Alex Menglet Movies

Danny (Noah Taylor) is a young man seemingly used to chaos, but he soon discovers that the fates are more than capable of dishing out more than he can handle in this offbeat Australian comedy. By his own count, thirtyish Danny has found himself sharing living quarters with one or more friends more than four dozen times in the past; one might imagine this would make him immune to roommate problems, but that soon proves not to be the case. While sharing a house in Brisbane with a handful of sloppy guys -- and one woman, Sam (Emily Hamilton), who ought to know better -- Danny finds himself obsessing over his most recent relationship, which crashed and burned six months before. The arrival of Anya (Romane Bohringer) picks up Danny's spirits, until he discovers she's dating Sam; this sets off his impulsive instincts, and too much spending (and too much damage to his rented house) forces Danny to high-tail it to Melbourne. Sam soon follows, smarting from a break-up with Anya, and she ends up sharing a flat with Danny. Danny's money management skills have not improved a bit, and he is soon on the run to Sydney, where he and Sam find themselves crashing with Nina (Sophie Lee), an actress with an eating disorder, and her gay friend Dirk (Francis McMahon). Just as Danny and Sam seem to be getting settled, Anya arrives, looking to reconcile with Sam; things get complicated for Danny, and he ends up moving in with Flip (Brett Stewart), an old friend with a severe drug problem. He Died With A Felafel In His Hand was adapted from the popular novel by Australian author John Birmingham. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide

This thoughtful Australian sci-fi film was shot on location on a spectacular dry salt lake at Woomera, where the Australian military used to test its rockets. The story is set in an environmentally ravaged, desolate future. For the first time in 40 years the warring New Territories and the Federal Republics have reached a tentative peace thanks to the secret machinations of the Central Union, a powerful group comprised of industrialists from both sides. As part of the deal, Central Union is allowed to monopolize all communications. Anne, the pregnant wife of New Territories army training officer Leo Megaw, works for CU as one of their leading security coders. To prove her prowess, she one day decides to prove to her skeptical boss that she can crack his supposedly uncrackable security code. In so doing she learns that an outer security zone has suffered a terrible accident resulting deadly contamination. Not long after her discovery, Anne "accidentally" dies under suspicious circumstances. Leo is devastated and nearly succeeds in killing himself. Eventually, he masters his grief enough to allow his pal Seton, a CU worker, to send him to isolated Zone 39 to man a lonely outpost to guard the border. He is ordered to shoot anyone moving into the zone and to carefully monitor the activities of the Federal Republics guard Pagett. It is an unpleasant duty and Leo's predecessor killed himself. People do wander into the zone, and all of them are "classified," and contaminated by something. When not on duty, Leo takes small comfort in a drug that allows him to converse with his wife. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide

Australian director Paul Cox, skilled at intense psychological stories about lone souls looking for comfort in a cold world, was at his best with this original script co-written by the director and Barry Dickins. Martha is a 78-year-old woman living out her final days. Not a maudlin tale of a lonely woman wasting away, A Woman's Tale focuses on a human who manages to maintain an amazing vitality in the face of death. She encourages her young nurse, Anna (Gosia Doborowolska), to use her flat for romantic trysts; she looks in on Billy (Norman Kayes), an elderly neighbor, and she resists attempts by her son Johanathan (hris Haywood) to place her in a nursing home. Sheila Florance's performance as Martha is a marvel, especially given the art-imitates-life aspect of production: Florance was terminally ill, and she died soon after she was nominated for the Best Actress Award for Australia's Academy Awards. ~ Tom Wiener, All Movie Guide

In this docudrama, the menace posed by Australian efforts to ward off terrorist attacks is shown to be at least as great as that posed by the attacks themselves. The story is told by a female German sociologist exploring the expanding power of the state, and her didactic commentary is interspersed with scenes of a hostage situation. Throughout, heavy-handed police responses to the situations they encounter, whether terrorist or not, make everyone look bad. In fact, the police soon deport the German academic as an undesirable. The filmmakers contentions seems to be that Australia is very virtually a police state already. However, the very fact of the film's being made and widely released within the country would seem to contradict that assertion, despite many well-documented abuses by the authorities. ~ Clarke Fountain, All Movie Guide

In this Australian entry into the early 1980s sub-genre of films dealing with families rejecting contemporary society for a life of freedom and non-conformity (Mosquito Coast, Lost in America), an Australian family tries to leave the suburbs and start afresh in the country. Connie (Judy Morris) and Lex (Barry Otto) are a happily married couple with a young son. They decide to leave the hustle and bustle of the city and purchase a farm two hours away from the city's noise. The problem is that Connie and Otto are not independently wealthy, and, until their farm becomes self-sufficient, one of them has to keep commuting into town to work. One solution to their dilemma is to hire a live-in baby-sitter. Connie hires Geraldine (Victoria Longley) and then their troubles really begin. ~ Paul Brenner, All Movie Guide

As if being a teen-aged girl weren't difficult enough, Sarah has the additional complication of being deaf. She blames herself and her handicap for the separation of her parents. When she goes to the countryside to visit her grandfather, she experiences the first stirrings of love with David, a boy she meets there. Unusually for such a teen-centered movie, this drama does not go in for easy solutions or a tidy ending, and Sarah can be found at the end of the movie pondering both her new problems and most of her old ones. ~ Clarke Fountain, All Movie Guide

Fresh out of medical school, Paul Armstrong (Simon Burke) has landed a job at an Australian urban venereal and sexual disease clinic. While he understands the medical stuff he learned in school pretty well, he is stuffy and a bit of a prude. Most of all, he hasn't yet adjusted to the idea that homosexuals are real human beings. However, in this fast-paced yet gentle comedy, which focuses on the intern's clinical encounters, he swiftly learns the ropes and changes his tune on a lot of issues, as he encounters women and men with all sorts of social and sexual problems. ~ Clarke Fountain, All Movie Guide