The Boys

Brett Sprague is released on parole after serving time for assault and returns to his family's house. The film covers the twenty-four hours that follow. Nothing extraordinary happens in that time: they eat, drink beer, argue, fall silent. But the pressure in the room keeps rising, and how the day will end is clear from the start. Rowan Woods adapted Gordon Graham's 1991 play, with a screenplay by Stephen Sewell. The source was inspired by the Anita Cobby murder, a case that marked Australia deeply. The film does not show the crime and does not name it; it stays in the hours before, and builds violence as an accumulation rather than an event. David Wenham plays Brett, Toni Collette his girlfriend Michelle, and Lynette Curran the mother. At the 1998 Australian Film Institute Awards it won Best Director, Best Supporting Actor, Best Supporting Actress and Best Adapted Screenplay. Who it's for: Viewers who like psychological thrillers, films that show the mechanics of domestic violence, and Australian cinema. Who it's not for: It is hard to sit through and offers no relief. Even with the violence kept offscreen, the constancy of the threat is suffocating.