DRUGGY NIGHTS

REVIEWED - LITTLE FISH ROWAN Woods's belated follow-up to his searing 1998 debut, The Boys, is certainly carried off with great technical flair. Set largely in the Little Saigon district of Sydney, this grim, sometimes sordid drama, in which ex-junkie Cate Blanchett gets repeatedly pummelled by life, conspicuously advertises its Asian influences. Danny Ruhlmann's cinematography has that indistinct watery quality you often see in the work of Christopher Doyle, and the ambient soundtrack reminds us of similar noises found in so many contemporary films from Korea and Hong Kong.

There is, perhaps, a little too much acting going on - thespians relish aping cold turkey almost as much as physical handicaps - but the performers certainly inhabit their roles effectively. Blanchett is frail and anxious as a video-store employee driven to desperate measures in her desire to better herself. Hugo Weaving, playing a former Australian Rules player who has drifted into heroin, sets vanity aside to create a pathetic, wretched figure. And Sam Neill, allowing himself the suggestion of a toupee, is suitably sleazy as a suburban mobster.

The film is, however, somewhat too obscure and disorganised in its storytelling. Those in any doubt that Little Fish is an example of High Independent film-making will be disabused by the opening image of Cate floating beneath the surface of a swimming pool. Further confirmation comes later with an inevitable shot of the heroine standing mopily in the rain. Such films are permitted a slightly cavalier approach to narrative, but Little Fish's stubborn refusal to adequately explain the characters' relationships to one another ultimately becomes irritating.

Weaving had some sort of affair with Cate's mother. The heroine's Asian boyfriend was involved in an accident that left her brother with one leg. Do I have this right? By the film's close there are still quite a few questions to be answered.

That noted, Little Fish is undoubtedly an attractive, classy piece of work. It may travel over familiar ground, but it does so with notable grace and smoothness.