Wake in Fright (1971) on Netflix
John Grant is a schoolteacher in the outback township of Tiboonda. Bound for Sydney, he stops in the mining town of Bundanyabba, where a bet at two-up strips him of his fare.
- Netflix3.3/5
- IMDb7.5/1016,754 votes
- Rotten Tomatoes96%
Trailer
Plot summary
John Grant teaches at a tiny school in Tiboonda, a remote outback township, where a bond signed in return for his education obliges him to stay two years. He resents the arrangement. With the Christmas holidays beginning, he heads for Sydney to visit his girlfriend, Robyn. His journey takes him to the mining town of Bundanyabba, nicknamed The Yabba, where he must pass a night before his flight. In a pub, the policeman Jock Crawford drinks beers with him and then introduces him to two-up, an illegal gambling game. John also meets Clarence "Doc" Tydon, a vagrant alcoholic doctor who questions his scorn for the town. Hoping to win enough to clear his bond, John joins the game and loses all his cash in two rounds, which strands him in the town.
Cast
- Al Thomasas Tim Hynes
- John Armstrongas Atkins
- Norm Erskineas Joe the Cook (as Norman Erskine)
Did you know?!Facts and trivia about Wake in Fright (1971)
Can contain spoilers, watch the movie first.
- While filming the kangaroo hunt, producer George Willoughby fainted after seeing a kangaroo "splattered in a particularly spectacular fashion", and the crew orchestrated a power failure to end the hunt.
- Editor Anthony Buckley began searching in 1994 for a better-preserved, uncut copy of Wake in Fright, and eight years later found its negatives in Pittsburgh in a shipping container labeled "For Destruction".
- Selected as a Cannes Classic by Martin Scorsese, Wake in Fright is one of only two films ever to screen twice in the history of the Cannes Film Festival.
- Robert Helpmann was initially hired to play Doc Tydon, but was replaced with Donald Pleasence because of scheduling conflicts.
- Actor Michael York said in a 1980 interview that he turned down a role in Wake in Fright because the kangaroo hunting scene offended him.
- Wake in Fright was the last film of veteran character actor Chips Rafferty, who died of a heart attack before its release, and an early film for future Australian cinema star Jack Thompson.
- At an early Australian screening, a man stood up, pointed at the screen and protested "That's not us!", and Jack Thompson yelled back, "Sit down, mate. It is us."
