Lantana [videorecording] / Lions Gate Home Entertainment ; MBP, Jan Chapman Films, Australian Film Finance Corporation present ; director, Ray Lawrence ; producer, Jan Chapman ; screenplay, Andrew Bovell.
Material type:
FilmPublisher number: VM8020D | Trimark Home VideoLanguage: English Subtitle language: English, Spanish Publication details: [Sydney, N.S.W.] : Australian Film Finance Corp. ; Santa Monica, CA : Distributed by Trimark Home Video, 2002.Description: 1 videodisc (120 min.) : sd., col. ; 4 3/4 inISBN: - 1588175405
- 9781588175403
- Bovell, Andrew Speaking in tongues
- Director of photography, Mandy Walker ; camera, David Williamson ; production designer, Kim Buddee ; costume designer, Margot Wilson ; editor, Karl Sodersten ; music, Paul Kelly with Shane O'Mara, Steve Hadley, Bruce Haymes, Peter Luscome.
- Australian Film Institute: 2001, AFI Award Best Actor in a Leading Role (Anthony LaPaglia); Best Actor in a Supporting Role (Vince Colosimo); Best Actress in a Leading Role (Kerry Armstrong); Best Actress in a Supporting Role (Rachael Blake); Best Direction (Ray Lawrence); Best Film (Jan Chapman); Best Screenplay Adapted from Another Source (Andrew Bovell); Screenwriting Prize (Andrew Bovell)
| Item type | Home library | Collection | Call number | Materials specified | Status | Date due | Barcode | Item holds | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Adult DVD
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Northport Library | DVD | DRAMA Lantana | Available | 33111008298131 |
Enhanced descriptions from Syndetics:
The intertwined lives of four couples living in and around Sydney, Australia, form the structure for this drama masquerading as a whodunit. Andrew Bovell freely adapted his play, Speaking in Tongues, opening up the action, as the geography and topography of Sydney and its suburbs become major characters as well. The film opens with a shot of what looks like a corpse entangled in a thick stand of branches -- the title plant, which grows in profusion in Australia. Bovell and director Ray Lawrence take their time in explaining whose body that is and then slowly reveal, with no help from a number of red herrings, how it happened to be there. The principal players are Valerie Somers (Barbara Hershey), a psychiatrist with issues over her child, a murder victim; her husband, John Knox (Geoffrey Rush), an aloof professor whom she suspects of infidelity; Leon Zat (Anthony LaPaglia), a police detective cheating on his wife, Sonja (Kerry Armstrong), who is a patient of Valerie's. Zat's mistress, Jane O'May (Rachael Blake), is someone he met at a dancing class his wife dragged him to; she is estranged from her husband, Pete (Glenn L. Robbins). Their neighbors, Paula (Daniela Farinacci) and Nik D'Amato (Vince Colosimo), try to stay neutral in the O'Mays' split; she works days as a nurse and he's unemployed and minds their children. Suspicion around the disappearance of one character manages to enmesh all of the others. Bovell's stories are about secrets, real and imagined, and how they can poison relationships. The film virtually swept all the major awards at the Australian Film Institute's annual ceremony, though its reception in the States was mildly respectful. ~ Tom Wiener, Rovi
Based on Andrew Bovell's stage play "Speaking in Tongues."
Special features: Trailer (2 min.); The nature of Lantana [featurette] (25 min.).
Lantana bush -- Sex -- Eleanor -- Infidelity -- Dignity -- Collision -- Partner -- Judging -- Betrayal -- Bad day -- Good stuff -- Dancing -- Emotional state -- Words -- Numb -- Dilemma -- Focused -- Grief -- Interrogation -- Comfort -- Truth -- Breakdown -- Change -- End credits.
Director of photography, Mandy Walker ; camera, David Williamson ; production designer, Kim Buddee ; costume designer, Margot Wilson ; editor, Karl Sodersten ; music, Paul Kelly with Shane O'Mara, Steve Hadley, Bruce Haymes, Peter Luscome.
Anthony LaPaglia, Geoffrey Rush, Barbara Hershey, Kerry Armstrong, Rachael Blake, Vince Colosimo, Russell Dykstra, Daniela Farinacci, Peter Phelps, Leah Purcell, Glenn Robbins.
Originally produced as an Australian motion picture in 2001.
Lantana: a noxious and troublesome weed with dense and spiky undergrowth, sometimes cultivated for its colorful, aromatic flowers (film website). Like the plant, this film is a thicket: lovely and sweet smelling on its surface, dense and thorny beneath. In Lantana, a quartet of married couples from different strata of urban Australian life--wealthy Valerie and John, the middle-class Zats, working-class Jane and her estranged husband Pete, and struggling, just barely working-class Nik and Paula--are connected by psychiatrist Valerie, whose disappearance is the event around which these couples lives begin to revolve. The delicately layered storyline reminds viewers of three essential truths about human existence: No one is exactly what he or she seems; actions generate ripples that reach far beyond the actions themselves; and life does go on, no matter what, but it is never the same as before. Before what? Before everything.
MPAA rating: Rated R for language and sexuality.
DVD; 5.1 Dolby digital sound; widescreen presentation, 2.35:1 aspect ratio, enhanced for 16x9 televisions.
In English with optional subtitles in English or Spanish.
Australian Film Institute: 2001, AFI Award Best Actor in a Leading Role (Anthony LaPaglia); Best Actor in a Supporting Role (Vince Colosimo); Best Actress in a Leading Role (Kerry Armstrong); Best Actress in a Supporting Role (Rachael Blake); Best Direction (Ray Lawrence); Best Film (Jan Chapman); Best Screenplay Adapted from Another Source (Andrew Bovell); Screenwriting Prize (Andrew Bovell)