Exile (Paul Cox, 1994) novel Priest Island by E. L. Grant Watson, dp Nino Marinetti; Aden Young, Beth Champion, Claudia Karvan, Norman Kaye, David Field, Chris Haywood, Barry Otto, Hugo Weaving, Tony Llewellyn-Jones, Nicholas Hope; feature went straight to video; Young is exiled to an island in C19 for sheep-stealing; filmed in Tasmania
Exile has an amazing cast: Hugo Weaving, Dave Field, Claudia Karvan, Chris Haywood, Nicholas Hope, Barry Otto, Norman Kaye – and all this for a Robinson Crusoe story, for a man on a desert island. The man in question is Aden Young. He's seemed to me for a long time to be the kiss of death for any film. Some examples. Black Robe: so expensive, and so boring. Metal Skin: which succeeds because of Geoffrey Wright and in spite of 3/4 of the key actors (the exception being Ben Mendelsohn, who's always good). Cosi: it's an ensemble film, and everyone is good except AY. Love in Limbo: nobody much is any good, but the production design triumphs. Aden Young should have got an MBA and made a lot of money, and left acting to people with ability.
The sound people on Exile (two of them) get the major credit: there's so much SOUND for much of the time, with nothing much else going on.
Finally: I can see how AY got the part. He had an innocent look back then. But not much acting ability to go with it. Young is, like Mel Gibson, a deracinated North American with more confidence than is justified.
Garry Gillard | New: 25 October, 2012 | Now: 4 April, 2020