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Canberra Today 17°/20° | Friday, March 29, 2024 | Digital Edition | Crossword & Sudoku

Review / ‘Ruben Guthrie’ (MA) ***

ruben_guthrieWRITER/producer/director Brendan Cowell’s stage play becomes a filmic cocktail of vigour, confusion, comedy, alcohol and product placement, served in the waterways and adjacent suburbs that make upper-class areas of Sydney such effective film locations.

Advertising whizz-kid Ruben (Patrick Brammall) drinks too much. Zoya (Abbey Lee), his live-in fiancée of five years heading home to a modelling gig in Prague, issues an ultimatum – stay dry for a year or it’s all over.

Party party party is the hedonist creed driving Ruben’s friends and associates. Agency boss Ray (Jeremy Sims) gives him a hard time for attending AA meetings where he meets the film’s most sympathetic characters – working-class Ken who shares his enjoyment of aquatic relaxation and Virginia (Harriet Dyer) who moves into his house and bed.

When his best friend, aggressively-gay Damian (Alex Dimitriades) reappears in his life, Ruben can’t find the courage to turf him out of the house, which is what should happen. His separated parents (Robyn Nevin and Jack Thompson) in the restaurant business confront him with temptations to revert to his old habits. Ruben perseveres until his mother pours him a lovely sauv blanc to celebrate the imminent end of his abstinence.

Some might give short shrift to the clichés in Cowell’s film. Its theatrical origins are palpable and sometimes irritating. Nevertheless, a generous attitude might appreciate the open-spirited treatment of its issues and the fun thus generated.

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Dougal Macdonald

Dougal Macdonald

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