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 to access audio and video on collective you need real player.Director Rowan Woods swims upstream. For a story about an ex-junkie teetering on the edge of addiction, Australian Rowan Woods’ Little Fish is striking for the scenes it doesn’t show: no scoring in a low-rent dealer’s dive; no euphoric “getting high” episode indulging in flashy visuals to convey a chemically altered state; no elegantly wasted montage set to a Lou Reed dirge. No needles, but still an intense rendering of the damage done.“It’s quite unusual because it doesn’t deal with any of that downward spiral usually involved with heavy drug-taking,” acknowledges Woods of his second feature film. “It’s a more serious, mature reflection of what it takes in life to resist and stay on track. It’s a film, in many ways, about growing up.”  It’s also a film with an all-star Antipodean cast – Hugo Weaving, Sam Neill, Martin Henderson and, in the lead, the great Cate Blanchett as recovering addict Tracy Heart. Little Fish starts with Tracy treading the fine line of sobriety, struggling to start her own business, yet still unable to escape the shadow of her own past and the friends who could pull her back there. Not that Woods is averse to generic conventions - hence a late-blooming subplot involving a sting on Neill’s bewigged drug baron - it’s rather that everyday life and relationships are at least as interesting. “The fact that the heroic struggle I see around me every day - to get to middle-age alive and in a sort of a happy state - isn’t put into cinema and dramatised is a constant surprise to me,” he attests.  A Sydney boy, Woods rigorously reveals the city’s lesser-known areas, particularly the Asian-dominated Cabramatta or “Little Saigon”, yet still “not making it a story about race; it’s more about people and relationships”. Such attention to detail helped reel in “actor magnet” Blanchett and her unwavering commitment. “This film is unusual for Cate,” notes Woods. “Believe it or not she hadn’t played on screen a woman of her own age, her own culture and of her own time. A lot of people who are close to Cate actually got quite emotional seeing her in Little Fish; they were seeing little Cate the girl come out. She put all the work in but then wanted to let it all go and reveal a lot of herself in the role.” As ever, Blanchett swims rather than sinks; and so does the film.
Leigh Singer
Little Fish, on selected release 21 July 06.
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comment by esmith
Jul 27, 2006
Well...I went to see Little Fish last night, and Ok even though I was in a light entertainment mood and maybe priates of the carribean might have been a better choice I thought the film was weak mainly because of the script - there was too much method acting, too many pregnant pauses and too little talking. All the characters were two dimentional Slackers apart from Lionel who was the most fleshed out and interesting character.While the film's visual look was fantastic it did make lend all the fatal junkie shennanigans a glamour that's just a load of bollox - I live next to junkie land and its pritty grim out there...
comment by qyming
Jul 24, 2006
hello
comment by flyingtwinkle
Jul 21, 2006
Director Rowan Woods and his collaborators have crafted a totally absorbing urban drama about complex homosapiens whose lives have been compromised by drugs and various addictionsOne of the characters was originally meant to have been gone for a few years in Hong Kong. However, after shooting, they realized that the actor had a slightly American accent, so changed all references to Hong Kong to Vancouver, Canada
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