Clevercell Very disappointing...

Dirtylogy It's funny, it's tense, it features two great performances from two actors and the director expertly creates a web of odd tension where you actually don't know what is happening for the majority of the run time.

Tayloriona Although I seem to have had higher expectations than I thought, the movie is super entertaining.

Mandeep Tyson The acting in this movie is really good.

jovana-13676 This is one of the most beautiful films I've seen. The colors are so vivid and the shots of Australian wildlife so fascinatingly cruel, you almost want to be out there in the desert, without food or water, just to experience this beauty in person. It's edited like a music video, with long shots and lots of jump cuts in between. Those who like dialogues and acting and drama would feel let down watching this, but to me, the cinema is first and foremost, a visual pleasure. If you want to go on a fantastic journey and spend some time in paradise, this is a film to watch. The pleasure is visceral.

Pete Aldin Apparently I watched this movie with a distinct disadvantage: I wasn't stoned.I can come up with plenty of adjectives to explain my dislike for it: incoherent, random, plot less, exploitative, amateurish.I have questions too:How did the car get to what looks like outback Northern Territory or Western Australia from Sydney with the lunch still packed and fresh and the two children still dressed in pristine school uniforms.Why are the children dressed in pristine school uniforms when they've accompanied weird old' dad to the outback??Why are we okay with the child nudity and sexual content in this film? Is it because it's "art"? Or because it's a "classic"?Why is every single white person in it weird or sociopathic?Why do random characters like the weather research people appear for no other reason than to release a balloon?How did this movie attract funding?

Benjamin Cox Other than spawning a franchise of Aussie-themed pubs/clubs in the UK, the only thing I associate this movie with was the sudden (and it has to be said, sustained) interest in Jenny Agutter in male viewers across the land. But "Walkabout" is like many of the dramas that emerged during the early Seventies in that it's well made but doesn't always make a lot of sense. It reminded me, weirdly, of "Vanishing Point" although there's less that happens here - the minimal cast, largely improvised script and uncomfortable setting makes for a much more visceral experience. And while its tale of cultures clashing makes for compulsive viewing, there is a sense of unease about the thing that might put you off.Driven by their father (John Meillon) into the Australian outback for a picnic, a teenage girl (Agutter) realises that he has other motives on his mind. As her father opens fire on her and her younger brother (Luc Roeg), they both run for cover before she sees her father shoot himself in the head and set fire to their car. Stranded in the desert and surrounded by the creatures that live there, they slowly wander through the terrain hoping for rescue. But they encounter a Aboriginal boy (David Gulpilil) on his walkabout - a rite of passage where they must live off the land before becoming a man. Aided by their mysterious friend and his survival skills (despite not sharing a language), the children's hopes for a return to civilisation increase."Walkabout" can, at times, be a brutal watch as animals are seen speared, shot and dismembered in graphic detail. It offers an unflinching look at a land and people largely untouched by our civilisation, one that often seems as alien to us as anything from outer space. But the film doesn't shy away from turning the spotlight on us, asking you questions that you might not like the answers to. Are we any better than the Aborigines because we hunt for sport with rifles and jeeps as opposed to spearing animals for food? Despite the lack of anything really interesting happening, the film is a compulsive watch thanks largely to the young cast. Agutter leads in a fearless performance as the bewitching schoolgirl although little Roeg (director Nicholas Roeg's son) also does well as he seems to have most of the dialogue. In between scenes, close-up shots of endless bizarre animals add to the unusual atmosphere while Gulpilil's performance feels frighteningly authentic.It can feel a bit of a head-trip but "Walkabout" is a good example of a movie working despite having little behind it. I wouldn't call it entertaining - it's much too bleak for that - but it's certainly interesting, both from a narrative and production point of view. With no effects, very little music other than what can be heard from the transistor radio the children have with them and little to explain what is actually going on, the film has to work hard to hold your attention and it succeeds, just. It's an unsettling attempt to compare our society with one that will be utterly foreign to 99% of its audience and while it's a brave thing to look in the mirror, it might have been nice with Nicholas Roeg wasn't using one he'd borrowed from a circus tent.

wandereramor Walkabout takes a premise that brims with condescending racism and Oscar-bait melodrama: a pair of white Australians are lost in the wilderness, but saved by a silent and resourceful Aboriginal, who teaches them the ways of nature and leads the young woman to a sexual awakening. It doesn't so much escape from these trappings as sweep them aside by making the whole narrative elliptical and bizarre, more reminiscent of a heat-drenched dream than a realist narrative.Roeg's visual gifts are the main attraction here, from the dissonantly- edited montages to the brutal close-ups of natural life. Walkabout is not a film that asks you to sit back and admire the beauty of a natural vista, but rather one that rubs your nose in the violent struggle for survival that is the wilderness. Jenny Agutter manages to wrench the viewer's attention away from the bizarre visuals, with both her beauty and her strangely detached air. David Guilpilil's Aborigine does certainly fall into the "noble savage" archetype, but there are some moments in the film which suggest that this too is an illusion.Walkabout is a film that at first seems instantly dated, but then suddenly becomes too strange to fit in comfortably with any time period or movement. For fans of experimental cinema, this is a must-see.