It's complicated... I really like the directing, acting and writing but, there are issues with the way it's shot that I just can't deny. As much as I love the storytelling and the fantastic performance but, there are also certain scenes that didn't need to exist.

Fanciful, disturbing, and wildly original, it announces the arrival of a fresh, bold voice in American cinema.

Not sure how, but this is easily one of the best movies all summer. Multiple levels of funny, never takes itself seriously, super colorful, and creative.

One of the most extraordinary films you will see this year. Take that as you want.

A contemporary, and classic, tale of injustice.Evil Angels, aka A Cry in the Dark, depicts the famous case of Azaria Chamberlain, a baby killed by a dingo near Ayers Rock / Uluru in 1980. Due to the sensationalist, libelous and slanderous nature of the Australian media and the evidence-manufacturing abilities of the Northern Territory Police the mother of the baby, Lindy Chamberlain, was charged with the baby's murder. What follows is a frustrating and harrowing ordeal, for the accused and for the viewer, as you are lead through the travesty that was the court case.Many themes are covered, none of which show Australian society in a positive light. Shows just how despicable the Australian media are - sadly, they're even worse now (95% of what you see or read in Australian media is sensationalized bs). Shows the incompetence, even corruption, of Australia's police forces, particularly in the Northern Territory in the 1980s. Shows how the media can influence a trial, and how far-from-optimal the jury system is. How the jury reached a unanimous guilty verdict is beyond me.Also shows how the media get the average yobbo caught up in someone else's affairs - the trial had nothing to do with them.Great performance by Meryl Streep in the lead role. She totally nails the accent (which is more than one can say for most Hollywood actors faking an Australian accent) and seems immersed in the role. She well deserved her Oscar nomination.Sam Neill is OK as Michael Chamberlain. The bit-part Australian actors often leave a lot to be desired, however, overdoing the redneckness.

It was one of the most intriguing mysteries of the twentieth century. On 17 August 1980, Lindy and Michael Chamberlain were on a family camping trip to Uluru (Ayers Rock), when their nine-week-old daughter, Azaria, disappeared. The couple maintained that she had been taken by a dingo, but circumstantial evidence, which included Lindy's confrontational personality and the family's religious beliefs, led to the perception within Australia that Azaria had been murdered by her mother. As many readers will know, Lindy was convicted of the crime after a trial that received unprecedented media coverage (rivalled only by Madeleine McCann's disappearance in 2007) and served three years in prison, before new evidence emerged which exonerated her.Hearing the news this morning that, at long last, an Australian coroner has served the Chamberlains with a death certificate confirming that Azaria was killed by a dingo, reminded me of how brilliantly the family's struggle for justice was portrayed in A Cry in the Dark.Quite often, the courtroom drama, so popular in the 1980s, can be a very formulaic film genre. The undoubted tension of real-life courtrooms rarely translates into exciting films; some exceptions being, I believe, Primal Fear (1996) and Jagged Edge (1985). The success of those films, like that of A Cry in the Dark, is chiefly down to their having an eerie, highly ambiguous mystery at their hearts which keeps the audience gripped. Indeed, Fred Schepisi's film focuses on conversations between anonymous characters throughout Australia in order to reflect the circus-like attention the Chamberlain case received.Meryl Streep's performance is key to maintaining the central ambiguity. In the film, Lindy is both a common housewife who is simply determined to prove her innocence and a potentially sadistic murderess. Despite your sympathy for her, the nagging doubt that Lindy might be guilty persists until the final scenes, and this prevents A Cry in the Dark from becoming predictable - even though you know the outcome.Like so many times in her acting career, Streep fully transforms herself into the human being she is portraying: accent immaculate (to my untrained ears at least), mannerisms, everything. She is Lindy Chamberlain - a hard person to like in some ways, but someone whom you instantly admire for her courage and conviction. Though nominated for the Best Actress Oscar, Streep uncharacteristically (and unjustly) didn't win on this occasion, although perhaps I should applaud this fact, given my last blog entry about Biopics.Sam Neill puts in, arguably, his best performance as Michael Chamberlain, Lindy's loyal but weaker husband. His struggle to defend his family's honour from the lawyers and reporters seemingly intent on breaking it apart is truly poignant, especially as even he must quash those nagging doubts regarding Lindy's innocence. It's not just the acting that makes this a great film, however; the razor-sharp script helps Streep and Neill along, the musical score (so 80s) is suitably mysterious, and the judicious editing makes for an intelligent and smooth viewing experience.A Cry in the Dark is a film that doesn't outstay its welcome. It begins, it delivers its emotive story, then it ends. It's about family loyalty and the often-malevolent influence of the press, an issue which is more relevant today than ever. Those of you who haven't seen this film should, and those who haven't seen it in awhile should reappraise it.Culturally significant and thoroughly entertaining.For more film reviews: http://ins-kino.blogspot.co.uk/

Once you pick your jaw up from off the floor from the realization that they... somehow... managed to put this thing together so fast that it was released the same year the case ended, you'll find that it's not half bad. The plot is engaging and interesting, and the pacing is fast, with this covering many situations, and thus often jumping swiftly on to the next one after a line or two has been spoken. Where this really stands out is the acting. The performances are excellent. Neill and Streep are both impeccable. It's also cool to hear so much Australian spoken in a Hollywood film, and even those who don't come naturally to it at least attempt an accent. The cinematography and editing are nice enough, but they don't really go beyond the standard stuff. This movie's story is compelling and the fact that it is authentic just makes it all the more chilling. While I have not read the novel or heard of what happened outside of this picture, I understand that it is quite close to the truth. There is some moderate to strong language and disturbing content in this. It is, at times, a downright great courtroom drama. I recommend this to any fellow fan of such. 7/10

I found it hard to like anyone in this film. The central characters, Lindy and Michael Chamberlain, whose daughter disappears during a night out in the Australian outback, are not bad people, but then surely not all, or even most, of the scores of people we see throughout this movie would be bad if we knew them better. But though we are as sure as the film wants us to be of the guilt or innocence of the Chamberlains from the start of their life's tragic disarray, the film takes on a more or less sociological perspective pertaining to gossip, news media, crowds, mobs and assumptions. It's not a movie about the society of Australia in particular; it's merely an account of a true story that happened there. Society en masse is much less evolved than the individual feels ensured that we are.When a warden insists upon killing all of an aborigine's dogs because of the unverified action of a single wild dog, when a randomly ruined life spins even further out of control owing to the majority of magazines, newspapers and TV programs distorts the tragic truth to a level of drama that provokes its consumers into a frenzy, there is no sign of empathy or even any kind of looking outside of one's own unaware perceptions, influenced left and right by the vigorous hearsay and vibes of those who surround one's life. The reason I appreciate the film is because it turns the focus inside out, from the victims to the masses.The evidence against Lindy Chamberlain aside, suspicion was jet-fueled mostly by a virtue of hers. To the public eye, she did not seem sufficiently distraught by the death of her baby daughter. Why was she able to keep her cool, even a sort of aloofness let alone holding her head up, for TV and the press? How much of the downward spiral could've been prevented had she behaved more to the public's liking in the media? Meryl Streep, one of, if not the, greatest actress working today, may not give a performance that particularly stands out, and frankly neither does any other actor, or department of film-making. But she, and the screenwriters, do understand Lindy. What is infuriating is that it's not that difficult. Apparently, she was not naturally prone to showing emotion in public in any case. Whether or not she is approachable as a lovable character in the immediate sense, we are naturally prone to sympathize with her situation.Whether or not her performance is as immediately gratifying as Sophie's Choice, The Devil Wears Prada, Angels In America or other such work, it is a triumph. It is difficult enrapture an audience when you purposely deny them insights into yourself. She frustrates us because we don't know what she's thinking or feeling. It took me awhile to feel endeared toward her, but this is the movie's way of suggesting the reaction of the public's attention.She is married to a pastor, and they both practice a religion that is in a small minority and thus misinterpreted by most. Initially, they react to their loss as if to be reconciling themselves to God's will, kick-starting a rumor mill generating the notion that their daughter's death was some sort of ritual killing on their part. Whatever happened to the little girl, her parents were part of a margin with whom most of the media's intake didn't immediately identify, so the first inclination was to go after them like a pack of hungry...well...Meryl Streep and Sam Neill are constantly on screen, but the public plays the real leads here. Like punctuation for each plot advance, director Fred Schepisi cuts away from restaurant to tennis court to dinner party to saloon to office, where the public tries Lindy and gets carried away into their own passionate projections.