OBSERVER: Spit
A sequel to the successful 2003 movie Gettin’ Square, the film Spit is a “criminal-with-a-heart-of-gold” story which, while sympathetically portraying the plight of refugees in Australia, suffers from a cliched script and plodding pace.
The central character, Johnny (Spit) Spitieri (played by David Wenham), is a small-time criminal who returns from overseas only to find himself locked up in an immigration detention centre.
To add to his woes his old enemies are out to settle scores and his beloved sister is in failing health.
The screenplay is by Christopher Nyst who also wrote Gettin’ Square. Unfortunately, it suffers from several basic flaws including a cliched storyline and, apart from one or two exceptions, crass caricatures instead of characters.
There is little subtlety in the writing, with nothing left to the imagination. There is too much exposition while the emotional life of the characters is overly sentimental.
Given such a difficult screenplay Wenham, one of Australia’s finest actors, makes a fist of making Spit a believable and likeable larrikin.
He is supported in this by a strong supporting cast, many of whom are reprising roles from the original film. Nevertheless, there is way too much ham acting going on. Ostensibly done for comic effect, it fails to deliver much in the way of laughs and consequently detracts from the story.
Jonathan Teplitzky directs the film and must shoulder some of the blame for this.
He also is responsible for the camera lingering far too often in several scenes; at one hour and 45 minutes long the film could do with some judicious editing to pick up the pace.
In addition, the mix of realistic scenes with others of a cartoon-like quality does not come off.
Admirable for its compassionate portrayal of refugees, sadly Spit is a lowest common denominator type of film that goes for cheap laughs and is peopled with hackneyed ocker-type characters telling a tired story.
In Australian cinemas from March 6.
Duration: 1h 45m
Review by Peter Murphy