An average movie

To be honest, I wasn’t really sure what to expect from this flick but, since it sounded like an intriguing story and since it was available on Netflix, I thought I might as well check it out. In fact, 50 years ago, before I was even born, my father went around the world with his brother for 3 years and, at some point, they did spend 6 months working in the Australian desert. If I recall it correctly, my dad was working in the kitchen washing dishes. So, as you can see, I had a personal connection with this story and I was wondering how they would tackle this material. Well, even though it was a decent effort, I’m afraid that the end-result still turned out to be slightly flat after all. The main issue I had was that none of the characters, neither the two backpackers nor the locals, were developed whatsoever. I won’t blame Julia Garner and Jessica Henwick, they were both fine but there was not much they could do with their characters. As a result, through the whole duration, one acted constantly scared sh*tless (probably understandably so) while the other was acting reckless on regular occasions but it seemed that she was making such poor decisions more to help out the plot than really because it made sense for her.  Unfortunately, it was probably the only things really defining them and it was just not enough. At several points, it was hinted that there might be some other reasons why they went backpacking at the other side of the world but nothing was done with that after all. Concerning the locals, well, it was even worse. Either they acted like some drunken sexual predators or they acted nice, always depending on what was needed for the plot at that specific point so they ended with no personality whatsoever. At the end of the day, the whole thing was pretty much reduced to the question ‘Will they get raped or not?’ which was so limiting for these two interesting girls and to the people living there. Anyway, to conclude, in spite of its flaws, it was still a decent watch and I think it is worth a look but, with this material, it could have been much better though. 

6/10