Worth: $18.00
FilmInk rates movies out of $20 — the score indicates the amount we believe a ticket to the movie to be worth
Cast:
Rahel Romahn, Elliott Giarola, Veronica Cloherty, Athiéi, Thuso Lekwape, Peter Maple
Intro:
A stunning depiction of an Australia not frequently seen on screen...
While Australia’s vast outback, inner cities, and glistening coastline are featured regularly in our local films, this country’s suburban sprawl tends to be ignored. Richly diverse, vibrant, highly multicultural and frequently wracked by crime and unrest, the spacious outer suburbs of, in particular, Sydney and Melbourne don’t get much play on screen here, even though they’re not far removed from the oft-filmed urban areas of New York and LA in the US. All of which makes writer/director Ronnie S. Riskalla’s debut feature Streets of Colour feel instantly original, alive, and distinct in terms of its visual rhythms and thematic thrust. While it certainly walks the same rough turf as cracking Aussie films like The Combination and Cedar Boys, Streets of Colour has a feel all its own, with its scenes of grim familial collapse, drug use, and suburban malaise offset with a glowing sense of hope and optimism.
Terence “Tez” Hadid (a beautiful performance from Rahel Romahn, who gets to slalom all over the emotional map here, even going full Raging Bull in one scene of wrenching, desperate emotion) is a young Aussie man who tries to disguise his Arabic heritage by bleaching his hair and wearing startling blue contact lenses. Tez likes to smoke weed and hang with his mates, but when his best friend Akachi (a lovely performance from Thuso Lekwape) is killed in a fight with the violently racist older brother of their friend Kyle (Elliott Giarola), Tez’s life implodes. His relationship with Akachi’s sister Tina (Athiéi) – who is carrying his child – hits the skids, and two years later, Tez is running drugs for a local dealer, dipping into his own bag way, way too much, and denied any access to his young son because he can’t pass a drug test. But with the help of new flame and calming influence Maddie (Veronica Cloherty) and the emotional guidance of mysterious old local Alexander (Peter McAllum), Tez might just be able to turn it around.
With gritty tales of petty crime and street life, authenticity is key, and it’s plainly obvious that writer/director Ronnie S. Riskalla knows exactly what he’s talking about with Streets of Colour, while his passion for his subject matter is equally striking. He gives the streets of Sydney’s western suburb of Mount Druitt a real sense of grungy poetry, capturing their beaten down, worn out quality, but also their vibrancy and feeling of urgency. Riskalla also gets very strong performances out of his young leads, and feels intimately in tune with the characters that he’s created for them. Even the film’s minor, late-play faith-related elements are weaved seamlessly into the fabric of the film, and don’t stand out as distractingly as they often do in other works. A stunning depiction of an Australia not frequently seen on screen, Streets of Colour is a tough, angry, honest look at one man’s journey through hell that will leave you emotionally shattered, but still brimming with hope. Streets of Colour is a true diamond in the rough.
