Lion

Emma Castle
17th Jan 2017

Lion could almost be a Disney story because of its classic ‘Hero’s Journey’ format, but what makes this film so compelling is that it’s non-fiction. Based on the real life experiences of Indian-turned-Australian Saroo Brierley, Lion follows Saroo from his home village in the far north west of India to Calcutta, where he mistakenly ends up as a scared and yet surprisingly street-wise kid.

Anyone who has seen the trailer is going to be expecting a tearjerker but Lion is respectably restrained in that regard. While the depiction of life on the streets of India is far from rosy, Lion’s strength lies in its faithful retelling – sans hyperbolic soundtrack or over-the-top action sequences – of how Saroo managed to survive long enough to be adopted by an Australian couple. The tension of the scenes where Saroo escapes would-be paedophiles and child-snatchers is enhanced by the lack of clichéd cues – the audience is just as confused as Saroo, which builds natural empathy for the dire situation he finds himself in.

Nicole Kidman dons ‘ugly face’ (or at least a questionable 80s perm) to play Saroo’s adoptive mother, Sue Brierley, and conjures a delicate, wry performance that endears her to an audience who might otherwise wonder what the hell she is doing popping up in this earnest anti-blockbuster.

Englishman Dev Patel embraces the Australian accent – an accomplishment worthy of praise – to play twenty-something Saroo who is tortured by the mysteries of his past. There are a few moments where he goes overboard on the ‘acting’, but he is generally a likeable and believable protagonist.

Strangely, the landscape becomes a peripheral character via Grieg Fraser’s skilful cinematography. Staggeringly beautiful aerial views of Tasmania are contrasted with Google Earth’s satellite imagery of India, all leading to a theme of geographic dislocation and questions around what is home. Is it where you come from or where you find yourself now? 

Weaving the past with the present, and questions of identity with the mystery of the past, Lion’s beauty is in its striking detail and understated approach to a genuinely extraordinary story.