Top End Wedding (Wayne Blair, 2019) wr. Miranda Tapsell, Joshua Tyler; Miranda Tapsell, Gwilym Lee, Kerry Fox, Huw Higginson, Shari Sebbens, Ursula Yovich; comedy
[Lauren and Ned are engaged, and they have just ten days to reunite her parents for their dream wedding.]
This is Miranda Tapsell's film, tho she got Wayne Blair to direct. It was her idea, she wrote it, and was an associate producer: that's all in the end credits.
Tapsell is a Larrakia woman, born in Darwin, but her character is from Tiwi - where the 'top end* wedding' takes place - giving the opportunity for lots of touristic footage of tropical foliage, Fly Tiwi, Tiwi Designs (which made the wedding dress), and so on.
It reminds of The Sapphires, not just because that's another Wayne Blair's film, but because there's a featured small group of women (bridesmaids in this case, not singers), and also because in both there's a not-very-good GB actor playing a lead role. And both films have made millions of dollars for their investors from undemanding audiences.
Luke Buckmaster:
The film, much like the characters, seems engaged in a constant state of finding itself. Like many well-made but unexceptional romcoms, Top End Wedding is the cinematic equivalent of comfort food: reasonably satisfying but hardly adventurous. Luke Buckmaster, Guardian.
* 'Top end' usually refers to the (northern) Northern Territory - on the mainland. This film could have been called Tiwi Wedding. However, much/most of the footage was shot in Darwin - and there is a reference at one point to crocodiles (tho without actually showing one). The film marriage actually takes place in Wurrumiyanga on Bathurst Island - so it's really Wurrumiyanga Wedding.
Garry Gillard | New: 28 December, 2012 | Now: 6 March, 2022