This book your little sister lent me.
How do Americans believe such stuff, let alone publish it?
Listen to this. 'Cash from the corporate conscience'.
'Youth ideals into youth dollars'.
Fundamentalist fervor meets galloping greed.
They've turned self-help into help-yourself.
And this is the book Pippa tells me could change my life.
I guess that's why America's in great shape.
How do you take seriously
anything written by someone called Candy Cane?!
What's wrong, Meg?
(Sighs loudly) "We shall not cease from exploration,
"and the end of all our exploring will be to arrive where we started
"and know the place for the first time."
Eliot. Yeah.
I'd hoped I'd know the place for the first time.
I don't know it any better than when I left!
Things change in 10 years, Meg. (Groans)
No, they don't. That's just it.
It's like there's this highly elasticized thread
tied around us three and it stretches from Australia to Britain
to the States.
All of a sudden it's just given up and thwack! -
we're flung back together again.
We're just the same little girls, only this time in women's bodies.
And we don't know anything more than when we started out.
I'm beginning to feel quite middle-aged.
(Scoffs) Not surprised.
The whole town feels like it was born into middle age.
The only conversations I've had since we've arrived
have been about children and compost.
Yeah, well, people don't know what to say to us.
Grief makes people realize how inadequate they are.
Oh, yes.
Tell me, does anything ever happen around here?
No.
People live out quiet little prosaic lives and then they die.
And the other people spend the rest of their lives
utterly emotionally... devastated by the experience.
That seems to be the pattern.
I must say, Hilary is quite a remarkable woman, isn't she?
Why do you say that?
The way she copes with things.
Oh, yeah - Hilary copes.
She copes because she shut down.
That's how she leads her life.
She doesn't let herself feel.
She doesn't think about things too deeply.
It's like she decided ages ago that she was done with crying.
Nothing and no-one was ever going to hurt her again.
So she copes, magnificently, and people think,
"She's so strong and so remarkable."
I don't. I think she's a coward.
I think you are being rather unfair.
I can't imagine what it must be like for her!
She's had to deal with three tragic deaths.
I can't begin to imagine how anyone deals with that.
I don't suppose you can.
I don't think you can either!
They were my parents too, Edwin.
I know. I'm sorry.
And I was here the night that Gary died.
I know. He wasn't your husband, Meg.
No, he wasn't my husband but I loved him.
That's what you don't understand.
I loved him too.
(MELANCHOLY MUSIC)
(ROCK'N'ROLL DRUMMING FROM HOUSE)
(DRUM MUSIC CONTINUES)
(Shouts) Troy! (LOUD DRUMMING)
Troy! Yeah?
Who was that driving off?
It was a guy - Dick Bennett.
Oh, yeah. What did he want?
He left this.
Must be down for the week.
Who's that?
That guy who came into the shop that day.
I think he's got the hots for you.
Don't be silly. Why did you say that?
He wanted me to go fishing with him.
Oh! That makes sense.
The way to a woman's heart is a bucket of flathead.
You'd be surprised the number of boring old farts who ask me fishing.
Sure, Troy. They're just banging down the door.
Oh, hey...
Maybe they've got the hots for you.
You're a nice boy - anything's possible.
What did you say? No, of course.
I don't wanna go fishing with him.
Where are you going? Out.
What's the card say?
Uh, "With sincere sympathy."
Do they really come here asking him to go fishing?
(Laughs) What do you reckon?
You know what I reckon?
I reckon it's time for you to pack up and leave.
It's your time, Hil.
You've been marking time for years, now's your chance.
(BIRDS CHIRP)
Meg!
What are you doing here?
I used to come here when I was a kid.
Wander around.
Read the tombstones.
I can still remember some of the names.
Charlotte Grace Phelps and Frederic Ernest Phelps.
September 11, 1890 and October 1, 1890.
He died three weeks later.
See?
Lottie and Fred.
Do you think he died of a broken heart?
Can you imagine loving someone so much you just can't go on?
I just wanted to say we read your book, Pop and me,
but we didn't finish it.
It's only a book.
He asked me to read it to him.
We only got part of the way through.
I tried to finish it last night, but...
You know my favorite bit so far? No.
When Helen and Grace meet in Italy.
That's the trouble with fiction.
It leads you to believe reconciliations are possible.
How do you mean?
Oh, you know, people getting together,
reconciling their differences.
It doesn't always happen.
It doesn't always happen in real life, you mean.
No, that's right.
Well, why did you write it then?
(SLOW, MELANCHOLY MUSIC)
We better get back.
Can't spend all your time in cemeteries.
Not unless you're dead.
I was looking for Meg. Oh.
I, uh, finished that book you lent me, 'The Cane Report'.
Oh, great.
Yes. It's, uh, a different language, isn't it?
It can seem a little, uh... a little crass at times.
Inventing your own future, then making it happen.
But you can.
Oh, I'm sure. Yeah. The, uh, American dream and all that.
Still, it's visionary in its way.
And, uh, not afraid of a spot of rhetoric. And innovative too.
It struck me that's what's wrong with Australian writing.
Partly a matter of structure, of course.
Of course.
There's also that breadth of vision.
I mean, Australian writers are so...
...driven by their obsession with the vernacular.
It utterly constrains them.
I don't know, the...
...Australian language, it seems a language of such tawdry dreams.
Ah, Meg. I was just off to bed.
Alright.
Will you be long?
Don't know.
I wonder, have either of you seen Troy?
I thought he and I might go fishing tomorrow.
(Laughs, clears throat)
Sorry. Sorry, Eddie. It's a bit of a private joke. Sorry.
It's Edwin, actually.
Goodnight.
(LIGHT ORCHESTRAL MUSIC)
I saw her in the supermarket the other day
and she looked quite normal.
It's odd, isn't it? What's odd about that?
Well, to see her with a shopping bag.
So ordinary, buying cat food.
Marge, you sweet little naive old thing.
(Scoffs) (Laughs)
What did you think she'd look like?
One of the Bronte sisters or something?
Did you ever meet my dad?
No. I, uh, I didn't meet Meg till after she came to London.
Oh, yeah.
How come she went? Do you know?
I suppose she wanted to travel.
Most Aussies have the travel bug, don't they?
Yeah.
Pop always said that
he couldn't understand why people wanted to do it.
Why would anyone want to leave a place like this?
Perhaps he had a point.
He said that people only traveled when they needed to run away.
Well, two of his daughters did travel.
What did he have to say about that?
He said they were running away.
I don't really believe that. Do you?
I don't know what to believe.
There's nothing much to do here anymore.
Not now.
Where do you want to go?
I don't know.
L.A., maybe.
(Laughs)
Join a group.
Oh.
I thought I might wander over there this afternoon.
Oh?
Oh, just to see how they're getting on. You know.
Oh. Hilary, you mean.
Hmm? WOMAN: Would you like a sausage?
Thank you.
You're welcome.
Are you wanting to see Hilary or Meg?
Oh, well, Hilary, I guess.
I haven't met Ms Moynihan.
Oh, don't you think that's a bit intrusive?
Well, we got a bit involved.
Oh, no. Don't use that. Please. What? What do you mean?
I'd hate to think you'd use that situation
to get your interview with Meg.
Well, what do you think I am? A journalist.
Oh. Oh, right.
Oh, I'm sorry if I've hurt your feelings.
Don't worry about it, Marge. I don't have any feelings.
Remember? I'm a journalist.
Just wish I'd had my camera with me that day at the beach.
Could have got some really good snaps.
Sister, the nephew, the whole damn page one horror story.
That's not an issue. We have to verify the changes...
MEG: Hi! Hi.
Hi. It's good you're back. We were talking about the estate.
We have to see the solicitor. Are you free Monday?
He didn't have any money, did he? Not much. But there's the house.
We have to decide what to do. What do you mean?
Whether to sell it. Sell it? You can't be serious.
Why would we sell it? It's our home.
It's worth quite a lot, I think. The land, I mean.
It belongs to the three of us now. So what? You live here.
That's alright by me. Isn't it alright by Pip?
Hil's considering moving to Melbourne,
which I think's a really good idea.
You didn't tell me this.
I haven't decided yet. I'm only one of three.
And I guess I wondered how you felt about it.
I feel terrible. PIP: Why?
You don't live here. You haven't lived here for 10 years.
And look, the way I see it,
Hil's been stuck here looking after Dad
while we've been able to do as we please.
It's time she got to do what she wants.
What do you want - Hilary to visit a gym
so she can front some American sandwich shops?
I want what Hilary wants. Since she made the sacrifice...
Don't talk about Hilary's sacrifice. She made a choice.
Hilary, you made a choice. What was the choice?
To get a nurse for two years after his heart attack?
Get in a housekeeper, Meals on Wheels?
Don't be ridiculous, Meg. There was no choice.
Were you prepared to come back and look after him?
Pippa, please. No. I wasn't. You know that.
But arrangements could've been made.
Oh, like what?
I don't know because it never happened!
Because Hilary said she'd step in. Yes. She made a choice.
It's OK, Pip. Look, no. It's not OK.
I think we owe you a debt of gratitude.
I'm sorry Meg doesn't feel like that.
I think it's disgusting. You're a child.
Is that all you can say? It's our family home.
Not anymore. It is, Pip.
It's not! You live in England. It's not your home.
You're doing your best to make me feel that way, aren't you?
Jesus Christ.
(ORCHESTRAL VERSION OF 'SURFER GIRL')
Oh, hello. How are you?
Hilary. I'm OK. How are you? That's more to the point.
Bearing up. I've been meaning to write you a note. I'm sorry.
I just didn't get round to it.
Don't be silly. Of course you haven't.
I wanted to thank you for all your help that day. You and Dick.
I'm just so sorry. I can't stop thinking about you all.
You want to sit down?
Would you rather be on your own?
I'll go potty if I spend too much time on my own.
How's things going at your place? Oh, pretty good.
Dick's been down again this week. Yeah?
Been coming down a lot lately. Driving me nuts.
I thought you two were the best of mates.
Oh, I suppose we are. He's such an ideologue.
It's like having lunch with a textbook.
What does he do?
He used to teach and now he's a writer.
He's... Political stuff, cultural analysis. Things like that.
I think I'd be out of my depth there.
Oh, I don't know.
Anyway, he's out of his depth relating to women.
I used to find him quite intimidating.
So articulate and clever. But now...
You should be at the table with Meg and her husband.
I'm sure they think I'm a complete dummy.
I doubt it.
You know, I used to think
that when my sisters had their babies, they'd have to stop.
That would be my chance to catch up.
While they were up to their elbows in nappies,
I'd be out there doing...
...everything that they'd been able to do.
But it doesn't work like that.
They're so capable in every other way, those two,
they'd be able to have their babies without the slightest hiccup.
Motherhood isn't that hard.
Millions would disagree, of course.
You sound like Helen.
Who's Helen?
In the book.
That'd be right, the parochial one. Yeah, that's me.
She's my favorite character, actually.
Is she?
Yeah.
See, I feel I was very much like Helen.
Except that I wasn't betrayed quite so terribly as she was.
My husband left me for another woman -
when the children were little.
Oh, it's years and years ago now.
And I behaved just like Helen - so adult about it all.
Well, I had to, I suppose.
I was always seeing them,
'cause we were constantly ferrying the children
back and forth between the two households.
I was so nice to them.
Seems I had such little self-esteem
I was able to understand completely...
...why he would want to team up with her.
'Cause she was everything I wasn't.
And because I wanted the children...
To be able to... cope with things properly, I...
...I kind of promoted them as a couple.
I'd tell the children
that she'd be able to tell them and show them things about the world
that I couldn't.
I gave her such good publicity.
And it worked.
And I paid for it.
Oh, not that the children lost respect for me,
necessarily...
I think they've always loved me.
But I don't feel as though they know me.
I'm not a known quantity to my children.
And I know exactly why I did it.
I couldn't bear my children to see me being bitter and resentful.
Which was exactly how I felt.
So, I suppose that's why I feel I understand Helen.
I mean, she couldn't really vent her spleen, could she?
She had too much to lose.
Or at least that's how she saw it.
So, she just went on coping.
And everybody thought she was strong.
(MELANCHOLY MUSIC)
Meg? Mmm?
I wanted to apologize.
I've been carrying guilt for too long.
I don't need you to lump it on me again.
It's in the past, Meg.
Do you think Troy thinks it's in the past?
You know, I don't know what to say to him.
Do you know?
Or do you just change the subject?
Maybe he doesn't ask you about Gary but he asks me.
You know, I think I hurt his feelings yesterday.
Shit happens.
Oh, Pip, isn't there any softness about you at all?
Do you have to cut at everything? He's only a boy.
I don't want him hurting any more than he is.
Oh, hurting.
Is that the title of some American crap you're reading?
(DOOR BANGS)
Hey, what's happening?
The Pipster!
Um, Mum said to say that she's invited that guy, Dick Bennett,
and Marge someone or other over for lunch tomorrow.
MEG AND PIP: Oh, shit!
(PHONE RINGS)
Hello.
Oh, uh...
Sure, uh, hang on a minute.
Meg.
Yeah?
It's for you. Oh.
Wh...
It's 3:00 in the morning. Who... who is it?
Um, London. A Deborah someone.
Your agent? Oh, yeah.
Uh, alright. I'll be... Thanks... (DOOR SQUEAKS LOUDLY)
Hi, Deb.
I'm fine. How...
What?
Who is this person?
Oh, that's, that's absolute bullshit.
I mean, I know who Fitzgerald is,
of course.
But I... I've never even seen her book.
Oh, God, Deborah, this is the last thing I need.
Yeah. Uh, alright. Thanks.
Um...
Keep me posted, alright?
Terrific.
OK. Thanks. 'Bye.
Well?
That was Deborah.
Apparently there's some literary critic or other
going around saying that 'Melancholy's plagiarized.
Plagiarized?
That's absurd!
Yeah. Well, that's what he's saying.
Someone called... Mendelsson?
Uh...
Yes, Geoffrey Mendelsson. He's got a chair in English at Cambridge.
Well, he's saying that I've lifted the whole thing
from some book by...
...Catherine Fitzgerald about three sisters called 'One of Three'.
Fitzgerald's not in the same league as you.
She's some spinster from the home counties.
Mendelsson knows better than that.
He's probably just trying to promote his latest work.
Yeah. At my expense.
He can't go out on a limb like that.
Must be some mistake.
Of course it's a mistake, Edwin.
But it's not much comfort, is it?
Bloody hell.
I'm sorry about it.
What does Deborah suggest?
Oh, she...
She says it's probably just hearsay at the moment. Not to do anything.
She'll see what she can do by way of damage control.
It's obvious what we must do. I'll organize the tickets in the morning.
No. No. Not yet.
Please.
What do you mean, not yet? The sooner we get home, the better.
(Exhales) I am home.
You go if you want.
That's what you want, isn't it?
Isn't it?
So, uh, you're in publishing.
Yes. It's just a small concern.
I'm in partnership with another chap. We do about 20 books a year.
What sort of stuff?
Well, coffee-table books mostly.
We do a lot of art books - architecture, historic buildings.
We've even done the occasional cookery book.
Against my better judgment, I might add.
I wouldn't have thought the English culinary tradition would fill a book.
Oh, no, that's not strictly true.
There's quite a resurgence of interest in it at the moment.
Amongst certain sections of the community, of course.
I suppose these would be the very same sections
that are doing very nicely, thank you, out of the present government.
Yes.
Ever thought of grubbying your hands with anything more political?
(Exhales) I don't think it's a question of 'grubbying'.
It's more a matter of expertise.
Uh, Troy, do you know, uh..? I'm sorry.
Dick. Dick Bennett. Yes.
Yeah. Yeah. G'day.
How are you doing, mate? Oh, pretty good.
It's a traditional Australian gathering.
Men in one room, women in the other. Isn't that how it goes?
EDWIN: Well, I've never been able to understand that.
I always thought that Australian women
were amongst the loveliest in the world.
You right for a drink? What? Yes. Thanks.
OK. Lunch, everybody!
Oh, great!
I'm starving.
Hey. You starving, are you? Yeah.
Could you eat a horse? Yeah.
That's good. It's all he had, the butcher.
I mean, I begged him. I pleaded...
Shut up, you two. It's chicken cacciatore.
And sit anywhere you like. This looks great, Hil.
Who did the painting?
Oh! A bloke called Clarry Evans. He was a local. He's dead now.
The story goes
that Dad offered to put a septic tank in this bloke's backyard.
Not Clarry. His neighbor. What was his name?
I don't know. Dunkley or something similar.
Anyway, Dad put the tank in the backyard.
This bloke never paid up. He was such a miserable old bastard.
Dad's mates thought this was a pretty poor show.
So they were always at Dad to demand his money.
But Dad... He just wasn't like that.
He couldn't stand making a scene. He hated that.
A few months later this bloke decides to sell. He'd gone broke.
He was a boat builder. Yeah. He was.
So, anyway, he needs to get his land surveyed.
Well, it turns out
when the boundaries of the land are officially drawn up
the septic tank is actually on the next-door neighbor's property.
Clarry Evans. Clarry Evans.
Poetic justice.
Well, the locals thought this was a huge joke.
And from then on whenever anybody needed anything done
they would go to Dad and say,
"Well, I reckon my next door neighbor needs a chicken coop.
"You interested?"
Anyway, the connection with the painting?
Well, needless to say, Clarry thought this development was fantastic.
And he felt that he owed Dad something.
So he said, "I'll do you a painting." PIPPA: It's him on the right.
He was such a whacker. A few months go by.
Then one day Clarry comes down the drive
with this canvas under his arm.
The moment Dad laid eyes on that painting, he loved it.
It was his pride and joy.
Why don't you get some wine?
It's this house, isn't it? Yeah.
Hotel Sorrento?
Dad and his mates would sit there on the veranda and have a few beers.
They called it 'Hotel Sorrento'. It's funny.
When I'm away and thinking of home,
it's the thing I remember.
You know, those summer evenings,
they'd all sit out there listening to the cricket.
Drinking and laughing. And drinking and drinking.
I was thinking about this the other day.
If I had to say what my dad taught me as a kid...
Never back a two-year-old in the wet.
I grew up believing
that the penultimate sign of weakness in a man
is when he couldn't hold his grog.
The ultimate sign was ordering lemonade in a pub.
That kind of man was highly untrustworthy. It's funny.
It was pathetic considering they were all drunks.
Mum would run around after them -
taking out trays of cold meat and cheese
and tomatoes and stuff.
Well, there was never any room in the fridge.
It was always full of bottles, remember?
And I suppose she never complained.
Oh, yeah. She complained alright. Loud and clear.
She harped and whinged and nagged. In the end, it killed her.
Cancer.
What do you do, Dick?
I write.
Mmm. Really?
Fiction?
No.
Nonfiction?
Essays.
Mmm.
Essays. I've always thought that a very honorable pursuit.
What's your subject? Australia. Contemporary Australia.
Fairly vast, I would have thought.
I edit a bimonthly paper.
TROY: Which one? The 'Australian Voice'.
Oh, yeah. Pop used to buy that.
And you're the editor? Yeah.
Dad used to say it was the only paper
that gave the working man credit for having a brain.
What about the working woman?
SISTERS: "If you're a woman and you've got any brains,
"you don't work."
Dad was a champion of the feminist movement.
He was coming around.
"Let us sit and mock the good housewife fortune from a wheel
"that her gifts may henceforth be bestowed equally."
What are you talking about?
Shakespeare. Terrific bean salad, Hil.
If he was so down on feminism, your dad, what did he make of your book?
I don't know. I didn't get a chance to ask him.
He liked it. But he said he didn't think you understood about loyalty.
Loyalty to whom?
He just said that he thought
loyalty was the most important quality a person could have.
Do you think he would have argued
that loyalty is more important than truth?
Yes, I think he would have. Loyalty was a big issue for him.
Sticking by your mates, and all that.
I think people hold onto these things,
like the notion of loyalty and truth,
as if they were unassailable.
Which means they lead fairly unexamined lives.
With respect to your father, I was just talking generally.
MARGE: No, I agree with you. Absolutely. It's like religion.
It makes life much easier.
I mean, once you've signed up, you don't have to ask so many questions.
Exactly.
I suppose this sort of thing comes up for you quite often.
What sort of thing?
I think the question of loyalty,
writing as you do, so autobiographically.
I don't write autobiography. I write fiction.
There is a significant difference.
In fact, there are some people
who think that 'Melancholy' is rather derivative.
They're always looking for influences.
Fictional ones, of course. Well, alright, fiction.
But the connection with Sorrento is, um, fairly obvious.
Well, I don't think it was obvious.
In fact, I don't think you would have made any connection, would you,
if I hadn't pointed it out.
Marge, I don't think that's the point, actually.
EDWIN: What is the point? Loyalty.
OK, you don't write autobiography as such.
But for me, your work has a very personal feel
and I just wonder if people ever take offence.
It hasn't come up.
It's not an issue for you? It's an issue.
It just hasn't come up. No-one's ever raised it, I mean.
I've been here 10 days
and it's the first time the book's been mentioned.
No, it's not.
Oh, yes.
You and I had a little talk about it, didn't we, Troy?
But, uh, you two haven't even mentioned it.
I don't know if you've read it. Of course I've read it.
Have you? Mm-hm.
Thanks. Then why didn't you say anything?
EDWIN: I think that's a bit unfair.
Why is it unfair? Talk about loyalty.
There have been other things happening, Meg.
Well, I'm quite happy to talk about it.
I'm not sure we want to hear from you.
I loved the book, by the way. Thank you.
Someone who doesn't think
it's a completely insignificant piece of work.
It has been nominated for the Booker Prize.
They don't care that it's set in small-town Australia,
or mind that it's written in a "language of tawdry dreams".
People used to ask me why I stayed in London,
why I didn't come home.
I'd say because the artist has no status in this country.
Why make art when you can make money?
That's Australia for you.
But I was sure things would've changed. And that was years ago.
Oh, but they have. There have been significant...
There's been all this talk about Australian literature,
film, theatre and Aboriginal art taking the world by storm,
and Australian novelists getting huge coverage
in the 'New York Book Review'.
AII... all of that.
But in this country there is a suffocatingly oppressive sense
that an artist's work is essentially self-indulgent.
How do you know? You've only just got back.
I was born here. I left. I came back. Nothing's changed.
We go through a cultural renaissance.
We're on the verge of becoming a republic.
And people like you, expatriates, still have no qualms whatsoever
about perpetuating the idea, on a global scale,
that we're still a colonial outpost.
Uh, Dick.
See...
...I think you're wrong.
And I can't for the life of me see
how you can feel so authoritative about this.
Like that interview in 'The Times'. (Moans)
I'm sorry, but I found that highly offensive.
What you said was cliché-ridden and misinformed.
You dump on us, yet the fact that you grew up in this country
is at the heart of your novel.
It's its life source.
You're entitled to your views. It doesn't sound like it.
MARGE: You've said enough. Aren't I entitled to disagree?
You know, the issue for me, though, is why you, as an expatriate,
feel compelled to dump on the people here who are trying to do things.
You can only be critical from the inside?
Perhaps not critical at all. You're missing the point.
The point is, this so-called cultural renaissance
is actually about patriotism,
which makes people like you very defensive.
Oh, that's bullshit.
I think you're being defensive.
I didn't read 'The Times'...
It wasn't worth reading. I think that's the point.
It was a highly contentious set of opinions.
It actually misrepresented everything Meg was on about.
Oh, I see. You didn't mean any of that.
You're going to retract that... No. I retract nothing.
I stand by what I said.
What did you say?
I said that Australians are terrified
of any expression of passion,
unless their passion's to do with hedonism and making money.
And sport - that's alright.
That the real cultural heroes are good blokes who make a lot of dough,
don't take themselves too seriously,
and have no pretensions about their intellect.
You all think I'm terribly pretentious
because I refer to myself as an artist.
You think that's pompous bullshit, don't you?
MARGE: No. I don't.
I do.
And you do too, don't you?
Well, yeah. I do.
You claim what you do is more important than anyone else.
I'm doing no such thing, Pip! You are!
You're mythologizing the role of the artist.
And precisely what the cultural movement
of the past two decades has been about is demythologizing it,
cutting away all that ivory tower bullshit,
making culture accessible to the people!
Oh! And you think that I haven't been doing that?
You think 'Melancholy' isn't accessible to ordinary people?
Of course it is.
And a great many people can identify with it.
It's just your attitude, Meg.
Oh, now I have an attitude problem, do I?
Well, let's talk about attitude, shall we?
What about when someone writes a novel
and gets no response from the people she knows?
What do we understand from that?
That the novel itself is no good?
That novels, per se, aren't really relevant?
Or is it the attitude of the other people,
something to do with selfishness?
Or what about cowardice?
Cowardice?!
What about the cowardice of someone who can't talk about problems openly
so puts it in a book?
Would I be better unburdening to a shrink
whose farewell is, "Have a nice day!"?
Meg, you've gone on and on and on
about the fact you don't write autobiography, you write fiction.
I've had to sit here and listen to that.
You know the only difference is you haven't used our real names.
(GENTLE LAPPING OF WAVES)
Oh, Troy. What are you doing up? You should be in bed.
Couldn't sleep.
It's cold. You should go inside.
Meg. Mmm?
What happened the night my father died?
I... can't tell you.
Why not?
Because I promised.
Who did you promise?
Your father.
Were you having an affair with him?
Tell me this first.
Just tell me, when Dad said I didn't understand about loyalty...
Yeah.
...did he mean as a writer or as a person?
I don't know.
The problem with loyalty is you can go on living a lie
and you don't know you're doing it.
I don't know if you'll make sense of this, but I'll tell you.
It's not fair, otherwise.
For quite a long time, I was very much in love with him.
Your dad.
I didn't... admit it.
I only admitted it to myself halfway through my book.
He was such a wonderful man.
He was loving and warm and generous.
So funny.
Used to make us laugh, Hil and me.
We'd be lying on the floor, holding our stomachs,
absolutely weak with laughter.
He was also very... sensual.
Very affectionate.
Those two years before he died,
I thought he wanted an affair with me.
I'd got it into my head that he was infatuated.
Maybe he was, a little bit.
But I resolved nothing could happen -
he'd married my sister, you don't do that.
Still, if I think I'm honest, I did want something to happen.
Anyway, that night I was... I was staying at Dad's
and the phone rang.
It was about midnight and it was Gary.
He said he had to meet me somewhere, urgently. Somewhere private.
So I agreed to meet him on the pier.
I got there first. And I waited.
And after a while, he came walking down the pier, huddled in his jacket.
It was very cold.
And he stood there trying to roll a cigarette
and his hands were shaking.
He was very agitated.
He said, "Meg, I've done something really stupid."
He was finding it impossible to get the words out.
And then he said it.
He said...
..."I'm having an affair...
"...with Pippa."
I'm sorry, Troy.
I'm sorry. It's so shoddy.
With Pippa?
Yeah.
What did you say?
I... I asked him if Hil knew, and he said he didn't think so.
And then he asked me what he should do.
And I said, "End it, obviously."
And I turned my back and I walked down the pier
and I never saw him again.
(Cries) I just turned my back...
...and that was the night he drove his car into a tree.
A month later I went to England.
Do you think he did it on purpose? No.
No, you must never think that. It was an accident.
Does Mum know?
Oh, I don't know what she knows, Troy. She thinks it's me, I think.
Yeah. That's what everyone thinks.
I know.
I'm sorry.
Good morning. Hello.
Can I come in? Of course.
I was just passing by and I wanted to thank you for lunch yesterday.
I'm sorry it got so tense. Wasn't much fun.
Oh, I wanted to apologize, actually.
I think I opened a can of worms and...
...well, I just didn't let up, and, uh, it was very insensitive.
Uh, I'm sorry.
You weren't to know.
I think I behaved pretty boorishly,
which, no doubt, confirms Meg's picture of Australian men.
I think she was behaving pretty boorishly herself.
It's a lethal combination, really, expatriates and Australian men.
Marge isn't speaking to me.
(Laughs)
Do you want a cup of tea?
No, thanks. I'm fine.
She's gone for a walk. Don't worry, you're safe.
Um, I've got to go up to town anyway.
I, um, I sat up last night and re-read 'Melancholy'.
Oh, no, please.
Last time I mention it.
I promise, OK?
Good.
You really are an extraordinary family, you know.
Is that the word for it?
Browning said this thing.
"When I die, the word 'Italy' will be engraved on my heart."
I couldn't get that out of my mind last night.
I kept thinking, "When I die, what'll be engraved on my heart?"
Port Melbourne? Flemington? All the dumps I've lived in? (Laughs)
You see, I realized
that Meg actually does know what she's got here.
You mean Sorrento?
No. No, not even Sorrento. I mean this house, this family.
You're a funny fish.
That's what Marge always says.
Morning. Hello, Meg.
Well, this is a pleasant surprise.
I... I was looking for Dick.
Um... Well, he's gone back to Melbourne.
Look, I'm sorry about what happened at the lunch.
Well, I... I think I owe an apology. What?
I treated him like a paranoid colonial.
Right now, I feel a bit like a paranoid colonial myself.
We've heard about that business in London.
I mean, about the Booker Prize. It's outrageous.
Dick was absolutely furious.
I mean, he took your side.
He said it was typical. (Chuckles)
Isn't there anything that can be done?
Oh, I... I guess so.
You know, right now I'd just like to forget the whole thing.
I didn't know you were a painter.
Oh, only a weekend painter, I'm afraid.
Yeah? Of course. (Laughs)
(GENTLE, BREEZY MUSIC) Oh, it's lovely.
It's very lovely, actually.
It's... it's full of yearning.
You know, I didn't get the chance
to talk about the book with you at lunch.
But my relationship to this place has changed so much
since reading 'Melancholy'.
Sorrento isn't just that pretty little place I come to
for a bit of peace at the weekend anymore.
I feel... a part of it.
You've given me the summer and the jetty and the beach
as if they'd never existed before I read the book.
You made it come alive.
And it's awakened something in me.
There's a yearning to feel again.
One closes down on one's passions so much.
So, there you are.
The power of fiction.
I'm a walking testimonial.
And that's why you can't let this professor get away with it.
Oh, Marge, there's a good part of me
that doesn't give a damn what they say.
I didn't write the book to win prizes
but because I had something to say.
Who cares if it gets a prize?
Well, I think it matters a great deal.
You have to prove them wrong.
I mean, your whole credibility as a novelist is on the line.
What about my credibility as a person?
Well, that too.
Listen, you may have taken things from your family life
that your sisters don't like.
Well, you just have to work that out.
I mean, the three of you. That's a private issue.
But there's more at stake than that.
Because what's happened is that you've written about all of us.
Not just people like you who grew up here
but those like me who came along later.
It's our home, our way of life.
The sense we have of ourselves as a people.
And they want to take it away and claim it's theirs.
You see, I don't believe you really think
this culture is as empty and fatuous as you made out at lunch.
Because if you did you'd never have written 'Melancholy'.
And if you let them get away with it,
if you let them pretend that it's all borrowed
from another book, another culture, another place,
then what you're really saying is that beauty, profundity and passion
can't arise from an experience that is essentially Australian.
If you're talking about credibility,
then that's what's at stake.
(TENSE MUSIC)
(Troy yells in sleep) Pop! Pop!
You alright?
I got cold, Mum.
I had to come in.
I know that, darling.
I went to get my towel
and when I turned back, he was gone.
Sh-sh-sh-shh.
I just...
...I turned my back.
I just turned my back.
Oh, my darling boy.
Now, every night...
And it's the same one.
I'm talking to someone
and I turn my back, and when I look around, they're gone.
They just disappear.
Oh, Mum.
Mum, I can't stand it.
Now, you listen to me, Troy.
Hey.
Now, listen to me.
There wasn't anything there.
By the time that you turned around, there was nothing to see.
If he had been calling to you,
if... if... if he'd been waving his hands,
if... if there had been anything, you'd have gone back in there.
I know that!
I know that... I know that more than I know anything else in the world.
And not because you're brave, even though you are.
You're the bravest kid I know.
But you didn't because there wasn't anything there.
Alright?
One day, Troyby.
One day we're going to walk along the back beach...
...and we won't be frightened by it anymore.
We'll look out there...
...and we'll say, "This is what happened.
"We don't know why."
But what we do know is that it didn't happen to you, darling.
It didn't happen to you and it didn't happen to me.
We're the lucky ones.
Now, we've got a lot to feel sorry for, you and me, God knows.
But I'm buggered if I'm gonna go under,
and I'm not gonna let you, either.
(GENTLE LAPPING OF WAVES)
(WIND BLOWS)
Here. You can have these.
Well, for Troy. Can't fit them in.
I don't mind what you do now. It's up to you. It doesn't affect me.
It's really about you and Troy - what you want to do in the future.
But I want to take this. That's all. You can have everything else.
And I want to take it with me now because I might never come back.
Leave it.
None of us might ever come back.
But until we decide, that stays where it belongs.
You successfully manage every time
to divest me of any sense of belonging, don't you?
I mean, you won't say it, you won't admit it,
but you really believe that this house and this family's yours.
What family?
What family are you talking about? There's no family anymore.
No, 'cause you won't share it. You want to own it.
(Half-laughs) Uh...
I've never owned anything in my whole life.
Damn you!
I never even owned my own marriage, damn you!
(Cries) Damn you!
And damn you.
Yeah, well, it's about time you started.
It's about time we all started to own what's happened to us.
Why, Meg? So we can all write bestsellers?
Alright. Let's talk about bestsellers.
I wrote that book.
I didn't steal anything from you, or you
or anyone who wants to claim ownership.
And you don't, Meg.
You don't own what's happened, don't you see that?
No.
I only own my own story.
And it's a very small thing.
Oh, yeah. It's your book.
It's your story, alright.
It's got your name written all over it.
But it's... our integrity. That's what you've stolen.
You really think that?
You think I've robbed you of your integrity?
Because if I'm guilty of that,
I'll recall every single copy of that book
from every publisher and every bookshop in the world.
I don't care what people say about me.
I'll withdraw it from the Booker Prize right now.
If that's what you think.
I always thought integrity was something
that couldn't be given or taken away.
That it was the only thing a person could own.
Do you know why I came home?
I wanted to see if I could fit into this family again.
I wanted to see if the three of us could be together again.
I want to know now...
...if you two think that's possible.
You'll never forgive me, will you?
For writing about something we couldn't talk about.
Did we ever try?
Did we ever really try?
(WIND BLOWS)
(RADIO SPORTS BROADCAST FADES IN)
RADIO: Wesley Hall tosses the ball
LITTLE GIRL: Smile, everybody. Ready?
(CLICK!)
(RADIO ANNOUNCER REPORTS EXCITEDLY ON CRICKET ACTION)
AUCTIONEER: Ladies and gentlemen, I'd like to take this opportunity
to extend a warm welcome to you all
for the sale, by auction, of number one Tea-Tree Road, Sorrento.
It is not often that a property in such a glorious location as this
comes onto the market.
This is a holiday-maker's paradise,
and with this beautiful location, the possibilities are endless.
Holiday flats, guesthouses, even a luxury hotel.
What a beautiful site for a hotel.
Ladies and gentlemen, I offer you number one Tea-Tree Road, Sorrento.
Who'd like to give me a reasonable offer?
(WISTFUL MUSIC)