These Final Hours

An intriguing, low-key take on an impending apocalypse is a very laid-back telling (all the more so as situated in a very Aussie society!); it’s uniquely sombre style almost hides the fact that the characters we are presented with are thinly drawn, and Hilditch seems to struggle to evoke how this society would have functioned before disaster struck. Phillips is a likably dogged hero, who even manages to inspire a spark of hope, despite the oppressive air of doom from the start, and Rice’s marvellously charismatic performance may well steal the film, giving the denouement a poignancy that isn’t quite there in Hilditch’s screenplay. Nice bit of unsettling work from Snook in a before-they-were-famous appearance.