Review by jmvscotland

First of all, I am Australian.

I read the novel "Dirt Music" not long after it was first published and I remember saying to my wife that it would make a terrific movie.

It is the greatest cliche to say "Oh, but the book was much better". In this case, that's most definitely true. There was an opportunity here to make a truly good movie, even if not a great one. How the producers, writer and Director managed to come up with this poor movie based on a great novel is difficult to comprehend. That's particularly so given the two fine actors involved. David Wenham is almost always terrific and Kelly McDonald, one of my very favourite actresses, doing a fine job with the Australian accent.

I gave the movie 6/10 not because the movie is in any way worthy, but simply because of the spectacular scenery of the locations where it was filmed. That is, around Esperance in WA. Not, I have to say, where the novel was based as I recall but all the same, beautiful.

I didn't really rate this movie highly at all and it's unlikely that I'll ever feel compelled to watch it again. It could have been, should have been, SO much better.

JMV.