City Libraries, City of Gold Coast

Crookhat and the Kulunada

eng

videorecording

Rating: G

Crookhat and the Kulunada

videorecording

23

The CAAMA collection

"As in Tranter's other films - Boomerang today, Crookhat and Camphoo, Karlu Karlu and Willaberta Jack - the stories are told by Elders in the community. In this case three old men, Donald (Crookhat) Akemarr Thompson, Alec Apetyarr Peterson and Casey Akemarr Holmes, travel by four-wheel drive out to a surprising strip of green bush in the desert, where a permanent spring feeds a large waterhole. We listen to their stories as they prepare their camp: stories rich in knowledge of the place and its history. They tell both the Dreamtime stories of the Rainbow Serpent, Kulunada, which lived in the waterhole, and also the violent past of the white settlement of the area. The ruins of a white homestead beside the waterhole evoke stories of the white man's clash with the Kulunada, and also the shooting of an Aboriginal stockman by the station manager. As Crookhat tells the stories, he is corrected and prompted by the others. As Tranter explains, the reason we have a narrator and a witness to tell the story is so the story is told the right way. For Tranter, the quiet, reflective style of his films is to be simple and straight in the same way that our old people tell their stories

general

live action