The Goddess of 1967

Plot synopsis:
The storyline opens in Tokyo where JM (Rikiya Kurokawa), a rich young IT worker and sometime computer hacker, is attempting to purchase a 1967 model Citroën DS, or Goddess, as it is known to French car aficionados. JM lives in a pristine but unfriendly hi-tech apartment. The smog filled city is blue-grey and bleak. He rarely speaks to his live-in girlfriend and is preoccupied with other possessions—his latest snorkeling gear as well as the pet snakes and other exotic reptiles he keeps in the flat. After tracing, on the Internet, a perfectly restored Citroën owned by a couple in Australia, JM abandons his job and flies out to purchase the rare car, which he thinks can fill the emptiness in his life.
No one meets JM at the airport but he eventually finds the home where the car is located and meets BG (Rose Byrne), a blind and emotionally unstable young woman. BG, who is minding a young child, explains that the couple did not actually own the Citroën and that the husband shot his wife and then killed himself after a violent argument over money. She shows him the car and tells him, after he has test driven it, that she can take him to its real owner, who is somewhere in the Outback, a five-day drive away. Intoxicated by the vehicle, JM agrees. BG abandons the young child at the blood-splattered house, instructing her not to trust anyone.
As BG and JM journey into the spectacular but harsh landscape, the viewer is taken on a series of complex and often confusing flashbacks which attempt to illustrate the dark tragedies that have shaped their respective lives. JM, we learn, became fabulously wealthy after a friend gave him the computer password to a major bank. But his friend was soon run over and killed by a passing truck. JM's infatuation with the car is apparently an attempt to fill the emotional gap created by his friend's death and the barren life he leads in Tokyo, which, he tells BG, is alien and "just like Mars".
Most of the flashbacks, however, concern BG. She was sexually attacked three years earlier by a young boxer from a travelling circus who is frustrated in his attempts by a Chastity belt. BG then escaped into the bush where she was protected by wild dingoes. As a young child, she was also sexually abused by her grandfather (who is her blood father) and traumatised by Marie (Elise McCredie), her disoriented and deeply religious mother. Grandpa (Nicholas Hope), who was a hippie, a wine maker and then an opal miner, believes his outback existence frees him from all moral constraints.
BG's favourite radio show is the obituary notices program and she is infatuated by the sound of insects splattering on the Citroën's windscreen, which, she explains to JM, is the "sound of death". Although blind, BG carries a pistol which she fires occasionally: the first time at two sinister men who pull alongside the car during JM's test drive and later, in the outback, to destroy the radio she uses to listen to the obituary notices. Unbeknownst to JM, BG's grandfather owns the car and she is leading JM to him not to consummate the car's sale but in order to kill the old man.
In the course of their journey through an unremittingly hostile world inhabited by cruel outback men and women, the couple become friends and, after JM teaches BG how to dance, tentative lovers. BG eventually finds her grandfather and confronts him in his rundown opal mine. She had planned to shoot him but, having reconciled her past in the course of the trip and found someone who genuinely cares for her, decides not to go ahead with it. The film ends with BG and JM travelling off together in the Citroën, the message being that humane relationships are only possible when people come to terms with their past.

Tags: murder, flashback

Review:
I loved it.The movie starts with a computer screen that says: I want to buy GOD.The Prologue doesn't have any human voices.
Because of that movie I can't let go of that.She succeeds in showing us her own vision of The Goddess of 1967 because she stays consequent by creating a contemporary and postmodern feeling.
Afterwards Film in London and lives with her husband in Australia.What Clara Law tries to explain in her movie is sort of autobiographic, it is obvious that she reflects this on the two protagonists.
Clara Law doesn't work this movie out in a shallow kind of way.
Or so she says.Once they are on the road with the car, you can follow the mental way of both characters.
On the road the flashbacks follow and the viewer learns the pain and history of the characters and why the are what they are.
I knew it was a road trip picture with a Japanese man and Australian woman...
What I didn't expect was two very real people, scared, vulnerable and eccentric characters on a journey across Australia that becomes luminous and intoxicating.
The visual style of the film /cinematography, while gorgeous, was at first distracting...
But as the story unfolds, the visual look of the film matches with the messy, hypnotic storyline and its characters.
Clare Law was a successful blockbuster director while she was in Hong Kong, who made films like The Reincarnation of Golden Lotus.
Its cinematography is beautiful; its writing is humorous, despite the fact that the story is heavy.
This is a description that requires a lot of hand gestures.It moves in such a way that you are carried along with the action, not separated from the action by this big "movie".
Although some of the underlying issues that the main characters have gone through are in many respects very serious and macabre, I don't think it was the director's intent to make this a depressing movie which dwells on those issues alone.
Ironically, the central character is blind, and cannot see all this visual beauty directly.
Rose Byrne's performance alone makes this film worth a look (it still airs occasionally on sundance).
Actors who take on the challenging role of blind characters are nothing new- but to see a talented actress take to it with total commitment and still be very believable and not over the top is something special.
Rose Byrne is brilliant here as B.G. and really shines in the more subtle moments, which are the primary driving force for this Clara Law film.The theme of incest abuse and it's lingering affects through generations make for very heavy subject matter that would otherwise threaten to undermine the film's subtle tone - but it's told in flashback here and works surprisingly well.
The comparisons of style to Wenders and Jarmusch are apt since it is precisely the more subtle scenes in this film that resonate more as the viewer gets drawn into the lives and past histories of this unlikely couple.
Not a perfect film by any means - the loving yet determinist, religious mother, Marie could have been fleshed out more, as well as the male lead - but the real gem here is Rose Byrne.
This film does several things that are hard to read and harder to fully appreciate without being hammered over the head with the story's themes.
The film sets up expectations for the characters, then proceeds to change said expectations as the characters evolve and reveal like layers peeling away.
I'm awed by much of the delicate caress of the pacing, and the contrast of the beautiful way many of the scenes are shot against the contents of the scenes themselves.
If you are driving or contemplating a purchase of a featureless economical car with automatic transmission, or if you have REALLY managed to bear the tedious 3 hours of  `The Titanic' without leaving the theatre for a half-an-hour refreshment or for good, THE GODDESS OF 1967 is not a film for you.
On the other hand, if you are sick of being able to predict the remaining two and a half hours of the contemporary Hollywood mind-numbing production, Clara Law has a remedy for you!
Moreover, if you have ever fallen in love with a car, you would be even more delighted to see that there are people like you out there.The first hint of the cinematic joy that THE GODDESS OF 1967 offers is clear from the first 10 minutes of the film.
However, Clara Law bravely takes the challenge, carrying us smoothly through the wonderful world of moving pictures backed by enchanting music.Thematically, THE GODDESS OF 1967 incorporates a number of topics, child abuse being but one of them.
Questions seemingly so simple that most of us would not bother asking, yet most of us would not be able to answer them, as well as the characters in the film remain perplexed, stammering nonsense that reverberates mockingly.THE GODDESS OF 1967 is a meeting point of several worlds.
The good and the evil, love and hate, reason and absurdity, trauma and optimism, gloom and humour are interwoven into the plot with straightforward simplicity, which makes the film surprisingly lifelike.
Finally, the film brings all these worlds closer to us, making us richer for knowing one another better..
In movies - road movies especially - we are looking for change in the characters, the relationships and possibly the balance between two themes.
Learned to love a being without scales?And in looking for themes that may be juxtaposed or in tension with each other - yes there is Megacity Vs Outback, there is beauty vs ugliness, black holes vs religion, responsibility for yourself vs the excuse of horrid childhood - but for me somehow they were a bit fitted in, if any one stands out - perhaps it is travelling with a purpose vs with your eyes closed, and the frightning thing of travelling with a purpose (to buy the car or kill your dad) turns out to be: What then?
The Goddess of the title is a Citroen DS which a young Japanese Man agrees to buy over the internet.
When he arrives in Australia to get it, the owner is dead and he embarks on a journey into the outback with a blind girl for a reason which is never clear, even when it is made apparent at the end.
Its flashbacks into the deprived and abused past of the blind girl are bleak, but otherwise there is little story and the two main characters appear almost lost in the vast landscapes they are travelling through.
Could Australian movies please get over their current pretentious pre-occupation with mad and irrational characters and meaningless storylines?The votes on this site, and some press reviews, suggest that some people enjoyed this film.
I suspect they are the same people who enjoyed performance art during the 1990s and Andy Warhol movies in the 1980s.
Clara Law succeeds in striking a style, but tells us nothing we want to know.
Even the Australian outback, which dominates the film, gets a raw deal: the locations appear random, the colour in the outdoor scenes is fashionably bleached, and the whole thing was shot during the wettest summer for years..
Visually impressive in a way that few films are, The Goddess of 1967 is a sumptuous feast for the eyes.
Unfortunately all the eye candy in the world can't save a film that suffers dreadfully from being extremely self indulgent.
There's nothing wrong with a slow film as evidenced by such cinematic gems as The Thin Red Line so long as the winding narrative path takes the audience somewhere.
Ponderous and meandering, The Goddess of 1967 is a tedious example of a film overly impressed with its own importance..
I loathe the phrase "It's only a movie", as in, "it's not real, they're only actors, don't let a film affect your emotions".
Obviously it's only a movie, but I for one can relate to scenarios, or start to equate a film to real people's lives, envisioning the woes and traumas of dark story lines affecting people all too vividly in the real world.
There are certain scenes in certain films that haunt me and stick in the back of my mind like an ugly memory, making the fact that the film was great or not a mute point.
GODDESS OF 1967 has a few such scenes which I found particularly disturbing and I wish I had never seen this film because of those few disturbing scenes.
I can't find this film beautiful or look at it strictly as an artistic endeavor with attempts at social commentary.
I did not get enough value or mind opening insight from this film to make it worth watching.
People who's projected imagination and human empathy are less vivid than mine, will probably have a much milder take on this film..
While some of the content of the film was not something I enjoy watching, there were two things that I did enjoy.
In addition, many of the camera movements added to the feeling of the story rather than be a distraction as in so many movies.
I just finished viewing this movie (The Goddess of 1967) that my roommate had rented and was quite moved by it.
That of a naive, young Japanese man (Rikiya Kurokawa) and a blind Australian girl, Deidre (Rose Byrne).
The movie tells of their journey through the Australian outback after the Japanese man travels to Australia in search of the car of his dreams, a classic French Citroen.
The trip is not a vacation, but a journey of release particularly for the young woman who has been tormented for most of her short life by the horrible memories of sexual abuse and a mother who failed to stop it.
THE GODDESS OF 1967 is a film by Clara Law and husband Eddie Fong.
It's set in Australia and it's by a Hong Kong/Australian director famous for her less 'Aussie' films.
It's about a Japanese businessman (Rikiya Kurokawa, look out for this name, a great performance by a Prada model(?!) in his first role) who finds a classic car (a Citroen DS 1967) on the internet and comes to Australia to buy it.
Anyway, when he arrives he finds the owners dead and ends up on a journey in the car across the outback with a blind Australian girl (yeah, it's a road movie).
The look of the film reminded me of innovative HK directors like Wong Kar-Wai and his cinematographer Chris Doyle.
Clara uses a lot of visual effects and graphics that work well, (although sometimes look like vague attempts to be experimental) and obvious back projection behind the drivers in the car which I thought was great but alot of people might not like.
Providing expensive clothes with designer labels , night life, bars with spirits and music , trips to Maldives , Mexico Bay , calm beaches of Africa by plane or liners , even by high speed catamaran without considering seasonal restrictions , open air concerts, opera , theater , all exclusive accesses which you will feel personally special , heavily depend on money.
He goes to the house where he thinks the owner lives only to find a red-haired blind girl, BG.
The Citroen DS is a much-loved car.
This fits since the two leads have shut themselves off with painful souls and away from the real world when they journey into the spectacular but harsh landscape.
P.S. Film based on C.L' s 18 days road trip by 4x4 car.
There are two important locations : Lighthning Ridge (for The Goddess of 1967) and White Cliffs ( for The Mechanical Bird-This film is not appeared yet.).
Directionless japanese internet thief goes to Australia to buy a Goddess (a Citroen 2CV) and meets a blind women.
They travel through Australia together and flashbacks into the women's history reveal a terrifying yet simple story about her childhood, including sexual abuse and religious fanatism.
While being displayed in beautiful pictures using very interesting camera technique, I experienced the movie as an overly long trip into the world of simply insane people.
The absurd end spoiled all the sympathy I had for the movie while I watched it, leaving me with the question: "What the hell did Clara Law want to express/tell/explain with this movie?" I didn't enjoy searching for the answer at all..
Although i have never been in either of the countries I think that this film gave me a good impression of what I could expect.
A person from the nearly unhuman hi tech world of Tokio comes to look for an old car which is more than low tech.
In this extreme world a love story is set.Very interesting..
It is lovely to look at, especially the way the scenery is filmed (& I don't care who tries to contemptuously dismiss it as 'arty'.
I don't want to look at tourist brochure cinematography, a la 'Japanese Story' - I've already been to the outback & seen the scenery).
The characters felt real to me (& never acted in ways that were inconsistent with or unexplained in terms of their personality & motives, unlike Toni Colette's character in 'Japanese Story').
However, if your life has not followed the mainstream-media 'happy families' narrative, you might, as I did, be able to deeply relate to the main characters, as well as the whole sense & sensibility of this movie..
Like too many arthouse movies 'The Goddess of 1967' seems to think that some excellent cinematography is enough to carry a superficial script full of stereotypical characters.
Apart from a handful of memorable visual images I can think of nothing positive to say about this movie.
Personally I'm sick of this outdated, narrow view which in no way represents the diversity and richness of contemporary Australian life.
To add further to the shallowness and predictability of this movie the Japanese car buff played by newcomer Rikiya Kurokawa is so poorly developed and pointless that he may as well wear a t-shirt saying "silly Asian character" and leave it at that.
The inexplicably touted Rose Byrne's "fiesty blind girl with a dark past" has slightly more depth, but only just.
This film combines an interesting and meaningful plot with cinematography which is a tribute to the many textures of Australia and some restrained but insightful acting and direction.
I saw this movie at a film festival, and have been patiently waiting for it to be distributed.
Beautifully shot and artfully acted, this film achieves (and then some) what Japanese Story fell short of..
It looked like just another graduate thesis from every film school around America: Tarkovsky-alikes.
Personally I am tired of seeing films like that.
How did Clara Law think of this film --- and write the script?.
It begins with an obsessed Japanese man, who meets a blind 38 year-old woman in Australia.
There are flashbacks.Try not watching this film: I don't think you will be able to.
See a female director credit and always go, you will never be disappointed.Clara Bow was born in China (Macao) and has two different Chinese names, according to IMDb. She first made films in China, in Chinese.
Her Japanese leading man is a knock-out, too.This film is a great package: definitely take it in..
The three main flashback scenes feel unnecessary and distracting at first, but once we make it to the finale everything comes full circle and all of the 'unecessary' filler from before just adds more and more to the complexities of Rose's character.
Salvation lay in the affection between the two protagonists.I sought this film out for Rose Byrne and was not disappointed.
Her performance is worth the film's nearly two hours running time.
There was too much of Byrne's character stumbling around feeling her way about.
His love making scene with Rose Byrne's character is very sensual and hot.
That'd be a simplified way of describing "The Goddess of 1967", a dazzling, unique road movie written and directed by Clara Law ("Floating Life").The goddess of the title isn't a woman, but the nickname of a Citroën DS, a famous car designed in the 50's.
A young Japanese man (Rikiya Kurokawa) dreams of buying that car, and he travels to Australia after he finds an offering on the net.
But special kudos go to Clara Law, her co-writer Eddie Ling-Ching Fong and cinematographer Dion Beebe (Oscar winner for "Memoirs of a Geisha"), responsible for the breathtaking visuals (Aussie landscapes seldom looked so gorgeous).Incest, murder, blindness aren't light issues, and a less talented director could make an imbroglio with this material.
Fortunately, Clara Law knows what she's talking about and her film is a cinematic poem - sad, sometimes disturbing, but not depressing (I have no idea how could someone classify this as a comedy, though).
"The Goddess of 1967" is a vigorous film that deserves to be discovered.
The fantastic cinematography and the performance of Rose Byrne.
The rest of the film however--While The Goddess of 1967 is very pleasing to look at, the actions of the characters are frequently shallow and seemingly random.
For example, during the conclusion, it simply was not believable that B.G. would make the choice to put her past aside and choose to pursue a life with J.M. when the chemistry and dialogue between the two characters was so completely mindless.Law failed to demonstrate the growth and change B.G. allegedly must have made during the trip and forces her into a 180 at the end of the film as a quick fix..
Clara Law's directing technique is first-year film school stuff with a lot of unnecessary appendages that do little other than distract; and the story is a fairly stale reworking of tired old themes about betrayal, revenge and redemption built upon on a narrative of incest and sexual transgression.
Even Rose Byrne's gorgeous face can do little to make this film watchable.