Review of Jindabyne (2006) by Sarah H — 05 Jun 2007

A muddled, confounding drama with a serious identity crisis. Ray Lawrence's ("Latana") latest feature stars Laua Linney as an American living with her Irish husband, Stewart (Gabriel Byrne) and young son in rural Australia.

When Stewart and his fishing buddies discover a mutilated body on the river, their actions taken (or lack thereof) result in a splintering of domestic life, opening up a proverbial "can of worms" that results in major consequences for all parties involved.

Starts out good, but takes a serious wrong turn once the dead body enters the story; frankly, the film had enough going before the body -- it seemed a little unnecessary. But the problems don't stop there; the film wants to be a family drama, a murder mystery, and a liberal guilt picture all wrapped up with a nice bow, but such a task is simply too ambitious for the underwhelming screenplay (based on a work by Raymond Carver, whose story is much clearer and better than this film, I imagine).

Linney is good -- she's good in whatever she does -- but "Jindabyne" is overlong and leaves a bitter aftertaste.