Film review of an Australian feature film - Essay Example

The Impacts of Cane Toads: An Unnatural History to the Australian Film Industry By (Module and number) The Impacts of Cane Toads: An Unnatural History to the Australian Film Industry The movie industry in Australia experienced challenges along with its efforts to become productive. It works silently while trying to sustain itself to be proven as a pride of Australia. According to Goldsmith and Lealand (2010, p. 160), the Australian film industry even started before Hollywood that greatly shocked a movie critic from America named Rex Reed as the movie industry was revived in the 1970s.

Despite of its revival, the industry is kept alive through governmental support as profits made are not enough to sustain it. Because of the strong American influence, most Australians in the 50s and 60s prefer American movies, but in the emergence of the Australian film industry revival the citizens had little choice on what to watch. The people in the industry struggled to make the industry alive by catering the needs of the Australian viewers (Cetti, 2010). The efforts were seen as great revival for the pride and culture of Australia as the government supports the local film industry.

Despite of the popularity of American films in Australia, the local movie industry made its contributions to bring itself up. In line with its endeavor, the film Cane Toads: An Unnatural History together with other movies was made to promote its local culture. After all, movies are made to add value to the lives of people and the entertainment industry. Brens (2000, p. 60) stated that the film industry does not exist plainly for making money through movies. Perhaps the movie Cane Toads highlighted the topic of free will in contrast with needs of various people coming from different genders, social standings and their opinions regarding the fast increase in the population of a toad introduced in the 30s to combat the pests in the sugarcane plantations.

The movie was presented not only as an eye-opener for the ecological consequences of the booming population of the cane toads but also to make use of the movie as a way of sociological inquiry as stated by Taussig (1992, pp. 79-80). The movie contained the natural science elements mixed with sociological issue that showed how culture can transform the view of people upon the existing pests. The cane toads came from South America and were brought to Queensland and other parts of Australia to remove the proliferation of grey back beetles that pester the sugarcane plantations.

Sugarcane plantation owners lost profits as many types of sugarcane were destroyed by the beetles despite of the quick breeding of cane toads (Crotty 2006). Unluckily, toads cannot reach the beetles as those do not come near the ground. Instead of doing the supposed job, the toads killed other predators using their poison from the neck glands. Snakes were the most affected, but the birds were able to survive as they learned to eat the non-toxic portions of the toads. Their existence led to several effects on the Australian culture like toad songs, toad races, toad-designed shirts and even a beer name according to Daly (1999, p. 520) and ( Maslin 1988).

The great intensity of the effects of the cane toads to the Australians were illustrated further in the movie of Cane Toads by Lewis. The movie was presented with humor as Queensland citizens make use of the toads as mascots and the overwhelming conflict of such proliferation coming from the scientists or the anti-toad faction. One particular scene in the movie catered the overwhelming sex drive of cane toads wherein a driver stopped and was surprised when he found a male cane toad having sex with a squashed female cane toad.

Another scene catered the local toad hunter who used his van to squash the cane toads that puff when danger is near. Other scenes showed how people loved the existence of the toads as a man sang a jingle entitled Queensland Toads and a child playing with her pet toad as supported by the criticism of Crouse (2003, pp. 33-35). The movie had shown how the animal and human nature were depicted and interacted as a toad culture of people spread in Queensland. People were not afraid that much even though those toads release poison through the parotid glands that can cause paralysis and even death to dogs (Badger and Netherton, 1995, p. 96). That movie showed how a local movie can gain popularity as it caters the everyday lives of people.

It holds true that movie industry focuses on adding value to the lives of people and not just for the sake of money. BibliographyBadger, D. and Netherton, J., 1995. Frogs. USA, Voyageur Press.Breen, M., 2000. Australia. In: Kindem, G. ed. 2000. The international movie industry. USA: Southern Illinois University, pp. 60-77.Cetti, R., 2010. Australian film tales. Australia: Wider Screenings.Crotty, M. 2006. The great mistakes of Australian history. Australia: University of New South Wales Press.Crouse, R., 2003.

The 100 best movies youve never seen. Canada: ECW Press.Daly, M., 1999. Rough guide to Australia. London, Rough Guides. Goldsmith, Ben and Geoff Lealand. 2010. Directory of world cinema: Australia and New Zealand. United Kingdom: Intellect Books.Maslin, J., 1988. Cane toads: an unnatural history (1987) review/film; Australian toads and feathers. New York Times [online]. (Last updated n.d.) Available at: < http://movies.nytimes.com/movie/review?res=940DE2DE163EF932A15750C0A96E948260> [Accessed 14 March 2012].