineffectual observers at best, upholders of the status quo at worst, as “The Drover’s Wife” proceeds along a narrative track that feels as unforgiving as that of a 1940s film noir. The Klintoffs are basically decent, well-meaning people - which Molly obviously recognizes when she accepts their offer to temporarily resettle her children in Everton - and the film grants them, in different ways, opportunities to reveal moral and physical strengths. Nate Klintoff (Sam Reid), who’s been assigned to enforce British law in the nearby rough-and-ready Everton Outpost, and his London-bred wife, Louisa (Jessica De Gouw), an aspiring writer and proto-feminist who intends to start a newsletter proselytizing for the rights of battered women, among other things. After some initial reluctance fueled by vigilance, she offers places at her table for two travelers: Sgt. Long before the fugitive Yadaka (Rob Collins) shows up near her doorstep with a metal shackle around his neck and a plaintive tone to his voice, Molly demonstrates her independence by shooting a wild bullock that wanders onto her land, then carving up the carcass to feed herself and her four children. At the same time, however, she repeatedly emphasizes - sometimes too insistently, but more often eloquently - the enduring wisdom of William Faulkner’s much-quoted observation that the past is never dead, it’s not even past. As a filmmaker, Purcell is brutally specific while defining her 19th-century world and expressing her concerns. Unfortunately, this formidable frontierswoman must indeed deal with more - a lot more, actually - during the course of Purcell’s perceptively detailed and punishingly harsh tragedy about lives shaped, stunted or destroyed by the sexual and racial politics and presumptions endemic to British colonial Australia.
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