Although Jennifer Kent hails from Brisbane, Australia, she has traveled the world beside her work. She first took the spotlight with her multi-award-winning short, Monster in 2005. Her first horror feature, The Babadook screened at Sundance to much critical and audience acclaim in 2014. Now she’s back with her tender love story, The Nightingale, set in brutal, colonial Tasmania, Australia in 1825. She took some time out to chat with Creative Screenwriting Magazine about her opus.
The Nightingale is an English bird with a distinct song that poets and other artists around the world claim sparked their creativity. “It may sound weird, but I had the name of the film before I had the story,” recalled the writer/director. “The film is about a woman called ‘The Nightingale’ in a way she’s not happy about. On a deeper level, it’s a story of a woman finding her voice after dealing with a traumatic event. The name made sense to me on a number of levels.”
Although The Nightingale is a specific story set in the harshness of colonial Australia, Jennifer felt it was a universal story. “I wanted to tell a story about the light in the darkness that dealt with something bigger than a domestic concern… something meaningful to me. I didn’t have to look very far because I care about our [Australia’s] history. I wanted to make a film about my home.”
Jennifer Kent. Photo Credit: Matt Nettheim
Tasmania is Australia’s southernmost state, almost closer to the South Pole than Sydney. Although the film centers on two Irish convicts Clare (Aisling Franciosi) and Aidan (Michael Sheasby), Kent is quick to point out that the Aborigines suffered some of the worst assaults on humanity in Australia. Despite the colonial violence, The Nightingale [Clare] still found time to sing a love song. “Setting the story in Tasmania wasn’t an intellectual decision… it felt right. I wanted to viscerally place the audience in the world of the protagonist.”
Colonialism Is A Violent And Arrogant Act
Australia has made several attempts to reconcile its violent past. The filmmaker added that “coming into a culture that operates differently and the colonialists interpret this as inferiority. Colonialization is about taking a culture that was more connected with nature, more family-oriented, more deeply spiritual, with the intention of annihilating it.” Australia still struggles with the shame of cultural genocide.
“I wanted to show the fallout from that primitive colonial thinking. The violent minds that created colonialism are the same violent minds that run our respective countries today. Even though the film is framed as a historical drama, it’s also dealing with something very current.”
“The greatest insult by the colonialists was calling Australia ‘terra nullius’ [null earth] before they came to instill civilization to the land,” she continued. The Australian Aborigines are one of the oldest living cultures whose ancestors can be traced back to over sixty thousand years. “The alleged savagery was propagated by colonialism, not by the natives.”
The Nightingale is not specifically a film about atrocities committed against the indigenous population, but also about the atrocities committed against the white convicts sentenced to a lifetime of hard labor in the Great Southern Land. “While it would be odious for me to compare the black and white experience, I think there was a commonality of abuse. Colonialism has many casualties. Convicts were basically indentured slaves with no human rights. The abuse in the film against both women and men was not exaggerated.”
Female convicts were sent to Tasmania because it was a corrupt system that did not answer to mother England like the other Australian colonies. “It developed into a lawless environment. Women like Clare were systematically abused by their masters. This is the reality of Clare’s existence. That’s why she’s so frightened to lose her husband, Aidan.”
Capturing Clare’s Spirit
“Clare is an incredibly brave and strong person from the get-go. Many films are criticized that sexual violence against women somehow makes them strong. Clare was always a strong person to survive life in Tasmania. The film is about Clare enduring and dealing with Hawkins (Sam Claflin), her master. She was tough, damaged and endured a lot of abuse. “She is a tragic product of her time.”
“Clare is also imperfect. She’s racist by thinking of Aboriginal pe0ple as ‘less than’ [common at the time]. Through the course of the film, after siding with local Aboriginal man Billy, (Baykali Ganambarr) something shifts inside her. She’s a real person.” In one scene they both share their wounds of separation from loved ones and abuse.
Kent did not set out to create a female-driven film, despite it being Clare’s story. “I have a commitment to tell stories about women, but Clare is ultimately human. I don’t think this is a film just for women.”
Clare’s husband Aidan was killed early in the story. However, she doesn’t see herself as a victim, although she is very much victimized. She just wants to survive another day in Tasmania as an enduring soul. “It’s a woman’s experience, but hopefully along the way we look through a window to the experience of men too. We’re seeing a side of men that is very noble and decent in Aidan and Billy. They end up being a casualty of the system too.”
Jennifer did not rush into writing her screenplay. “It was difficult exploring those deep emotions and experiences and write them truthfully and honestly.” Kent researched the era thoroughly, down to the explicit sexual violence. Women of the time were routinely raped and convicted of being unwed mothers if they fell pregnant. She even had a psychologist on board during the filming process. You need that safety net to protect your actors.
She also hired an Aboriginal advisor to help her authenticate the story from the first draft. “I took his lead on the script in terms of what was necessary and accurate.” She heavily researched The Nightingale for about five years before embarking on the arduous screenwriting process.
Clare (Aisling Franciosi) & Billy (Baykali Ganambarr)
Billy’s Resilience
Billy assisted Clare to make her way to Launceston to find Hawkins. The screenwriter/ director took great care not to portray him as a cartoony “mystical other. I wanted to make him someone we connected to and cared about. He was human and flawed as well. Billy is also a survivor and the heart of the film. He’s not sentimental or self-pitying. He is his truth.”
Colonialism still has deep repercussions of Aborigines in Australia today. “We have the tools to heal as a country, but we are so far from fully acknowledging and accepting what white people have done. That’s why I didn’t want to sugar-coat the film. This is not just the story of Australia. It is the story of many first-world nations. I wanted this film to open a difficult conversation.”
Once Clare arrived at Launceston, she did not complete her planned revenge on Hawkins and co. “If the audience asks that question, they’ve missed the point of the film. I wanted to look at the nature of revenge. Is it really as redemptive and cathartic as cinema often dictates?”
The Nightingale does not end with a clear conclusion. There is no closure or clear justice. “We can hope for it. It’s a film about love in dark times. You can be poisoned to the point of becoming your aggressor. Clare realizes that exerting violence reduces her to the level of her abusers; a state ‘less than’ an animal. That’s what the film explores. The true nature of revenge, although this is not a revenge film.”
