Last Cab to Darwin

Studio: First Run Features
Directed by Jeremy Sims

Jun 08, 2016 By Stephen Mayne Web Exclusive

In a city far from the sea, you shouldn’t trust the seafood. It’s the first, and by no means the last, piece of advice dished out in Last Cab to Darwin, a low-key Australian drama that relies on astute observation to cover over tired foundations.

Adapted from Reg Cribb’s play by Cribb himself and director Jeremy Sims, the focus is on Rex (Michael Caton), an elderly taxi driver trying to bow out gracefully when he discovers aggressive stomach cancer has left him only 3 months to live. After hearing about a new law in the Northern Territory legalising euthanasia, he decides to drive his cab two thousand miles to Darwin to volunteer as the first test subject.

It’s a bleak premise that doesn’t represent the mostly optimistic tone present for much of the running time. Rex’s impending death may be the motivating factor, but life is what really interests Last Cab to Darwin. Rex’s self-imposed isolation is severely tested along the way, partly by the intervention of Tilly (Mark Coles Smith), a lost Aboriginal man running from a chance to make it big playing Aussie rules football, and Julie (Emma Hamilton) an English nurse working as a regional barmaid, but mostly by his neighbor Polly (Ningali Lawford-Wolf). The affection between them is real, as is the divide that keeps them – a quiet, working class white man and a fiery Aboriginal woman - apart.

Teasing out the ongoing racial rift in Australia is what the film does best. It’s a given for the characters that only whites get served in many bars, and that Rex won’t require ID to rent a hotel room but Tilly will. These observations are never overplayed, dropped in with enough regularity to make the point without overwhelming. Rex’s gradual realisation that dying far from loved ones might not be the best idea, and that he actually has loved ones, is handled equally well, particularly by Caton whose hangdog face belies a carefully hidden zest for life that gradually surfaces.

Less successful are unnecessary dramatic lurches that don’t fit this intimate story. Tilly, played sympathetically by Coles Smith, forms an engaging relationship with Rex, but an overblown rescue and a bit of sporting wish fulfilment proves too much. At least he has something to work with. Julie is a foil for both Rex and Tilly to discover useful truths, while poor Jacki Weaver, appearing briefly as Dr. Farmer, the professional willing to carry out the euthanasia procedure, is suddenly villainised at the end.

Last Cab to Darwin works best when it steers clear of ideas that aim to create a big splash. When it remembers this and zeroes in on Rex and his personal relationships, there’s a lot to enjoy.

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