漫漫回家路

首先说，音乐配的太恐怖了，多大的事儿，给《指环王》都够用了。
这片的白人不如我预想的那么可恶，典型的公务员，追踪的人只得了三个星期的报酬，到期就撤，很好的法制社会，难道忘了你们的伟大理想——消灭低等民族了吗？岂能是我等有理想有抱负的革命战士的对手！Molly途中遇到的那些人，是浪人？是探险家？是工作者？一个个的无政府主义，不像“良民”。（可能是没有告密的条件，戈壁草原望不到头，又没个手机，心有余力不足，但一个大男人对付不了三个小女孩吗？绑也绑去了啊）
Moodoo大叔这个原始猎人在追踪中对自己的猎物渐生好感——表面上是对对手的钦佩，可能是父爱情感的蔓延，还有自身民族意识的觉醒，最后还像是放了Molly一马——至少是不作为。
Molly用自身的努力回到了自己母亲身边，回到了自己的土地，也许白人的世界很好很强大，但她不属于那里，她更希望在自己的土地上自由的生活。
有些细节表现不好，比如在旷野中行走数千里，水源的问题——我只看到挖草根下的水，但够吗？我总觉得就影片中给出的条件，她们早就中暑倒毙了。还有食物，似乎她们是一路靠别人的施舍过来的，自己也就会掏个鸟蛋，并不具备荒野生存的条件。
总评：意志的宣扬大过细节的表现。

如果看了剧情简介，大概就不想看这部片子了，因为太像片子里那些白人的口吻在说话。
在茉莉的眼里一切阳光和微笑都是虚伪的魔鬼，而遮蔽太阳的乌云，磅礴的大雨才是逃向自由的天使。是呀，指向自由的是逃。
茉莉能逃过众多人的追踪包括擅长追踪术的土著，她的精明源自与苍鹰翱翔于天际的自由同样的空灵，也许逃不过猎枪，但它的一生是自由的一生。

Rabbit Proof Fence tells a story about how the three girls, Molly and her sisters escaped from Moore River to walk nearly 2000 mile all the way to home. Molly and her sisters are considered as Stolen Generations that is, the Australian Aboriginal children who were removed from their families by the Australian stage government. The use of the word “stolen” implied the immorality and injustice of the robbery performed by the government to take off the identities from the Aboriginal children.
The assimilation conducted by A.O. Neville, the head of the government program, is considered by himsel as empathy to the Aboriginal half-caste children. He feels very proud and responsible for the carryout of the job. However, what he does in the film is cruel and cold-blooded that raises empathy among audience. Neville’s intentional empathy turns out to be cruelty and injustice to the Aborigines he wants to “save”. The unjustifiable assimilation makes audience feel empathetic about the Aboriginal children.
Not only the story but the advertisement tries to raise the universal empathy to the Aboriginal children. “What if the government kidnapped your daughter” pulls the world into the story even before the story begins. The victims of this story are mostly females, including children and their mothers, so naturally people will be easily moved by this kind of set. Also, the story is pulled to step out of the screen and becomes a more documentary style at the end of the film to evoke more empathy from the audience. This approach, similar to what Spielberg uses in Schindler’s List, manages to affect the audience outside the theatres. It provokes further discussion in people’s real life.
The leading roles of Rabbit Proof Fence are children and the camera stays around them for the most of the time. It is a wise idea because such style draws the audience closer to Molly and her sisters. The raw interpretation of the story brings more intensity. The audiences feel so relieved when the protagonists get their way home. Successfully, the director found three aboriginal children without any related experience to acting to carry out the main roles, adding the most important brick to the achievement of the film.
In the documentary on the making of the film, the director says that he is looking for children with special quality so that white Australians would like to say “they are my kids”. He needs children who keep intact traditional lifestyle and have recently come into contact with the white world; therefore they do not lose their nature. The point, as indicated by the director, is to get them “not to act” and to conquer the fear of these little actors doing an adult’s job. The director also manages to have a group of three girls who can work together as real sisters, leading the film more convincing.
Undoubtedly, the wise choice of actors and the effective training enables the film to trigger the real empathy and awareness of the issue from the bottom of the audience’s heart.

Additional Notes:

1. The Stolen Generations is a term used to describe those Australian Aboriginal children who were removed from their families by the Australian stage government. The use of the word “stolen” implied the immorality and injustice of the robbery performed by the government to take off the identities from the Aboriginal children.
2. This comparison efficiently translates the storyline of the long film into a simple plot: a wicked witch takes away the children and tries to put a spell of forgetfulness on them, and the children escape a long distance all the way to home. However, I do not think this analogy is really reasonable. First, in classic tales, the border between the good and the bad is very clear, so if the story is interpreted in this way, the government then is asserted as a “bad” side, ignoring the fact that the issue of the film is still controversial. “A spell of forgetfulness” is a wrong translation of what Mr. Neville wants to do to the Aboriginal children. His intention is to “save” the half-caste children from discrimination in the tribe, but unfortunately this leads to the destruction of their family and culture. So the fairy tale interpretation of the issue is too biased to be taken into account.
3. Not only the story but the advertisement tries to raise the universal empathy to the Aboriginal children. “What if the government kidnapped your daughter” pulls the world into the story even before the story begins. The victims of this story are mostly females, including children and their mothers, so naturally people will be easily moved by this kind of set.
4. “The Stolen Generation Narrative” refers to a true story on children’s view. It is a wise idea because such style draws the audience closer to Molly and her sisters. The raw interpretation of the story brings more intensity. The audience quickly finds himself so relieved when the protagonists get their way home. On the other side, this setting makes the film very biased that does not provide sufficient information on each side using narrative.
5. The story is pulled to step out of the screen and becomes a more documentary style at the end of the film. This approach, similar to what Spielberg uses in Schindler’s List, manages to affect the audience outside the theatres. It provokes further discussion in people’s real life.
6. The assimilation conducted by A.O. Neville is considered by him as empathy to the Aboriginal half-caste children. He himself feels very proud and responsible for the carryout of the job. However, what he does in the film is cruel and cold-blooded that raises empathy among audience. Neville’s intentional empathy turns out to be cruelty and injustice to the Aborigines he wants to “save”. So the assimilation and empathy are totally different in his case. Additionally, empathy is the feeling that the director wants to raise among the audience, while the unjustifiable assimilation is one of the reasons that audience feel empathetic about the Aboriginal children.


February 26, 2008

2008年2月13日，澳大利亚土著长老及上千名土著居民从全国各地赶赴首都堪培拉。这一天，澳大利亚总理陆克文代表新一届政府和议会向澳大利亚“被偷走的一代”道歉，在澳各界引起广泛回应。

　　在1910年到1970年间，澳大利亚的法律允许政府将土著居民的子女从他们的家庭中带走，送入白人家庭或教会中抚养。澳大利亚土著领袖曼塞尔估计，遭此命运的土著儿童约有1.3万左右。产生这项政策的背景其实相当复杂。在修建贯穿澳大利亚南北部的GHAN铁路时，铁路沿线诞生了许多白人和土著的混血儿。由于文化原因，这些混血儿并不受当地土著部落欢迎，他们经常遭到遗弃及虐待。当时有一份报告建议政府，应该出面保护、抚养这些儿童，从而刺激了澳大利亚实行将土著儿童带离家庭的政策。另外一个主要原因是，当时的澳大利亚政府认为土著居民没有文化、没有前途，将他们的子女带走、漂白，有助于他们融入现代社会。

　　对于成千上万个土著家庭来说，有的甚至几代都有孩子被强制带走，上演了一代又一代的家庭悲剧。曾是“被偷走一代”的詹妮弗为我们讲述了她的家庭故事。她的外祖母瑞贝卡是家中最小的孩子，长得十分漂亮，5岁时就被教会带走，14岁时她生下了詹妮弗的母亲格蕾丝，之后又生了3个女儿。23岁时，外祖母患结核死去。詹妮弗的外祖父拼命工作，辛苦抚养4个女儿。1915年的一天，外祖父回来跟母亲说，他被强迫签署一份文件，将4个女儿交给政府带走，否则他将被送进监狱。就这样，4个女儿哭着离开了父亲，被送上前往悉尼的船。母亲很多年后依然记得当时的感觉，就像当年失去外祖母一样悲恸。到了悉尼之后，她们被分开寄养，还是婴儿的维尔丽特2年后死于结核。格蕾丝所在的保育所条件十分恶劣，拥挤不堪，条规严苛。她记得一个女孩只是由于动作慢了一点，就被绑起来用皮带抽打，当天晚上就死去了，甚至没有人知道她最后埋到了哪里……然而悲剧没有到此结束。1952年11月的一天早晨，警察又来到詹妮弗的家里，“他们不顾父母亲的阻拦，硬是把我们姐妹两个带走。此后我再也没能见到父亲”。

　　政府的举措并没有带来预想的结果，1994年澳大利亚国家统计局的调查显示，政府的同化政策彻底失败了，那些被从土著家庭带走的孩子无论是受教育的比例还是就业率，非但没有高于那些同期还留在自己家中的孩子，还略低于这些一直生活在土著家中的同龄人。“被偷走的一代”大多数不能完成中学学业，却常常使用违禁药物、并有犯罪记录。

　　1997年4月，澳大利亚人权委员会一份题为《带他们回家》的报告显示，被带走的儿童和他们的家庭遭受了巨大的心理创伤。有人这样述说被带离家庭、长大成人后的感受，“我们也许可以回家，但我们无法重新回到我们的童年。我们也许可以与父母、亲人再次团聚，但是光阴已经流逝，我们无法体味亲人的爱与关心，这种遗憾终身无法抹平。我们可以再次回家，但是身心所受到的伤害无法消除，因为‘监护人’们认为他们的任务就是消除我们的土著身份。”

（摘自2月18日《环球时报》作者刘婕）

their feet scuffed up dust that settled behind them as quickly as it was raised. They lifted their eyes with each step they took, peering toward the horizon for the first red rays of the sun. She went down the road drawing one foot from behind and hurling it in front of her with her might. There was no other way she could move herself over the ground.

---Erskine Caldwell

转载自http://www.convictcreations.com/culture/movies/rabbitprooffence.html

Rabbit-Proof Fence (2002)
Director - Phillip Noyce
“Nevertheless, there’s still plenty worth watching from the land of Oz and starting on October 28, Beijing is hosting its annual Aussie film festival…But(sic) the highlights are(sic) Noyce’s Rabbit Proof (sic) Fence, shot by Chris Doyle, which deals with the plight of aboriginal children forcibly removed from their families under a racist government programme designed to destroy aboriginal culture (sic) and forcibly integrate native Australians.” (2005 advertisement for Australian movies in China)

Australia does not have a commercially successful arts sector and the ideologies displayed in the creation and promotion of Phillip Noyce's Rabbit-Proof Fence helps explain why. Rabbit-proof Fence was a typical product of the contemporary Australian artist that feels status in making ignorant statements about their culture, and inevitably undermines any sense of affinity the Australian public has to their arts sector as a result.

In theory, Rabbit-Proof Fence was meant to be a political movie showing support for Aboriginal culture and educating Australians about the untold Aboriginal story. In practice, the movie contained almost no examples of Aboriginal culture. Even the music was foreign. Director Phillip Noyce preferred the music of Englishman Peter Gabriel to the music of the people he claimed he was fighting for. Furthermore, despite claiming that he wanted to give Australians a history lesson, Noyce showed that he wasn't particularly educated in the very basics of Aboriginal history himself. When promoting his movie, Noyce said:

"For me, Rabbit-Proof Fence the movie will be as much about stolen history. History that we Australians needed to reclaim...Until 1967, Australian Aborigines couldn’t vote and were not counted as citizens." (1)

In truth, the 1967 referendum that Noyce was referring to had nothing to do with Aboriginal voting rights or citzenship. When the colonies of Victoria, South Australia, Tasmania and NSW framed their constitutions in the 1850s, they gave the vote to all male subjects over the age of 21, Aborigines included. Admittedly, most Aborigines didn’t know about their voting rights and perhaps didn’t care. It wasn’t until the 1890s that any Aborigines actually commenced voting.

When the various colonies federated into one nation in 1901, Aborigines were not given the federal vote. However, they did retain their state voting rights and these state voting rights gave them federal voting rights. Under section 41 of the federal constitution, any person who held a state vote also held a federal vote. Legally, Aborigines in NSW, Tasmania, Victoria, and South Australia have been allowed to vote in all federal elections. Aborigines were formerly given the federal vote in 1962.

The 1967 referendum that Noyce mistakenly believed was about giving Aborigines the vote was really about whether to include Aborigines in the federal census and whether the federal government should be allowed to make laws specifically for Aborigines. When the Australian constitution was written in 1901, the federal government had been denied the power to make laws specifically for Aborigines. Although it could make laws for all Australians, Aborigines included, it could not single Aborigines out. For example, it could not make laws to remove Aboriginal children from Aboriginal parents, even if the removal was deemed to be in Australia's interests or the interests of the children. This power had been reserved for the states.

It is not without irony that it was only in 1967 that the federal government gained the power to make the Aboriginal-specific laws that Noyce believed it had from 1900-1970, and believed it had used to create the stolen generations. Perhaps Noyce was aware of the truth, but simply lied about it because it conflicted with his political aim of making the federal government apologise to the stolen generations. If not, he was an extremely arrogant man for relying upon incorrect oral history for his facts and thinking this oral history was sufficient for him to then go forth and play the teacher to other Australians.

In regards to citizenship, Aborigines became British citizens the moment Captain Cook annexed Australia in 1772, in accordance with British law. However, counting them in censuses was difficult because Aborigines did not have fixed addresses, did not lodge birth certificates, did not lodge death certificates and often changed their name according to which tribe they lived in. Furthermore, they often did not speak the same language as the census officers and might well of speared any census officer that came wandering with census forms.

Even though Aborigines were British citizens in 1772, giving Aborigines the protection of British citizenship was problematic. For most of Australia's early years, being a British citizen meant little more than obeying British laws designed to protect each citizen or a vested interest. These laws could not easily be applied to hunter gatherer tribes. For example, to protect women from men, from 1838 to 1902 it was declared illegal to swim during the day in NSW. The exposure of flesh was deemed to put men into uncontrollable states. Even though the law was deemed to be in the individual's welfare, it simply wasn't pratical to send soldiers out into the hunter gatherer communities to force Aborigines to wear clothes. Furthermore, even if the laws could have been applied to hunter gathering communities, Australia's penal colonies were not the type of societies that any individual could be considered fortunate to be part of. To the contrary, if an individual wasn't bound by the laws, then there was some good fortune in that. Arguably, the bush was so important to the early colonial identity because the bush offered an escape from British citizenship, and the oppressive laws that British citizens were bound by.

After Rabbit-proof Fence won best picture in 2002, Noyce used his acceptance speech to criticise the federal government for not apologising for "its" policy of removing mixed race children from their communities from the 1900 to 1970. He then criticised Australians for losing their humanity.

Although some Australians were attracted to the "moral courage" shown by Noyce, other Australians were turned off by a movie that undermined the sense of community that could motivate Australians to think that their arts sector had value. As for people in the arts who supported making the movie, the story itself undermined their sense of pride in being Australian. It certainly didn't make them want to get out onto the streets to wave the Australian flag.

Ironically, some journalists highlighted the fact that Noyce himself shared a number of parrallels with A.O Neveille, the bad guy of the movie. Firstly, Noyce also scoured bush camps to find his Aboriginal actors and believed he was giving them an opportunity for a better life. Secondly, Everlyn Sampi, the star of the movie, was not always grateful for the opportunity given to her by the white man. She was rude to Noyce and kept running away. In response, Noyce abused her and said she showed “signs of the worst behaviour that I’ve observed. ” Noyce then explained to journalists,

“During the rehearsals, she ran away twice. We found her in a telephone booth ringing up inquiries trying to book a ticket back to Broome….I found myself thinking, ‘I have to look after her. She can live with us. I’ll send her to school.'”

When reporter James Thomas asked Noyce if he had noticed a commonality between his own attitudes and those of Neville, Noyce said,

“Well, I suppose in one way you could say that in a different context, in a different time, I’m A.O. Neville promising these young Aboriginal children a better life, asking them to do things that are against their instincts, perhaps because it’s for their own good. But we do live in a slightly different world...”

Noyce failed to elaborate on how the worlds were different. For many Aborigines in bush camps, the lifestyle today isn’t much different to what it was like 70 years ago. Furthermore, whites such as Noyce continue to look upon the camps with the same judgemental attitudes that they did in the days of A.O Neville. The only real difference is that the whites deal with their prejudices in a different way. A.O Neville dealt with them via a policy of assimilation. Although Noyce was assimilationist in his actions, he was also in denial about himself.

Unfortunately, calling Australians racist was not a way for him to open his own mind, provoke discussion on a very difficult topic, or foster respect for the Australian arts sector. All he did was show that if Australia had a history of bigotry, that history is alive and well today amongst people who think they are free of it. It takes more than calling a long-dead figure of history a racist to be open-minded. The only reason to do it would be to show one's own perceived superiority.

Noyce's innability to deal with cultural diversity
Many supporters of the stolen generations campaign have argued that the state government policies that resulted in mixed race children being removed from their mother's communities were a form of cultural genocide. Ironically, Rabbit-proof Fence was also a form of cultural genocide because it almost completely omitted any evidence of Aboriginal cultures. Instead, the movie was about whites doing bad things to Aborigines. By victimising Aborigines, Noyce didn't have to learn anything about them or show their culture in any meaningful form. Such was the focus on white culture, the music of Peter Gabriel, an Englishmen known for his progressive humanitarian causes, was used in preference to Aboriginal music.

The cultural censorship was not surprising considering the morality of hunter gatherer communities was, and continues to be, confronting to people living an urban existence. For example, in 2005 an Australian court heard that a 55-year-old Aboriginal elder had anally raped a 14-year-old girl, imprisoned her for four days and repeatedly beat her with a boomerang. In the man's culture, his actions were perfectly acceptable. The girl had been promised to him at the age of four, and she had dishonoured him by having a boyfriend before their marriage. According to traditional law, the elder was perfectly entitled to educate her in the manner that he did. In fact, a case could be made that if he didn't, he was not fulfilling his duties as an elder. The girl's family had further legitimised the actions of the man. Her grandmother had collected the girl, and taken her to the man so that he could rape and punish her.

The case posed numerous questions that had to be answered. Firstly, should the man be punished in light of the fact he was practicing his culture? Secondly, what protection did the child deserve under the Australian legal system? Thirdly, what should be done with the child in light of the fact that her family had arranged the child’s marriage, and then facilitated her rape to teach her a lesson? Should she be removed from the family, or left in its care? (The judge gave the man a one month prison sentence and sympathised with him in regards to his cultural predictament. The feelings of the child were not made public other than the fact she had lodged the initial complaint with police. While the man's culture had been respected, it had come at the expense of recognising the equality of the child as an Australian.)

From the 1900s to 1970s, the same questions were dealt with by social workers wanting to help Aborigines. Should they have respected traditional law and excluded the child from the protection of the Australian legal system, or removed the child in the belief the child would have had a better life by doing so? Either choice would have reflected a form of racism. To deny the child protection of the legal system would have meant the child was not being recognised as an Australian. To provide protection would have been a form of cultural imperialism.

Because such cultural dilemmas were too problematic for Noyce to think about, he simply omitted all aspects of Aboriginal culture that he couldn't deal with. In a nutshell, he put himself in denial to deal with his prejudices. He called others racists in order to see himself as open-minded.

Noyce showing Neville talking about advancing Aborigines to white status. If the depiction were true, then Neville would have been no different to every concerned citizen that defines Aborigines as "disadvantaged" today. By defining Aborigines as disadvantaged, concerned citizens are defining non-Aborigines as the advantaged models that Aborigines should aspire to be like. All government funded programs to lessen "disadvantage" are really programs to "assimilate." While the labels might be different, in substance they are the same.

 
1)Rabbit-Proof Fence: Phillip Noyce's Diary http://www.landmarktheatres.com/Stories/rabbit_frame.html