Rabbit-Proof Fence Movie Analysis

Philip Noyces 2002 drama film, “the Rabbit Proof Fence”, has showed people the inner working of the stolen generation and will stun the hearts of their viewers. Noyce has done a great job of educating the audience. This film focuses on judgement or prejudice of half-caste children at this time in Australia as undesirable and unworkable and this topic is covered thoroughly throughout the film.

This film follows the story of three half caste children, Daisy, Molly and Gracie. Just a few of many Aboriginal children that were snatched from their families and had everything they know stripped from underneath them. It is set in the 1930’s western Australian outback. It is a retelling of these girls’ story. They were taken from their families and sent to the Moore River Native Settlement to be re-educated, also known as “whitewashed”. These girls escape to get back home.

This film assiduously covers the topic of prejudice during this time. One of the characters, A.O Neville, a white male European, had the power to relocate any Aboriginal child within Western Australia and he did so as he could. He saw these children as unnecessary and wanted to discontinue anyone of colour. His plan was to take these children to be re-educated, in Molly, Daisy and Gracie’s case it was the Moore River Native Settlement. A dreary camp that was nothing short of purgatory, to be taught to marry into white families and have children with white men which would cripple the genetics. This meant that after time people of colour would no longer exist in Western Australia. These actions were obviously racist, and Neville had prejudice at mind that white was superior and those of colour could not do anything with their lives without the help of a white male. His actions also proved against this because he employed his best tracker who was Aboriginal, and this is known because Neville mentioned it multiple times and he was the only tracker that was half successful at finding the girls. Given these facts, Neville is proving against his argument that white is superior but remains this position throughout the film.

This film uses a wide range of film techniques that are effective in capturing an audience’s attention and unfolds the moral message of the film. When focused on A.O Neville, the camera was at a low angle proving his superiority. This same action occurred when Neville was talking to Molly. A high angled camera was used on Molly to show her insignificance and a low angle camera was used on Neville to prove his power over her. This later changes during the film. As Molly, Daisy and Gracie continue to escape Moodoo (the best tracker hired by Neville) and slip through the grasp of Neville, the camera starts to get lower on the girls and higher on Neville. This is to show that the girls are not anything less than Neville and if anything, they are more powerful than him. This is displayed using film techniques. This is a great way to show that they are more powerful without making it completely obvious. This is because their successes include walking 1500 miles alone, with no prior food or water, in the harsh Australian outback for almost 3 months, along a fence and managed to survive, whereas Neville got other people to do the dirty work for him such as tracking the girls, running the camps, getting all the children and transporting them to the camps, he just had to sign off on it.

This film produces language features that are mostly belittling to the Aboriginal culture and proves that there is prejudice. “We’ll have no Wangka here, you talk English” says miss Jessop, one of the carers that work at the settlement. This statement is showing that their native language is not welcome and the only language that is welcome is English. This is belittling the Aboriginal culture and is proving prejudice at the time.

This film successfully displays prejudice through a range of film techniques including language features, camera angles and lighting and it shows that prejudice is very much existent throughout the film, while still making the film alluring for the audience and focuses on the true aspects of what these girls had to go through to get back home. Only in the final shots does this film find its quality but it’s worth the wait. It occupies many emotions and feelings, all of which the audience goes through with the characters. This film is engaging and captures the hearts of many viewers. It is a great was to be educated on the topic. It is definitely worth the watch.