Reviewed by Rama Gaind.
Director: Philippa Bateman, Bonsai Films.
This cinematic reinvention of a legendary concert that premiered in 2004 is an intensely moving story of loss, love — and what it means to truly come ‘home’. Wash My Soul in the River’s Flow is also a story about the healing power of music; a song about a woman, a man and a river.
Here is a picture that celebrates the lives, fondness and creative collaboration between First Nations singer-songwriters Archie Roach and Ruby Hunter, Australian pianist, composer, arranger and conductor Paul Grabowsky and the 22-piece Australian Art Orchestra. The concert was Kura Tungar — Songs from the River.
Roach and Hunter are shining icons in our nation’s culture. Award-winning, revered and widely admired artists, they occupy a unique place in Australian music and society. They have played internationally with some of the greatest in the world, but their journey to self-expression and success has not been an easy one.
Their music ‘connects’ you in this beautiful film. It’s a cinematic musical journey into the landscape of soul. The movie uses footage shot in 2004 of interviews, rehearsals and the opening night and creates a wonderful portrait of artists at the peak of their abilities.
It generates a wonderful ambience using never-seen-before material of conversations with Archie and Ruby, try-outs, opening night and with breathtaking images of Hunter’s Ngarrindjeri country in South Australia.
Hunter and Roach’s profoundly moving experiences — about being stolen as children, finding each other and returning to Country — is on the big screen in a filmmaking celebration of adoration, survival and, above all, triumph.
About a film that is her directorial debut, Philippa Bateman says: Wash My Soul in the River’s Flow has been 17 years in the making. “I saw the potential of this film through Archie and Ruby’s truth, humour, generosity and talent, to open people’s hearts and minds to the power of listening.”
- Wash My Soul in the River’s Flow has a national cinema release on 10 March.
