I wanted to but couldn't!

Good movie, but best of all time? Hardly . . .

Don't listen to the negative reviews

if their story seems completely bonkers, almost like a feverish work of fiction, you ain't heard nothing yet.

This film had apparently been lost for over 30 years before it was found again, it was added into the book 1001 Movies You Must See Before You Die, I had to see if it was all worth it, directed by Ted Kotcheff (Fun with Dick and Jane, First Blood). Basically in Australia, John Grant (Gary Bond) is a middle-class teacher from the big city who arrives in the rough outback mining town of Bundanyabba, known as "The Yabba". John plans to stay overnight before catching the plane to Sydney, he has accepted a position at the tiny school in Tiboonda, but John's one night is stretched to five by his own methods. It is through encountering many discomfiting characters, such as medical practitioner "Doc" Tydon (Donald Pleasence) and policeman Jock Crawford (Chips Rafferty), and a series of alcoholic fuelled nights out, that John causes his own self-destruction. When the alcohol effects fade away there is little left of the original man, John becomes self-loathing trapped in a desolate wasteland, and he contemplates suicide with the one bullet he has left in his rifle, will he get out of it and get back to a sane civilisation? Also starring Sylvia Kay as Janette Hynes, Jack Thompson as Dick, Peter Whittle as Joe, Al Thomas as Tim Hynes and John Meillon as Charlie. Bond as the frustrated teacher going downhill during his time in the small town is good, and Pleasence proves himself a good character actor, this film has been called the "Australian Deliverance", I can see what similarities with the format, the film makes you feel uncomfortable with its disturbing imagery, and you hope desperately the leading character will get out of the downward spiral, a weird but worthwhile thriller. Very good!

A good Australian drama that had the potential to be great. The background and setup were excellent. As you go further into the story you feel more and more trapped, as the lead character is. The writer and director take you on a downward spiral of alcoholism and hellscape-entrapment. It is suffocating, the lead character's predicament, and plays out almost like a horror movie. You can check out but you can never leave...The movie also shows the pointlessness and futurelessness of rural redneck life.However, from a point is almost starts to glamorize this lifestyle. There are several consecutive scenes that are quite irritating to watch: the drunken parties, the random kangaroo killings, the general drunken boganism. While this shows what awaits the lead character, it is very annoying.A tighter script around the 2/3rds mark and a grittier follow- through on the setup and this would have been a brilliant movie.

When one-room schoolteacher John Grant (Gary Bond) ends up in the dusty little one-horse town of "Yabba," he finds himself down and all but out: drunkenly gambling away what little money he has, he finds himself wandering from place to place in search of sustenance (which consists mostly of beer, which he guzzles with great gusto throughout the movie). (An odd habit, that: alcohol dehydrates you, yet everyone in this town guzzles it like it's going out of style.) Grant wakes after one drinking binge to find himself in the shack of "Doc Tyden" (Donald Pleasence). "I'm a doctor of medicine," he tells Grant: "And a tramp by temperament." Along with a pair of Doc's drinking buddies, he and Grant go on a late night shooting spree. Their prey: kangaroos. In what's easily one of the most disturbing animal-killing sequences in any movie ever made, we see the 'roos actually being shot on camera. A "disclaimer" of sorts at the end of the movie tells us that the slaughter was handled "by licensed professionals." I can't help but equate THAT one with the abrogations of Nazi soldiers: "We were just following orders." Grant gets so caught up in the bloodletting that he cuts the throat of a 'roo (a one-eyed 'roo, at that) before winding up back in the cabin with Doc- who proceeds to sexually assault him. Heads or tails, WAKE IN FRIGHT is a disturbing but must-see piece of filmmaking.

Has the over all feel of the US film Deliverance--creepy drunk back woods male bonding.A young bonded school teacher (Gary Bond) would like to escape the outback where he has been posted. When he goes on Christmas leave-- his first stop on the way to catch a plane to Sydney is a small town Bundanyabba (Yabba). Bond gets enmeshed with the local drinking betting culture causing him to lose all his money and go on a week long bender that features cruel drunken hunting and finally the ultimate "degradation" a homosexual act with (Donald Pleasance) the alcoholic town doctor.This movie while quite good was made in the bad old days when the homosexual encounter at the end of the bender was the absolute bottom of the barrel in terms of degradation... requiring Bond to first try to kill Pleasance and then turn the gun on himself. Par for the course in 1971---how far we have come.If made today I would give it a 1 for the homophobic plot and the senseless cruel slaughter of animals for the movie. Without these personal objections it would get about a 8 or 9 it really is quite fascinating unique... It gets an honorary 6 because that was the norm then.Recommend with caveats.