Disturbing yet enthralling

Ok... Let's be honest. It cannot be the best movie but is quite enjoyable. The movie has the potential to develop a great plot for future movies

It's a movie as timely as it is provocative and amazingly, for much of its running time, it is weirdly funny.

Great movie. Not sure what people expected but I found it highly entertaining.

Having seen this film at first release in a cinema, and enjoyed it, I was somewhat disturbed by some negative posts on this page. When the opportunity arose to see it on TV, then, I viewed it again. It's a bit more mysterious than I was aware of at first viewing. This could be because the two versions are different cuts. Perhaps the sound was better on my home cinema than I recall from the hardtop. Certainly, the story was well set in the opening scenes, when it is obvious that Sandy, the female IT specialist, is coming off an unsatisfactory relationship. As one of her colleagues remarks: "I don't know how anybody could do it with him". We then are aware that Sandy is "on the rebound" from that relationship. The unpleasantness of that experience is not helped by her being told to escort a visitor, Hiro, on a sightseeing trip for which neither is well prepared. This is where things get complicated. Sandy is a female in the blokey environment of outback mining, where the usual job for a woman is driving a large earthmover. Hiro treats her, not as a professional, but as his driver. On the phone he describes her to his wife as "She has a big bum and she talks loudly". When it becomes obvious that Hiro is clueless about outback motoring in his demand to be taken to inaccessible places, he secretively peruses Sandy's guidebook. At the same time, Sandy hides her Japanese phrase book inside a magazine. Their communication level in zilch. Sandy does most of the right things when they get into trouble, not knowing that Hiro has read at least one trick to get them going. Or does she deliberately leave that trick out of her lexicon? In any event, the episode does improve their communication level. To some, that is a mystery. In the finale, we see one of the basic rules of drama. Conflict is followed by changes in the characters. Sandy is less uptight, and we become aware that Hiro was in love with his wife all along. That is the mystery in "the letter". Why did Hiro's wife give Sandy the letter? We don't know, but remember that we have here a woman director and a woman writer. In any case, the wife and Sandy reconcile, as I suppose, two intelligent women would do in the circumstances. Viewers might care to check the lengths of the original film and the video version. This is a very watchable movie.

Weak plot, no character development, seriously dumb dialogs. The male main character is a shame for all men and as previously mentioned its a humiliation of the Japanese: he shows weakness so many times it is very annoying, (spoiler alert) even in the "sex scene" I felt he is being raped by the female character. I did not even get how these two developed any chemistry over extremely silly conversations, the intellectual level was like listening to 4 year old not adults. The only value in the film is some nice scenic shots, however it dragged out the movie which made it even more boring. The closing scene is completely illogical. I do not get how could this receive so many Australian awards ( I live in Australia for the last 3 years) it is not even a good film on the Australian scene, watch Candy if you would like to see a good OZ movie, but this is outrageously horrible, I wish I could vote 0 to drop the current rating even more.

I actually don't know why I watched the whole thing. It's very serious and awkward. Especially the sex scene when the woman takes off her clothes, then puts HIS pants on? I'm not sure what was going on here, but I just couldn't get into it. Someone said it was a lot like the Painted Veil, and yes, maybe so except for the fact that I liked the Painted Veil. There's little music. And the whole movie was just bad and poorly put together... it doesn't seem very cohesive to me. It didn't make sense.... after they do it while she wears his pants, she asks to get her things back from his room. So she carries her bra, in her hands, out in the open, back to her car. I've been stuck in the desert before too and everyone knows you put rocks or sticks or something hard underneath the tires... they just clowned around. BAD movie. Bad. Bad. Bad.

As Alfred Hitchkock used to say "It's only a movie!", so what's a few stereotypes among friends? If you want real life, watch Reality TV, or go home and have a TV dinner in front of the Boob Tube. Didn't you ever hear of "suspension of reality"? It's not supposed to be real!The relationship doesn't seem real but seems possible, and the sequence of events is moving - more moving than the reality of the nightly news. So, what better way to get in touch with your emotions than by watching a modern fairy tale? Some things are not meant to be - to echo the words of Kipling. And in our case, North is North, and South is South, and never the twain shall meet.