The Chant of Jimmie Blacksmith

The Chant of Jimmie Blacksmith (1978)

Genres - Drama  |   Sub-Genres - Social Problem Film, Psychological Drama  |   Run Time - 108 min.  |   Countries - Australia  |   MPAA Rating - R
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Synopsis by Mark Deming

Based on a novel by Thomas Keneally, which was in turn inspired by actual events, this drama is a shocking indictment of the racism inflicted on the indigenous people of Australia. Jimmie (Tommy Lewis) is a half-white, half-aborigine young man raised by a Methodist minister. Feeling outcast among the aborigines, Jimmie moves to the city and gets a job working for a white family. When a white serving girl at the estate becomes pregnant, everyone is convinced that Jimmie is the father; to spare the girl's honor, Jimmie marries her and is allowed to live with her on the estate. But after the child is born, everyone realizes that the father was a white man, not Jimmie; he is still willing to accept the child and stand beside his wife, but his employers now feel that he married a white girl under false pretenses, and they bar him from the estate. Forbidden to see his wife and fired without receiving his pay, Jimmie finally explodes in a fury of violent revenge. Director Fred Schepisi's original cut of this film runs 122 minutes, though it was more widely distributed in a shortened version running 108 minutes.

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Keywords

Aborigine, Australian [nationality], child-abuse, culture-clash, minister, racism, revenge, social-inequality