Movie Review: "The Australian Dream" Is a Must-See for All Aussies

The Australian Dream is shattering. And now, the illusion of our country can’t be unshattered.

In what is easily 2019’s most essential movie, AFL great and former Australian of the Year Adam Goodes agrees to re-examine the racial vilification he faced from jeering footy fans.

This is no reflection on a bygone, less-enlightened era. The period under the microscope? 2015.

Directed by Daniel Gordon, The Australian Dream at first seems like it will just follow in the footsteps of ESPN’s 30 for 30 documentaries (Gordon has directed a few). It contains cracking sports footage, beginning with Goodes as a pre-draft VFL champion, and culminating when he’s a two-time Brownlow medallist fighting through a PCL injury to win the Grand Final for his Sydney Swans. Then, like many 30 for 30 docs, it eventually homes in on a bizarre, sports-adjacent event: the persistent booing Goodes faced in his final years of the game, inciting his retirement.

What separates the film from the pack is the overarching narrative provided by screenwriter, journalist and sorta-narrator Stan Grant. As he outlines, this story isn’t just a slice of meaningless sporting ephemera. The doco places Goodes’ experience in the context of English occupation of Aboriginal land; it articulates the hurt and confusion of Aboriginal Australians felt by their daily encounters with racism, now given a platform in the AFL; and it explores the trauma of genocide, and of the Stolen Generations, and how these unhealed wounds are prodded by modern incidents. As we see, the collective roar that emanates from booing attendees takes on an increasingly ominous tone in The Australian Dream. The horde speaks as one, echoing Australia’s dark history.

The weight of this all on Goodes must have been unimaginable, and it shows in his racked—and rare—talking head interview. I was reminded of the scene in Spike Lee’s BlacKkKlansman where Adam Driver’s character speaks on having to hide his heritage while undercover as a white supremacist: "I never thought much about being Jewish, nobody around me was Jewish… I was just another white kid… I never thought much about it, now I'm thinking about it all the time." As The Australian Dream outlines, Goodes didn’t know much of himself either, or what his mother endured (her heartbreaking journey haunts the picture’s fringes). When he finally learns of his people’s past, he refuses to stay silent, earning an Australian of the Year award in 2014 as a result. It coincides with the booing he’d receive whenever nearing the ball on the ground during AFL matches. As Grant and Gordon frame the argument, you can no longer dismiss that as a coincidence. Goodes was suddenly thinking about his identity all the time. And Australia was reminding him about it all the time too.

The filmmakers succeed in pulling in other compelling subjects to speak, including the iconic Nicky Winmar, Olympian Nova Peris, politician Linda Burney and even two antagonistic characters in Goodes’ life, Eddie McGuire (who found himself embroiled in his own vilification scandal) and conservative commentator Andrew Bolt. This is the rare documentary in which everyone you want to see have a say gets a guernsey. Without even realising, some have allowed themselves to serve as examples of the friendly, reasonable faces that allow systemic abuse and disenfranchisement to roll on. In Bolt, you see the dug-in stubbornness and denial that Australia needs to reckon with too.

What’s marvellous about The Australian Dream’s scope is that it doesn’t over-reach; it really is so big it entails 60,000 years of Indigenous history, 230 years of white colonial history, and several decades of Australian sporting history. And it is similarly not overcooking it to say Australians cannot miss this feature, nor let its lessons slide. It’s a beautiful call for reconciliation and basic civility. But it is a war-cry too; a steadfast refusal to allow racism or wilful ignorance define our cultural character any longer. The Australian Dream is a powerful watch. It is also a challenge; one I hope Australia accepts.

5/5

The Australian Dream arrives in Australian cinemas 22 August. Rating CTC.