Rabbit-Proof Fence

Australia, 1931. The rabbitproof fence from the title divides the north and south of Australia in two at the Jigalong, depot on the edge of the desert. Three young aboriginal girls live there with their mother and grandmother. Their white fathers, who worked on building the fence, left long ago. The aboriginals in the district fall under the responsibility of the governor Neville (Kenneth Branagh). He makes sure the children are taken away from their mother to be trained 1300 miles away as household helps for the whites. Neville has introduced a law to ban children from mixed marriages from marrying (full blood) aboriginals. In this way, he hopes the aboriginal race will die out. Molly, Daisy and Gracie manage to escape from the camp and start a threemonth trek to the south. They find the fence and follow it, as it leads them back to their family, closely followed by Neville’s men. These are guided through the outback by the experienced aboriginal `tracker’ Moodoo (David Gulpilil, also seen in The Tracker and the documentary Gulpilil One Red Blood). The beautiful camerawork is by Chris Doyle, and the grim percussion on the soundtrack by Peter Gabriel. This true and gripping drama is based on the book by Doris Pilkington Garimara, the daughter of the character Molly Craig in the film.