Ned Kelly, outback outlaw, the son of an Antrim born mother and a Tipperary born father (did they meet at some ancient hurling match or what?), attained iconic status during his brief life.
Proud owner of the most notorious Aussie criminal record until ‘Can’t Get You Out Of My Head’, he was a cop-killer at a time when the police were little more than paramilitary thugs, made up from mercenaries and the more disreputable elements from the RIC. Kelly’s legendary status was ensured by his death on the gallows in the 1870s. He was only 24 at the time and his reputation as Australia’s Robin Hood was cemented. Talk about a career move.
Hardly surprising, then, that Kelly has popped up in countless movies, including one from 1906 which may be the first ever feature film. He was even played by Mick Jagger back in the cryptic 1970 version. Like these earlier incarnations, Gregor Jordan’s film probably isn’t the place to go for a thorough history lesson on the chap.
A dreamlike film, it takes the ethereal Robert Drewe novel My Sunshine as its source rather than Peter Carey’s excellent True History Of The Kelly Gang, and truncates or skips many episodes of the Kelly saga. So there’s no room for Kelly the failed revolutionary, or Kelly the inspiration for an insurrection comparable to that of the Boers.
But there is plenty of mythical material – Ned cradling the policeman he has shot, and making speeches accompanied by a huge, swell-erific score. Basically, this is a transported Western, and the best moments come from Jordan playing with Western iconography against an exotic, antipodean background. Heath Ledger, though a bit mumbly, does a decent job in the title role, and while certain accents (take a bow, Orlando Bloom) wander about, the supporting cast do admirably well.
Okay, so you can’t quite figure out what some of them are there for – Naomi Watts for one is wasted in the most pointless role this side of Jar Jar Binks. But Ned Kelly is charming if rough around the edges. Bit like Australia really.