Sirens
Short description
Sirens is set in 1930s Australia, where Anglican clergyman Anthony Campion and his wife, Estella, travel to the home of the painter Norman Lindsay. Church authorities want the artist to withdraw a work planned for a London exhibition because they consider it indecent. Anthony is meant to persuade him, but Lindsay stands his ground, and as the couple settle in as guests, the household's freethinking atmosphere unsettles their marriage. Three models who pose for Lindsay, Sheela, Pru and Giddy, become a particular focus of Estella's attention. Written and directed by John Duigan, the film belongs to the stretch of his career between Flirting and Lawn Dogs, with Hugh Grant and Tara Fitzgerald as the Campions and Sam Neill as Lindsay. Elle Macpherson, Portia de Rossi and Tziporah Malkah play the models. A supporting cast and crew of more than a hundred people are credited. The film is a co-production between Germany, Australia and the United Kingdom and took about 8 million dollars worldwide. On IMDb the film holds a critics' rating of 6.3/10 from 32 reviews, somewhat higher than the audience score of 5.6/10 on TMDB from 175 votes. That gap suggests reviewers responded a little more warmly than general viewers to its mix of comedy and drama. The result sits modestly within Duigan's filmography, a mid-scale period piece rather than a breakout.
What's left behind the scenes
- The avant-garde artist played by Sam Neill shocks the British with his bohemian antics. In reality, Norman Lindsay was sincerely convinced of the intellectual superiority of white men over women, Asians, and Black people, and he considered modernism to be a "plague" spread by Jews—art dealers who were conspiring with one another.
- Elle Macpherson intentionally gained nearly 9 kg for the role of Sheila because the figures of models in that era were rounder and more feminine than they are now.
- Tara Fitzgerald (who played Estella) deliberately avoided parties with the film's technical crew and creative team to avoid breaking character as the downtrodden "mousy" woman—the priest's wife she played in the script.
- The film was shot in the house where Norman Lindsay actually lived until his death in 1969. It now houses a museum and art gallery.
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