Movie: Tomorrow, When the War Began
Release Date: February 24, 2012 (limited)
Studio: Freestyle Digital Media
Director: Stuart Beattie
Screenwriter: Stuart Beattie
Starring: Lincoln Lewis, Chris Pang, Deniz Akeniz, Caitlin Stasey, Phoebe Tonkin, Ashleigh Cummings
Genre: Action, Thriller
Official Website: Not Available
IMDB Rating: 6.2
Story: Right o, I don’t want to spoil the experience for you guys, so I’m going to keep this short and sweet.
On June 16, 2009, Screen Australia announced that John Marsden’s “Tomorrow, When The War Began” was to be made into a film. After a short bout of unintentional girlish squealing, similar to what I’m told is commonly seen throughout Twilight films, I managed to calm myself and began thinking about what this means to the thousands of fans. A story that means so much to so many people was about to be reinvented for the big screen. Many concerns were voiced from fans, and admittedly, I had my own.
Ellie (played by Caitlin Stasey) is Tomorrow’s protagonist. For me, Ellie was what had to be right in the film adaptation, above anything else. It’s her story, and if she wasn’t played right, the film would fall apart. After “officially” waiting since 2004 for a Tomorrow film, my concerns were well and truly quashed, when I saw the film a week ago at its world premiere in Sydney.
Caitlin, we want to hug you.
The chemistry between the cast was outstanding, from the very faithful, perfectly written and delivered dialogue, to the subtle glances and natural reactions between each actor.
The locations were beautiful. The opening shots of Wirrawee and the surrounding land, following Ellie’s camcorder introduction, particularly stuck with me.
Each character is introduced early on, faithfully to how they were in the novel, and what surprised me more than anything throughout the film was how funny certain scenes were. Homer’s (Deniz Akdeniz) introduction in the beginning, where he exits a police station wearing a t-shit with “F#@K THE POLICE” printed on the front, particularly comes to mind. As we know, upon returning from Hell (which was breathtakingly beautiful, needless to say), the group finds their homes deserted, and make their way into town to suss things out. This is the turning point for the film, where the group and the audience are violently thrown into the war.
Stuart Beattie has put a lot of emphasis on giving each character a strong personality. The humour present in the novel has been really accentuated, along with the characters’ transitions into living in a war zone. Several scenes were changed, and several scenes were written from scratch, but it all works. Chris (Andy Ryan) and Robyn (Ashleigh Cummings) have been altered in several ways in the film, as mentioned by John Marsden, but this also works. Chris is uniquely loveable in a way that wasn’t really present in the novel, and Robyn has been given a much more obvious point of normal-life to war-life transition, which was incredibly moving.
Being objective is almost impossible for me, having waited for a Tomorrow film for so long, having had my own ideas on how it should be done, and seeing the ideas of many other people. I did however manage to walk into the cinema with a clear mind, hoping for something good but having no expectations… and I left the cinema jumping. I’ve been buzzing since, and will be seeing Tomorrow: When The War Began many more times, when it’s officially released.
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