And I think that's also Jane. Like Isabel Archer, Campion lost a baby. Jasper died when he was 12 days old, just after Campion had won the top prize at Cannes. She says the two experiences taught her a lesson, made her reassess her life. The irony of Jasper dying at the moment of winning the Palme d'Or is that you learn that what you want is not always under your control.
Portrait is dedicated to Jasper.
Darkness, strangeness, madness have always been important to Campion's vision. Not so much an analysis of strangeness, just an acknowledgement that it is there, stirred in with the apparently normal, inseparable. She likes to set things into action and see what happens. But, then, that's rather like being a movie director. Australia and New Zealand loom large in her films, particularly the latter, which provides the sombre psychic landscape for An Angel at My Table and The Piano .