Last Cab To Darwin

Adapted from their own 2003 play of the same name by director Jeremy Sims and his co-writer, Reg Cribb, Last Cab To Darwin tells the story of Rex (Michael Caton) a Broken Hill taxi driver who learns that the stomach cancer he thought had been successfully removed is, in fact, going to kill him. 

Rex knows his end will be painful and, having no taste for hospitals, he elects instead to drive to Darwin, where new but untested legislation might allow him the option of assisted suicide. It’s no sure bet, but Rex has nothing to lose: his parents are dead, his friends (a motley collection of great Aussie actors, including John Howard and David Field) are just drinking buddies, and his relationship with his Aboriginal neighbour/lover, Polly (Ningali Lawford) might be more than a friendship, but it’s less than a partnership. On the road, of course, he learns that he may have underestimated the connections he has forged with his peers.

Last Cab To Darwin is funny, profound and deeply affecting film, built around a complex and eminently watchable performance from Caton. Romantic without being sentimental, its by turns hilarious and heartwrenching, dealing with a sombre and serious topic but refusing to be dragged down into po-faced morbidity. Rex might be dying and he might be depressed and lonely, but he retains a grim humour and a warm humanity.

We see those qualities shine when he is joined by two unlikely travelling companions, the larrikin would-be football player, Tilly (Mark Coles Smith) and the British nurse turned barmaid, Julie (Emma Hamilton), who resolves to nurse Rex to whatever end he chooses. These two help highlight the essential contradiction of Rex’s character: he believes himself to be a laconic, closed-off loner, but he cannot help but warm to the people in proximity to him. Rex’s tragedy isn’t his terminal illness, but his difficulty in recognising this. 

Sims chose to shoot in sequence, the production team tracing the narrative journey rather than subbing in more easily accessible locations and faking. As a result, the film has an enviable if difficult to pin down air of authenticity; though it’s a fictionalised version of actual events, there’s a palpable sense of what Herzog called “ecstatic truth” - the abstracts are real even if the events depicted are not. 

Drily, raucously funny, irreverent, thoughtful and incredibly moving, Last Cab To Darwin isn’t just a great Australian film, it’s a great film, full stop. Awards season should see it practically smothered in plaudits - let’s hope it strikes a chord with audiences, too. It deserves to.

Originally published in X-Press Magazine