STACK February 2016 Issue 136

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visit DVD&BD FEATURE
32 FEBRUARY 2016
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A character-driven three-
hander, Cut Snake
follows former con
Sparra (Alex Russell), who has
left his unlawful ways behind
and settled into a new life with
fiancée Paula (Jessica De
Gouw). But before long the past
catches up with him in the
hulking shape of cellmate Pommie
(Sullivan Stapleton), who pressures him
into returning to a life of crime.
Directed by Tony Ayres from a screenplay by
Blake Ayshford, Cut Snake was a project that
spent over a decade in development hell before
its release in 2015.
“The script took a long time to find its form
and there were issues of financing,” Ayres
explains. “I first read it in 2003, but I didn’t
come onto it officially until 2009. When I
came onboard we shifted the direction of the
script and that took a couple of years to do.
But honestly, one of the issues we have with
feature films in Australia is that our best writers
are always so busy with TV, and it’s hard to get
them available to write movies. So it was a
combination of those factors.”
Ayres himself is heavily involved in
television, having created the AACTA-winning
supernatural drama series Glitch as well as
serving as executive producer on The Slap, and
notes that TV offers writers greater scope for
storytelling than feature films.
A CRIME STORY WITH BITE
“It’s a much more rudimentary
medium, but it really helps craft
your storytelling skills; you realise
very quickly what’s necessary
and what isn’t. Cinema is more
a director’s medium with more
time and resources.”
Ayres reveals that the bombing
of Brisbane’s Whiskey Au Go
Go nightclub in 1973 provided the
inspiration for Cut Snake, and although
the film is set in Melbourne, he and Ayshford
felt it important to retain the
seventies’ setting.
“[The bombing of the
Whiskey Au Go Go] was integral
to the writing,” he says. “We
always wanted to keep that
reference, even though the
story moved away from the
real story that influenced it.
Also, and more importantly,
we felt that even though
Sparra’s dilemma is very
contemporary, what kind of
life he could live, I felt that the
choice he makes is much more urgent in the
‘70s than it would be now.”
Although resembling a traditional crime
film, Cut Snake has added bite, with a major
plot twist sending it slithering off in a different
direction.
“It starts out as a conventional thriller that
you feel you’ve seen before,” says Ayres, “then
halfway through it gets turned on its head.”
The catalyst for this plot detour is the
character of Pommie, whose menacing
presence dominates the film. Played with
ample machismo by Sullivan Stapleton, Ayres
admits a special affection for his bad guy.
“He really jumped off the page – a charming,
charismatic psychopath… He really embodies a
lot of contradictions, which makes for a
great character.
“I’ve known Sullivan for a few
years as a friend and he was
my first choice for the role,” he
continues. “He was able to exude
both menace and vulnerability,
and that’s quite a task.”
Cut Snake is the latest in
a recent run of Aussie crime
thrillers, which includes Son of
a Gun and Kill Me Three Times.
It’s a genre we appear to have an
ongoing obsession with, although
Ayres believes the fascination
isn’t just local, it’s global.
“If you look at entertainment
across the world, crime is a
recurring theme. We notice
it more in Australian cinema
because we don’t make that
many films, and when there’s a
year or two with a whole bunch
of crime films, you notice it more.
"The thing about crime is that
it’s high stakes drama, and people
are fascinated by lives that go
wrong – it satisfies a kind of
voyeurism, perhaps, in audiences.
“For filmmakers, the attraction
to crime is that the drama is life
and death, and big drama is what
attracts storytellers.”
Director Tony Ayres twists the rules of Australian crime films
with the serpentine thriller CUT SNAKE. By Scott Hocking
Sullivan Stapleton and Alex Russell
It starts out as a
conventional thriller that you
feel you’ve seen before,
then halfway through it gets
turned on its head.
Director Tony Ayres
Here in Straya, we
know the title means
‘mad as a cut snake’.
But overseas viewers
have Buckley’s
chance, and are
probably wondering
what an injured Joe
Blake has got to do
with it. Strewth!
Here’s four more
bonza bits of fair
dinkum Aussie slang:
FLAT OUT LIKE A LIZARD
DRINKING
Incredibly busy
FEW CANS SHORT OF A
SIX-PACK
Dumb, not the full
quid
FIT AS A MALLEE BULL
Strong, in top nick
SHE’LL BE APPLES
No worries mate