The Proposition

by Erik McClanahan

An Aussie western with substance and style to spare, The Proposition is a film full of great performances, engrossing themes and lovely cinematography that juxtaposes the beautiful desolate Australian outback with scenes of brutal violence.

Australian director John Hillcoat (To Have and To Hold) puts a fresh spin on the western film genre by setting it in British-invaded Australia sometime around the end of the bushranger era (1880’s), where the criminals and coppers both would rather be anywhere else but among the native aborigines and endless desert.

Nick Cave, pulling double duty here by writing the script and composing the film’s music (with Warren Ellis), weaves a riveting story together with the subtle, string-heavy score and his tough, realistic script. Cave’s fabulous screenplay mixes morbid dialogue, memorable characters and the always-important western themes of redemption, betrayal, family and loyalty.

Hillcoat, along with editors Jon Gregory and Ian Seymour, begin the film with an elegiac montage of old black and white photos of people from the era (similar to Terrence Malick’s Days Of Heaven). The music grabs your attention at once and you feel immediately transported to this time and place. Then like a punch to the gut, the viewer literally is thrown into this time and place as gunshots echo throughout a shack. We are in the middle of a gunfight and Hillcoat lets the viewers play catch up. This opening clutches you by the throat and doesn’t let go until the chaotic ballet of bullets ends.

After several casualties, and about a thousand bullet holes, Captain Stanley (the terrific Ray Winstone, from Sexy Beast) questions Mikey and Charlie (Richard Wilson and Guy Pearce), two-thirds of the notorious Burns brothers. Stanley has been after the brothers (saying “I will civilize this country”) since they massacred the Hopkins family, which were friends of Stanley and his wife. Stanley gives the titular proposition to Charlie and sets up the rest of the story: he has until Christmas to hunt down and kill his older brother Arthur (Danny Huston, of The Constant Gardener), who Stanley believes to be the real madman of the family, and Mikey will not be hanged. Stanley tells them they will both go free if this is done.

The characters and narrative are then set in motion. Mikey is being held in prison, and Charlie sets out to find his brother. On the way, he encounters a drunken bounty hunter, played by the legendary John Hurt, and receives some clues as to where his brother might be hiding. In the film’s most violent and shocking scene, we see Charlie wake up, confused and wandering around when he is suddenly speared by an aborigine through the shoulder. This scene looks extremely real as Charlie leans back in pain, spits out some blood, looks up at his assailants and watches one of their heads get blown off by a rifle shot.

Charlie’s brother has saved his life. A member of the gang gives him medical remedy to his injury. From then on, Charlie has to decide what he’s going to do. He is conflicted by the offer given to him by Capt. Stanley. Speaking of conflicts, Stanley is in a bit of a pickle as well. He is stricken with headaches, feels he must protect his wife (Emily Watson) from the harsh dangers of the Outback, and is questioning if he did the right thing letting Charlie Burns go free. The Proposition is filled with layers of characterization and substance.

In the end, the film goes in all the right directions and finishes on a strong note. Before the credits roll, Charlie has chosen to become a good person. Guy Pearce (Memento, L.A. Confidential) gives another memorable performance. How is he not one of the top leading men in the movies now? Here he makes us care for his character, which is something given his history and his criminal ways.

The cinematography is first rate from DP Benoit Delhomme, using the sun-drenched vistas and amazing Outback landscapes to create a character in and of itself. The photography is full of sepia tones splattered with dark blood reds. Delhomme uses the greens and light reds of Stanley’s garden at his home to show how the British tried to make Australia in the UK’s image, but the desert just wouldn’t have it.

The screenplay is so full of memorable dialogue that it could be a dark horse contender for an Academy Award nomination this year. The characters speak such brutal dialogue, and the actors believe in it with such conviction, that you feel transported to this time and place:

Jellon Lamb: What is an Irishman but a nigger turned inside out?

Samuel Stote: What's a misanthrope?

Two Bob: A misanthrope is a bugger who hates every other bugger.

Samuel Stote: Are we misanthropes?

Arthur Burns: Lord no! We're family.

Ultimately, The Proposition is a film that is great because all of the parts came together at the right time and the right place. It is a beautiful film, one that deserves to be seen by many. It’s the best western to come along since Clint Eastwood’s Unforgiven.