35mm Stir (1980)

The Most Controversial Australian Movie Ever Made.

Filmed in the Clare Valley, Gladstone and the Flinders Ranges in South Australia, this prison movie was inspired by the true life prison riot at Bathurst Jail in 1974 and the subsequent Royal Commission into New South Wales Prisons.

Unwillingly finding themselves at the centre of this violent event are China Jackson (Bryan Brown), a semi-habitual minor crim wanting to keep his nose clean, and Norton (Max Phipps), a complex warder deeply ashamed of his former treatment of prisoners and now seeking redemption.

Stir shows how both men are ultimately driven to desperate violence when tensions inside the gaol build to an explosive finale where the prisoners are caged, jeered, gassed and then made to run the gauntlet of armoured revenge-seeking warders. Harsh, uncompromising and as violent and unrestrained as the system and men it depicts, Stir is one of the most harrowing and controversial movies ever made in this country.

Screening includes an introduction from director Stephen Wallace and producer Richard Brennan.

Rating

R18+

Cast

Bryan Brown, Max Phipps, Dennis Miller, Gary Waddell, Phil Motherwell, Michael Gow, Edward Robshaw, Tex Morton, Ray Marshall

Director

Stephen Wallace