Dirt Music is a contemporary bodice-ripper set on the wild West Coast of Australia. Georgie (Kelly Macdonald) has become increasingly dissatisfied in her lot as the second wife of Jim (David Wenham), the local commercial fishing baron. Taking some personal time out on the beach, she happens upon Lu, a recluse who ekes out his subsidence from midnight poaching; it turns out that Lu has been emotionally scarred by tragedy in his family.
Georgie and Lu are soulmates and soon become passionate bedmates. Jim, pissed off about Lu’s poaching and REALLY pissed that he is screwing his wife, drives Lu out of town. Georgia goes on a quest to find Lu, who has become even more reclusive, becoming a needle in an endless haystack of tiny coastal islands. At this point, there’s a very unexpected plot twist that is justified later by a dark secret about the earlier tragedy,
During Georgie’s search, the landscapes and seascapes of Western Australia, become even more spectacular.
Will Georgie reunite with Lu or will she have to live only with his tragic memory? The WTF ending wants to have it both ways. As I said, WTF?
Dirt Music is based on the award-winning novel by Australian writer Tim Winton, (and I am assuming that a substantial percentage of the Australian movie audience had previously read the novel). In fact, this is one of those stories that might be better told as a novel.
Kelly Macdonald has been a compelling screen presence since her debut in Trainspotting. She’s brought her intelligent watchfulness to roles in Gosford Park, Intermission, Finding Neverland, No Country for Old Men, Boardwalk Empire and Puzzle. Macdonald’s performance elevates this material, which could have been completely silly with a lesser actress.
Garrett Hedlund is appropriately moody and hunky as Lu; he plays most of the movie with his shirt off and the rest with his shirt unbuttoned. David Wenham is very good as the unsympathetic husband. It’s always a treat for me to watch a movie with Aaron Pederson, so great as detective Jay Swan in the movies Mystery Road and Goldstone and the more recent miniseries Mystery Road; here, Pederson has a small part as Jim’s indigenous factotum Beaver.
Dirt Music has an abysmal Metacritic score of 35 because critics have uniformly opined that its corniness outweighs the gorgeousness. I could tell this was going to be a chick flick from the trailer; that usually means that I’m not the ideal audience for it, but I really admire Kelly Macdonald, and took a flyer in case some family members might enjoy it.
Those who can swallow the ending might enjoy this romantic melodrama in a visually spectacular setting. Dirt Music can be streamed from Amazon, AppleTV and YouTube.