By Maria Lewis
What is the greatest Australian horror film ever made? It’s a simple enough question, really. If you centred it around another nationality – say American or British or New Zealand – you’d be greeted with a chorus of things like ‘The Exorcist!’, ‘28 Days Later!’, ‘Brain Dead!’ in rowdy succession. The point is, people have an answer and they usually have one that leaps to mind straight away. When it comes to anything close to a consensus on the greatest Australian horror film, the results are scattered.
Largely, in part, due to the Australian film industry’s systemic shaming of anything genre related. As a nation, we’re still recovering from the ‘cultural cringe’ revered film critics like David Stratton felt following the Ozploitation movement of the ’70s and ’80s (to be fair, Stratton himself is still recovering from it as even the act of reviewing Wolf Creek 2 back in 2014 was beneath him). Yet artists and audiences have – to put it delicately – moved the fuck on. With some of the most sought after horror filmmakers in the world being Aussie – Leigh Whannell, James Wan, Jennifer Kent, Greg McLean, the Spierig Brothers – and horror making a dent at the Aussie box office this year (international offerings like Get Out and Split took over $6M and $12M respectively), perhaps we may be getting a little bit closer to forming an opinion.
Back in 2009, I was the entertainment and film writer at my local newspaper, The Gold Coast Bulletin. After lobbying for months, I’d finally been given the green light by the editor to research, write, edit and produce a one-off magazine of the top 100 Australian films of all time. The lift out would be available in a Thursday paper to coincide with the first day of the Australian International Movie Convention, which saw a who’s who of the local and Hollywood screen industry roll into town. My number one film was The Adventures Of Priscilla: Queen Of The Desert and that choice went by largely uncontested. In fact, every single choice went by uncontested from the bosses upstairs … except for Greg McLean’s feature debut. When the final proofs of the magazine were printed the week of publication, the editor called me in to his office. Turns out, I had 99 problems and Wolf Creek was one. “Do you really think this should be in here?” he asked, tapping the page in front of him, which listed the top 10 countdown. “Wolf Creek?” I asked, uncertain as to whether he was actually referring to the movie or a typo I’d missed. It was when he asked me about the film’s artistic merit and the presence of gore that I finally understood what he was saying. “Should I remove Dead Calm?” I asked, which was also in the top 10. “What? No, this is about Wolf Creek.” He seemed perplexed, until I followed up with “How about I take Picnic In Hanging Rock out too. And Wake In Fright, Patrick, Razorback, Long Weekend, The Cars That Ate Paris … “ He conceded my point, as I argued that not only did Wolf Creek belong in the top 10 but horror films belonged sprinkled throughout the list.
That encounter taught me something I had only seen from a distance and that was Australians’ reluctance to count horror as worthy. We’d all read the interviews with Whannell and Wan, who couldn’t find support locally for Saw so they had to go overseas to get it off the ground. There was also Mark Hartley’s careful curation of the nose-turn-upage in the Ozploitation doco Not Quite Hollywood. Yet up until that point, I had considered those attitudes as old, dated and attached to people who disliked Broadway but raved about theatre. That same year I had been on the set of the Spierig Brothers’ latest, the highly ambitious Daybreakers, and had genuinely believed things were changing. And yet, the attitude still lingered.
Thankfully, 2017 is a very different time for horror fans compared to what it was nearly 10 years ago. Streaming services have leveled the playing field for not only moviemakers, but those who might have been restricted from seeing films due to financial or physical restrictions (which again is why the elitist cries that streaming is killing movies baffle me). More people are getting to see movies than ever before and more stories are getting told by a range of filmmakers, including horror. The viral nature of hype and buzz has also played a big role. A movie like The Babadook – which barely got theatrical support down under – doesn’t die, but goes on to have multiple lives and impressive box-office in France, the US and UK due to social media and (later) incidental gay icon status. Even something like Wake In Fright, which is a completely foreign beast to people under 30, is getting a new life as a mini-series on Network Ten.
For a long time, many crusty critics and commentators might have considered the question ‘what is the greatest Australian horror film of all time?’ a distasteful one. Now, however, it’s something that garners a huge response from where the majority of the modern movie going public live: social media. In a highly scientific (*cough*) poll carried out across Twitter and Facebook, Wolf Creek was the film most considered to be the best Aussie horror output. There were other titles hot on its tail, Picnic At Hanging Rock, The Babadook and The Loved Ones all scoring notable mentions and plenty of votes. Wyrmwood and Wake In Fright seemed to be the two big cult favourites, with people considering them “underrated” and “underappreciated”. For their part, audiences certainly made Wyrmwood feel valued when the Aussie zombie flick debuted back in 2014. Originally it was only supposed to have a single night theatrical release on Friday the 13th, but Australian theatres had to extend the run for weeks due to audience demand. There are a lot of great Australian horror films out there. With a slate that includes things like Winchester, Cargo, Bloodlands, The Nightingale and Killing Ground all releasing in the next year, it’s a genre legacy our filmmakers (thankfully) aren’t letting go of anytime soon. At least now there’s a more transparent way for them to see that Aussie and international audiences really and truly give a fuck.
Maria Lewis is a journalist and author previously seen on SBS Viceland’s The Feed. She’s the presenter and producer of the Eff Yeah Film & Feminism podcast. Her debut novel Who’s Afraid? was released in 2016 with the sequel – Who’s Afraid Too? – out now. You can find her on Twitter @MovieMazz
