Heaven's Burning (1997)

User Rating:

5.6/10   

Director:

Craig Lahiff

Writer:

Louis Nowra (writer)

Release Date:

3 April 1998 (USA)

Genre:

Action | Crime | Drama | Thriller

Tagline:

Too Many Guns

Plot:

"Heaven's Burning" tells the story of a man and a woman who are inexplicably thrown together, amid violence and chaos...

Plot Keywords:

Japanese Culture | Australian | Accordion | Wheelchair | Interracial Sex

Cast

Russell Crowe	...	Colin
Youki Kudoh	...	Midori
Kenji Isomura	...	Yukio
Ray Barrett	...	Cam
Robert Mammone	...	Mahood
Petru Gheorghiu	...	Boorjan
Anthony Phelan	...	Bishop
Matthew Dyktynski	...	Moffat
Colin Hay	...	Jonah
Susan Prior	...	Sharon
Norman Kaye	...	Store Owner
Kate Fitzpatrick	...	Gloria
Kuni Hashimoto	...	Oshima
Salvatore Coco	...	Gullbuddin
Christopher Duncan	...	Confused Man (as Christopher Duncan)

MPAA:

Rated R for violence, language and a scene of sexuality.

Runtime:

96 min | Argentina:98 min | Japan:100 min

Country:

Australia

Language:

Japanese | English

Color:

Color

Aspect Ratio:

2.35 : 1

Sound Mix:

Dolby Digital

Certification:

Singapore:M18 | Argentina:16 | Iceland:16 | South Korea:18 | Australia:MA | Finland:K-16 | Germany:16 | New Zealand:R18 | Portugal:M/12 (video premiere) | UK:18 | USA:R

Filming Locations:

35 Rose Street, Ottoway, South Australia, Australia

Company:

Duo Art Productions

Goofs:

Crew or equipment visible: When Yukio is riding his motorcycle and suddenly comes across a kangaroo, when it cuts back to a front view of the motorcycle, you can see the ramp in the lower left corner of the screen as the motorcycle flies up and crashes.

Movie Connections:

Referenced in "Supernatural: Lucifer Rising (#4.22)" (2009)

Soundtrack:

ANOTHER SPRING, ANOTHER LOVE

Stick it out till the end

Well, I watched this again after seeing Russell Crowe in The Insider.

THE reason to watch this movie, in my mind, is the last five minutes. If you've read the title, I don't think I'm giving anything away when I say that it's the sort of poetically cataclysmic ending you'd expect from the best of film noir...bringing to mind a vague connection with Kiss Me Deadly...and the only way to end any good road movie. That said, the rest of the movie is pure B...true to the noir roots...and whether or not the mistranslations and boom mike shadows were intentional is somewhat irrelevant. You may laugh, you may not, but at worst it's a quirky, passably interesting vehicle to the "good" part.

As for Crowe, well, fans may enjoy, but no one's really given enough time or lines to shine in this movie. Or establish believable relationships for that matter. They're grim characters on a silent march to their doom, leaving a path of carnage and (I must insist quite relevant) dead bystanders in their wake.