Walkabout: 55 Years On
Nig Roeg's beguiling fable of returning to nature and lost innocence is still eerie, enigmatic, and devastating
Warning: Contains spoilers
Once upon a time, Nic Roeg got fired by David Lean. He was originally director of photography on Doctor Zhivago (1965) but quarrelled with Lean so much that he got the boot. As a result, Roeg went uncredited, even though much of his work remained in the final cut of Lean’s Russian Revolution romantic epic.
I tell this story not to take sides with either party. Both Roeg and Lean are major cinematic heroes of yours truly. Rather, I tell it because it illustrates how some artists are so singular that they have to be free to pursue their own visions. Roeg went on to become a superb director in his own right, creating masterpieces such as Walkabout (1971), which is currently celebrating its 55th anniversary.
All cineastes have their favourite Roeg film. Performance (1970) for some. The Man Who Fell to Earth (1976) for others. For me, it’s horror classic Don’t Look Now (1973), but Walkabout is a very close second. The first time I saw this, as an impressionable teenager, I didn’t fall in love with the film purely because of my obsession with Jenny Agutter, but because it felt so hypnotic, beautiful, and mysterious. Walkabout is a rarity; a one-off that looks and feels like nothing else in cinema history. The experience of it cannot be explained in mere words. However, in this essay, I hope to at least convey my passion for Roeg’s extraordinarily enigmatic fable.
