Matthew Dyktynski Movies

Following their feature debut, Road to Nhill, in 1997, screenwriter Alison Tilson and director Sue Brooks team up again for the Australian drama Japanese Story. Toni Collette stars as Sandy Edwards, an ambitious geologist who is most comfortable when working alone. She also runs a software design company with a business partner, Bill Baird (Matthew Dyktynski), and she doesn't get along very well with her mother (Lynette Curran). While trying to sell their software products, Bill asks for her help in catching a prospective client. Sandy reluctantly meets the quiet and reserved Japanese businessman Hiromitsu (Gotaro Tsunashima) in order to make a sale. After he requests that she take him on a driving tour, the odd couple find themselves stranded in the Pilbara desert for a night -- one of the most remote places in the Australian outback. During this time together, their relationship quickly escalates and both parties are changed by the experience. Japanese Story premiered at the 2003 Cannes Film Festival. ~ Andrea LeVasseur, Rovi

A runaway Japanese bride finds herself alone in Sydney, Australia when her lover fails to show up to save her from her husband, and she ends up on an off-road adventure with a handsome getaway driver while fleeing gangsters, cops from two countries and her murderously humiliated spouse. The whole mess begins when Midori (Youki Kudoh) engineers her own kidnapping to avoid her honeymoon night with her hyper-tense businessman husband Yukio (Kenji Isomura). When he notices Midori's absence, Yukio panics. Local policemen Bishop and Moffat are assigned the case and it is while talking to Yukio and the staff that they learn the truth. When the Japanese press finds out about Yukio's plight, they merrily proceed to crucify him in the headlines, making him a laughingstock. Meanwhile, Midori, after getting jilted, goes to a bank to exchange some money and is caught in the midst of an armed bankrobbery masterminded by Afghani hoodlums Mahood (Robert Mammone) and his brother Gullbuddin. The two are about to shoot the terrified Midori when their getaway driver Colin (Russell Crowe) intervenes. Gullbuddin is accidentally killed during the scuffle and Colin hits the highway with Midori. With the aforementioned crowd in hot pursuit, the two fugitives head for a farm in the boonies where Colin's elderly, embittered father lives in almost comical isolation. Along the way, the two encounter several memorable characters. ~ Sandra Brennan, Rovi

Australian college students struggle to deal with school, romance, and life in general in first-time director Emma-Kate Croghan's comedy. The film's focus falls on cinema studies major Mia (France O'Connor) and her roommate Alice (Alice Garner), both of whom find themselves in romantic flux. Alice is torn between the cocky Ari (Matthew Dyktynski) and the shy but loyal Michael (Matt Day), while Mia is in the midst of a messy break-up with her girlfriend Danni (Radha Mitchell). Further complicating Mia's life are her unfinished thesis (on the feminist implications of Doris Day films) and her struggles with the college administration, which provide the opportunity for gentle satire of academia and the frustrations of bureaucracy. The characters deal with their troubles through articulate, questioning dialogue, and Croghan punctuates the film with title screens featuring famous quotes and with attempts to liven up the relatively familiar story with occasional forays into art-film stylization. Most critics viewed the film as a promising debut, with likable characters and a charming romantic tone, if an inconsequential narrative. ~ Judd Blaise, Rovi