Redheads

This thriller, set in Brisbane, kills two good ideas with one movie. The first is to tell a realist story of the developing relationship between two young women from either side of the tracks: of how sisterly friendship gives them the courage to face up to the chauvinistic, corrupt and unjust system surrounding them. The other is to deliver a slick crime thriller with a high paranoia factor. The one elbows out the other. The script has its origins in a play directed by Vendramini, where the main characters were a Maori girl and a female social worker. Here they've been replaced by a teenage white offender, Lucy (Karvan), and a rookie legal-aid lawyer, Diana (McClements). Lucy has been secretly sleeping with Diana's boss, and when he's gunned down by an anonymous assailant, she fears for her life as the web of cops, lawyers and detention-centre employees close in. A ponderous script is not helped by self-conscious video and sound effects and jarring noir lighting. A plus is Karvan's sparky performance.