- The Hunter. Directed by Daniel Nettheim. Starring Willem Dafoe and Sam Neill. Rating: 7 (out of 10)
WILLEM Dafoe's hunter is a paradox: a loner with a paternally protective streak; a man as well-versed in opera as he is with leg-hold traps.
In The Hunter, Dafoe plays Martin, hired by a bioresearch conglomerate to hunt down the officially extinct Tasmanian tiger. There have been rumours and sightings in remote areas, and the company will spare no expense for exclusive rights to the creature's genetic code. Posing as a university researcher, Martin boards a plane with a single pack and an array of high-and low-tech hunting gear.
"It must be very nice, not to need anyone," a shadowy contact observes. But worldweariness hangs around Martin like a weight; he's clearly a man in need of redemption.
His opportunity comes courtesy of the family whose room he rents, in a house with no hot water and a generator on the fritz. Two young kids are running wild because mom (Frances O'Connor) is too drugged-up to get out of bed. It seems their naturalist dad wandered into the woods one day a few months back and never returned.
Helping out is crusty local Sam Neill, who oozes aid and malevolence in equal measure, and seems to have ulterior motives where both the mom and Martin's mission are concerned.
Martin gets a hostile reception from the inhabitants of the remote town, which has been suckled by logging but faces increased opposition by encamped "greenies" who seek to preserve the old-growth trees of the rainforest.
The landscape is fascinating. It's a wonder to survey a place that can still swallow a man whole and leave no trace, let alone get no cell service. The best scenes are of Martin alone in the elements, setting delicate traps and sleeping rough, and increasingly conflicted about killing the last member of a species.
Tension builds as we wonder whether Martin will be undone by the elements, the loggers, or some unseen foe on the mountain.
Director Daniel Nettheim adapts the novel by Julia Leigh (who directed last year's ominous Sleeping Beauty) with care and finesse, but also constructs a ragged pace with Martin's trips up and down the mountain. Capping it off is a rushed resolve that doesn't do justice to the carefully constructed relationships preceding it.
That there are too many tempting paths down which the viewer can be led is the film's flaw. A man in pursuit of a mythical beast is a film in itself; add a dysfunctional family, a missing person, corporate intrigue, a potential love triangle and environmental battles, and we quickly lose our way from the central story.
Saving all is Dafoe, who never fails to keep us mesmerized as he navigates treacherous personal and professional territory.
