Rocky Road: Running from Responsibility in Kurt Martin's 'Moon Rock for Monday'

Australian cinema has a long history of outlaw heroes, and this independent feature – about the friendship that develops between a teenage criminal on the run and the terminally ill girl he kidnaps – fits squarely within that tradition. But while the film has much to recommend it in terms of its acting and visual language, its jarring tonal shifts and insistence on downplaying its protagonist's criminality make it a distinctly uneven experience, argues Thomas Redwood.

Additional keywords:
screenwriting, narrative structure, cultural mythology, violence, George Pullar, Ashlyn Louden-Gamble, David Field, Nicholas Hope