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Between the turn of the century and 1970 Britain sent thousands of the children within its care services to Australia. Ostensibly this was for adoption, but in reality they were largely sent to work houses run by various charities and religious organisations.
This film is the real life story of Margaret Humphreys and her attempts to mend these wounded, dislocated, people.
The film is by Jim Loach, son of Ken Loach, and whilst I don't think it's capital G great I think it's a very worthy production and a great debut picture for Jim Loach. He has a touch of his fathers naturalism, although this film seems to pull its punches a little more than Ken Loach would. It's far more straight forward and far more broad in scope than a Ken Loach film and at times it feels like it's almost populated with pantomine villains (both the British government and the Australian adoption agencies come across as one dimensional monsters in their limited screen time). It's not a film that dabbles in grey areas, but that singular purpose actually allows you to really empathise with the situation.
The deportation programme is a dark history in both Britain and Australia's history, with the British governments cynical lack of care and the institutional abuse within the Australian adoption agencies creating an entire generation of broken people. Loach focuses on the people and in particular focuses on Humphreys' and the effect the work is having on her well being. The film is populated with great performances (Hugo Weaving and David Wenham are both great as grown up orphans) but Emily Watson is kind of astounding as Humphreys bringing a terseness and passion to the role which really helps to shade a character who could be potentially very one dimensional. Her performance is singularly devastating, as she essentially becomes an avatar for a thousand Orphan's grief, and it helps to tie the film together.
The movie, due to its scope, is very episodic with the story, and characters, progressing at an almost breakneck pace. The ancillary characters as such never really get to exist outside of their interaction with Humphreys and it's only due to the great performances by Weaving and Wenham that we really get a feel for the people.
But still, it's a fascinating insight into a particularly nasty piece of British/Australian history and it's a great start for Jim Loach.
