TRUE HISTORY OF THE KELLY GANG

 

TRUE HISTORY OF THE KELLY GANG dir Justin Kurzel

 

The True History of the Kelly Gang comes complete with bearded, corpulent Russell Crowe as a Godfather of crime (not a Godfather of acting although one suspects that this was his actual role).  There have been other interpretations of the Kelly legend, previously in 1970 a version with Mick Jagger as Ned and in 2003 Heath Ledge assumed the mantle of the eponymous anti-hero and bushranger, Ned (Edward) Kelly.  Heath Ledger’s interpretation of Ned is more like a western shot in Australia, Ned speaks with a strong Irish accent and his protest is coherently and vividly depicted.

Justin Kurzel's film True History of the Kelly Gang concurs with the Postmodern dogma that, in the words of Nietzsche, 'there is no such thing as truth, only interpretation.'  Kurzel had previously shot Shakespeare’s Macbeth in the manner of a Sam Peckinpah flick with lots of groaningly awful slow-motion decapitation.   However, there are also some postmodern reflections, at the beginning of the film the Macbeths bury their child, a memory never touched upon by Shakespeare.   The difference between Kurzel’s film and earlier interpretations of the legend is that this film wants us to know that this isn't a truthful interpretation but merely a presentation of the subjective dimensions of the legend viewed largely through the perception of Ned himself.  Firstly, it is taken for granted that Ned's grandfather was an Irishman transported to Australia for stealing a horse or some other trivial offence.  The breath-taking unfairness is one of the reasons why the Kelly gang evolve, and Ned uses typical myths, that he is a son of Ireland and 'a son of Sieve'.  This may be a reference to sects and unlawful organisations that once appeared in rural Ireland such as the Whiteboys, Ribbonboys, Orangemen, Peep O' Day Boys and others who existed on both side of the community.  However, Ned is not very Irish, and his Irish prostitute wife Mary, played by Thomasin McKenzie, refers to him as a 'colonial' with a pronounced Australian accent.

The film is divided into 3 more or less equal segments which are signposted with headings in the manner of Lars von Trier and earlier Modernist and Marxist authors.  The first segment is titled Boy.  In brief, Ned's mother Ellen Kelly, played by Essie Davis who was last seen in The Babadook, an Australian horror movie, is central to his personal evolution. She has retained a strong Irish accent and strongly Irish Nationalist sentiments although hazily and sentimentally drawn.  She is also a sex worker, employed by local policeman Sergeant O’Neill, played by Charlie Hunnam, with a pronounced Durham accent.  The hierarchy of race and class spirals downwards to encompass Russell Crowe's character Harry Power, who becomes Ned's mentor in crime.  That the film fails to maintain its initial impact is partly because of its insistence on depicting Ned's internal rationalisation of his actions and his willingness to add to his own legend, indeed writing up his own life story as it unfolds, seemingly knowing that it will be viewed by posterity in the way that he wanted it to be.  Thus, we are never totally sure if the Ned Kelly narrative is merely in his own mind or, viewed externally, an insurgency or an uprising that became a heroic failure.  Power insists on humiliating Sergeant O’Neill to test Ned’s readiness for a life of crime or resistance which is also bound up with Ned’s strong family loyalty and dependence on his mother. 

In the second chapter, Man, Ned is fully grown and this time his antagonist is another policeman played by Nicholas Hoult.  The two chapters are propelled by parallelisms and chance rather than by narrative ploys and authorial conceits.  Constable Fitzpatrick, played by Hoult, is a plausible, suave and adeptly insightful into Ned's agonising as he reveals that Mary has given birth to the child of his mother's would-be husband, an American, who happens to be about the same age as Ned himself.  Hoult's performance is a highlight of the film as is George MacKay as Ned.  MacKay, last seen in Sam Mendes’ 1917, portrays Ned's bravado, foolish uncertainty and rash, temperamental behaviour, his performance is a tour de force.  Ned possesses a print of an American Civil War battleship, realising that he must become the ‘Battleship Monitor’ (the Monitor was a heavily armoured battleship with a shallow draught designed for use in harbours and rivers with shallow bottoms.)  Ned begins to design body armour for himself and his would-be insurgents.  The gang dress in women’s clothing stolen from a brothel they frequent and seem to realise some connection between their role as killers and their ambivalent gender identity.

The final chapter concerns the siege and death of Ned.  The film assumes that we already know the story, so the emphasis is now placed on understanding Ned's narrowly subjective horizons and myth-making appeal.  As Ned advances out of the shack complete with his infamous body armour defence, he seems to personify every unformulated act of resistance, formed on an emotional level of protest but doomed to defeat.  Ned’s stream of consciousness is depicted as a concatenation of the more or less overtly fantastical matter that he has summoned over the course of events; the sons of Sieve, the Battleship Monitor and all the rest of the half-formulated mush that has criss-crossed his mind.  He is captured alive so that he can be hung in Melbourne gaol house uttering the slightly shambolic words 'such is life' as anti-climactic as they come but also symbolically appropriate and in tune with the legends craziness and seemingly Australian appeal.  Ned is the archetypal Australian larrakin, a mad tempestuous youth with a heart of gold.  In fact, Ned was awarded a green scarf in honour of his bravery when saving a drowning boy from a creek when he was 11 years old.  Ned wore the scarf during the battle at the shack, or so the legend says.

 

Paul Murphy