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The Man Who Sued God [DVD]

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The Man Who Sued God is a 2001 Australian film starring Scottish funnyman Billy Connolly, who plays fisherman and retired lawyer Steve Meyers. His wife has left him for the owner of the caravan park she lives in and is thinking of leaving with their daughter. This suits Steve just fine as he gets to spend his days on his boat with his dog, until lightning destroys it. When the Insurance companies refuse to pay on the basis of it being an act of god, Steve contemplates legal action. His local church gives him the idea to sue God instead, holding the Insurance agencies responsible for using God as a legal loophole.

Another significant coup for the filmmakers was signing Peter James, one of Australia’s leading cinematographers who works constantly overseas. Peter had just finished the smash-hit comedy Meet The Parents, with Robert de Niro and Ben Stiller, and a film in Vienna with Bruce Beresford, and had a gap in his schedule before shooting Beresford’s next film. He has had a long collaborative relationship with the Australian Academy Award winning director. Maggie Blincoas a Plaintiff: Blinco was still working into her eighties and was listed on Showcast, here, saved to WM here. The intelligent qualities of the script and the chance to do comedy convinced Bille Brown to take the role of QC Gerry Ryan: “All of us deal with the issues in the film on a day to day basis - how we survive the extraordinary circumstances of living; the precarious, risky business of being alive … and I thought this was a really wonderful thing. We all have loss, we all endure the vicissitudes, the risks, the chances. I loved the script for that.” Judy Davis is a newspaper reporter who takes an interest in his case, but then in the climactic court case, is revealed herself to be fiercely hostile to insurance companies (thanks to events in her past).Mark Joffe has spent several summer holidays at Bermagui and admits that the feeling of the town inevitably permeated the screenplay. After working with various writers over the years, Joffe teamed up with producer Ben Gannon in the early '90s and ultimately sought out the collaboration of writer Don Watson. “We had worked with many different writers, all good ones, but all having very different takes on the concept. It wasn't until Don put it together with us that we felt it might finally get done,” says Joffe. Together with Lantana, The Man Who Sued God was one of three big domestic box office winners in 2001. She always was ready for the things I would do in a scene and that is terribly impressive. I like her very much as a person - I like talking to her about life. I don’t speak to actors, directors or producers about drama. I want to know where they come from, who their parents are, how they met their husbands … I like to work at that human level, not on a technical level.” As for the film, it mainly serves as a comedic vehicle for the two stars, Billy Connolly and Judy Davis. Billy Connolly plays a barely disguised Billy Connolly, pretending to be a fisherman, who, when his boat gets zapped by lightning, decides to take on his insurance company and assorted churches, all satirical targets for Don Watson’s screenplay.

in, the bed gag was done by props people positioned below slamming the bed up towards Billy Connolly, the special effects people not being able to rig it to get the joke to work. Again, because of Davis’s tendency to deliver early in her takes, Joffe recalls that her talk of her memories was done in close up, and take one was the one that made it into the cut. Joffe was all the more impressed because of the difficulty of doing an expository story-telling piece, which began with the line “when I was about ten …” Watson says that the film caricatures the Anglican church, and that it was largely written from a Catholic and Jewish angle (Joffe certifies to the Jewish perspective), but they noted very few complaints from any of the churches about their representation. Watson jokes that these days the churches are happy for any publicity. According to Joffe, the sinking of the Titanic being treated as an act of God, mentioned by Connolly’s character in his questioning of John Howard’s insurance company man, was true.Bermagui is sometimes seen by the characters from a hill whereon there’s a caravan park belonging to the ex-wife played by Wendy Hughes, but according to Joffe, this was a built carvan park, which shifted to provide a variety of angles at various points in the film. Some of it was in Sydney, near the sea-side suburb of Botany. Billy Connolly stars as Steve Myers, bringing humour as well as the kind of depth and realness to his character with which he touched audiences around the world in Mrs Brown. Judy Davis is Anna Redmond, a well known but jaded media personality who inspires Steve to teach the insurance companies a lesson. As offensive as this portrayal may be for some viewers, it is worth staying to the end of this film to see how well religious faith comes out of it. When the dog was thrown into the water, off the jetty, he didn’t know what was going to happen, and it was done in one take.

Davis’s insured goldfish Michael was originally a Japanese walking fish (just after 70 mins in), with Davis going on a diatribe about the fish poisoning everything, but they decided to keep it simpler. Tim Robertson as the Judge: Tim Robertson has only a short filmographic wiki listing here, but he played a role in the Pram Factory ( WM here) and was also a lecturer in drama at Flinders University.We sent Billy the material when he was on tour here about 18 months ago and he responded straight away - he liked it immediately.” Judy Davis’s apartment was filmed on location in Surry Hills, an inner city suburb (ironically where media giant News Corp is also located, though the production went with the 7-Fairfax connection). When TV host Cressida arrives just after the 30 minute mark, Joffe confesses he took the name from a friend of his, Cressida Campbell (Billy swearing in the TV station corridor was an ad lib). According to Watson, Davis was very keen on the speech she delivers about the baleful media while walking down the TV station corridor with Connolly, and contributed to the content. When the rabbi makes the joke that they should be praying for better lawyers (about 47’12” into the show), Joffe goes even further, saying he wrote the line 15 years ago, and so will take the credit for it.

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