This week’s screening, Mystery Road (2013), is a filmed by Australian director Ivan Sen, following an Aboriginal detective (Aaron Pederson)who returns to his home town in the Australian outback to investigate the murder of a young girl.

Narrative refers to a series of chronological events related by cause and effect. It regards how the story is given to us, through components of film form and style, including narration, mise en scene, setting, and more. Manipulated order, frequency and duration can help us make sense of events within a narrative. We can consider how the opening of a film relates to its resolution, and the connection between this.

Time within a narrative film is usually contracted, as it is in Mystery Road. The film’s narrative spans over a few weeks, even months, yet is contracted within a two hour film. Ivan Sen creates a uniquely Australian narrative through the film’s style. Wide shots of the Outback landscape, the red dust, and Australian architecture, and the film’s characters and costume all work together to draw us into the narrative. Aerial shots of cars driving along lonely, dusty roads both serve as transitioning shots and give a sense of the vast scope of the landscape.

Aaron Pederson as an Aboriginal actor gives credibility to his role as the detective as racial tensions underscore the narrative. We are drawn into his characters view as his performance enhances how he feels isolated from the community, and yet driven to make positive change. His role as detective sees him set of a chain of cause and effect that leads to the climax of the film, but yet, this chain is not as straightforward as Hollywood narrative films. Due to limited dialogue and background music, there is more mystery and the story is not always clear, especially in the film’s ambiguous ending.