Backbencher

It's nighttime in a Sydney pub. People are laughing, singing, and generally having a good time. Then a fight breaks out between a group of Aborigines. They take their fight outside, and one of them ends up dead. It seems like such a straightforward case: they had a little too much to drink, got a little too rough, and one of the men ended up dead. In steps lawyer David Burton. After talking to the Aborigines, however, Burton becomes convinced that the man was not killed in a bar fight, but rather for violating some sacred Aborigine law. No one will admit to it, however. In fact, the aborigines won’t even admit to being 'tribal', so Burton has nothing but his own instincts to build his case on. So begins Burton’s search, through Aborigine law, tradition, and myth, for the truth behind this death.

This main story line is superimposed over several other stories: one environmental, one deeply personal. Australia has been experiencing huge rainstorms and other disturbing weather-related phenomena that officials are hard pressed to explain. In conjunction with these storms, Burton has been experiencing disconcerting dreams. He dreams of people and things that he later comes across in real life, and also dreams of water and drowning. The man he dreams of is Chris, a young Aborigine, and one of the men that he is defending. With the help of Chris and a tribal spiritual leader named Charlie, Burton begins to understand the spirituality of the Aborigines, especially the importance of dreams, the Dream Time, and Mulkurul.

Aborigines believe in two 'ribbons' of time: the one that we live in, and a circular one known as the Dream Time, which dictates what happens in the time we live in. As Chris said, a "dream is a shadow ... of something real." They are often used to communicate between our time and the Dream Time. Mulkurul are spirit beings who often use human vehicles to communicate their desires, and they are also intertwined with the Dream Time. This is one of the things that was important and interesting about the movie: it really took the time to explore Aboriginal myth and tradition.

However, I found this movie rather difficult to follow and understand. As it progressed, the movie got more and more disjointed, almost as if Burton's dreams were taking over his reality, and taking the movie to hell with them. However, this movie was made in the 1970s, which was an age of fascination with the paranormal, so perhaps the ambiguousness can be blamed on the time of its creation.