Ivan Sen’s Magical Mystery Road | FilmInk

Set in a remote outback town, Limbo follows Travis (Simon Baker), a jaded cop, as he investigates the unsolved murder of an Indigenous girl.

Limbo is in many ways a big change-up from Loveland. How did the film come about?

“I think like most things that I do, I just get inspired by location. Around 2014, when we were filming Goldstone, I actually had an idea of shooting something in Coober Pedy. And initially, I was thinking of writing the first Mystery Road TV series and actually planting it in Coober Pedy, but I decided not to. I handed that job over to the producers of my company [Bunya Productions], and they took over. I told them to stay away from Coober Pedy, I wanted to save that for a film project. As I was in post-production with Loveland, I started writing Limbo, and developing the look and the design of the film first, and then integrating the story into it, as time went by.

“The Dodge Phoenix was in the film before there was a story [laughs]. It took a while to find that car too, because no one really cared that much about the car except for me [laughs]. So, I actually had to find that car myself. I was thinking of a white cop and that interaction between the white side of the justice system and the Indigenous side, when they actually are a victim of crime.”

Having come from a sci-fi where you used VFX, did you enjoy working in an area that was simpler?

“Yeah, Loveland was such a big learning curve for me in certain ways, and it really pushed me up a few levels. I had such a long time in post-production because of Covid. And so, I had a chance to really, really sharpen my focus.

“I went into Limbo very relaxed with no sense of anxiety, just wanting to enjoy the whole thing. I didn’t have a lot of the actors, the kids, until the week before or a few days before. Normally, that would be a reason to get anxious. But, after all of that kind of stuff on Loveland and learning so many different things, I just went back to an area that I felt comfortable in. And I had a great actor and I think that’s got a lot to do with it.

“Simon Baker talks about how he could relax because he felt safe in what we were doing. It’s the same with me. When I have a great actor, I feel safe.”

You always had Simon in mind for this role?

“Years ago, back in 2003, I sent him a script. But the script wasn’t that great. There was something about his kind of ability to do non-verbal performing and the quietness that he does in television, but I wanted to expand it in a cinematic way. I knew that Simon was more than capable of doing it. He responded to the script immediately and felt that this is something that he could engage with. He’s a director as well. He was there watching from a directorial point of view as well as an actor.

“Whatever anxieties he had, he just let them go, sat back and concentrated on his performance. I think that once he felt that it was under control on my end, he just relaxed into the role, and we got on really well. It was a very creative relationship, where we gave each other ideas constantly and sometimes took them on board and sometimes didn’t. He has fantastic ideas about direction and story and character, and it was great to work with someone like that. He is very sharp.”

Initially, you’d wanted to shoot the film in colour but decided against this. Can you tell us about this?

“I was thinking about this film being in colour on 35mm. I took a 35mm camera out with some giant anamorphic lenses and shot some stuff by myself lugging around this gear that weighs half a tonne. I got the film back and, it was just too much of a process to chase, because film isn’t done professionally in Australia anymore. So, the whole thing of getting the film to the lab and then I had to get the film sent to Los Angeles and get scanned over there. It’s just such a long process. And, in the end, I just felt like it was too much of a risk. And, then I tried to get an Alexa 65 camera, which I had booked, and then the booking disappeared at the last minute. For me, that was the only camera that could actually deliver the image quality that I wanted. I ended up going with a RED camera, but I wasn’t happy with the colour, so I just thought, ‘it looks much better in black and white, so I’m just gonna go black and white with this project’. That’s how it eventually happened.”

The racist attitude of authorities towards Indigenous victims is a core part of the film. Can you expand on this?

“It’s a huge driver because it’s a huge problem. It’s a problem that’s not getting any better. A relative of mine was found murdered under a roadway in North NSW. And, the family, they had protests in the street, just to get some action from the NSW police.

“When you live close to a state border, it doesn’t help either because there’s the two different police bodies that have to communicate with each other. I think they’re better now, but 30 years ago, the communication wasn’t so great with each other. You’ve got something that’s been going on since colonisation, originally the cops were the ones coming to do the killing…

“It’s been a long slow turnaround to actually treat Indigenous people as a victim of crime and do something about it in the same kind of level as they would for non-Indigenous people. There are probably details that creep into this story [Limbo] from real life cases from around the country and manifest into the film.

“The institutionalised racism is there because of the individuals that make it up. The problem with the institution is that when people come into it, they come into something that’s already established; racism that’s already established from 200+ years. It’s something that just keeps growing and not dissipating. It’s self-perpetuating. It’s like that around the world as well, it feeds itself and it just gets more individuals coming into it, and if they’re not of that mindset, they are exposed to it and more than likely will take it on, and then it just keeps going and going. But hopefully, films like this help slow it down and maybe even try to reverse it.

“That’s largely why the film was made, it’s a chance to reflect on the Indigenous experience of being victims of crime in Australia, and the response from government and how that actually impacts the next generation as well, which is in the form of children in the film, and how they react to the crime that’s happened to their auntie, who they actually didn’t really meet, but feel the impacts of that in their everyday life.

“The thing about Limbo is, it’s largely through the perspective of a white cop who has no real passion for Indigenous people and probably doesn’t at the end either. It’s just a one-on-one connection that he makes with this family, and he may or may not see things differently when he leaves the town. But this interaction is something that he has never had before, so it’s a starting point for him.”

What was the biggest challenge of making the film?

“I think from a story point of view, the biggest challenge was creating something that plays within the realms of a procedural police story, but also that’s in the drama domain as well.”

Limbo is in cinemas May 18, 2023