The Rover

Eric (Guy Pearce) pursues three robbers across Australia because they stole his car. As they left behind their car and he grabbed it, the question is what's so important about the car. Along the way, he encounters Rey (Robert Pattinson), who was the fourth member of the gang, left behind when he was wounded and presumed dead. He wants to reunite with his brother, Eric wants to kill said brother. What a mismatched pair!

This is set 10 years after "The Collapse", which is some sort of economic disaster. It's not a full-on apocalypse. There are still people running businesses here and there (although they insist on U.S. dollars), but a lot of people have left. Looking for jobs, or something else. Mines have closed, towns are almost fully deserted. There are soldiers rolling around in Humvees, doing something, but it could hardly be considered maintaining law and order. They're more concerned with doing anything that proves they should still draw a paycheck. At one point we see a train hauling freight, with men in body armor and machine guns riding on it. But they're also wearing jorts and t-shirts rather than combat fatigues. Playing soldier-for-hire, I guess. I wondered if they even knew what they were guarding, or who the heck they were guarding it from in the Outback. Emus?

There's a lot of people talking past each other deliberately, mostly Eric. He will demand his car, or to know if it passed by, or why it's going the direction it is, and the other person will ask him something else. Which he will ignore in favor of repeating his question. Sometimes this goes nowhere, like with the middle-aged lady knitting, other times, he gets at least some information. Everyone has their own interests, and nobody really cares what anyone else is interested in. Certainly Eric gives no shits about anyone else, a fact he does his best to make clear by growling threats and various depressing statements to everyone. Pearce feels like he's trying too hard in those scenes, to the point the lines come out as almost laughable. I wait for someone to make a wanking motion and respond, "OK Captain Bringdown."

I'd suspect that was deliberate, that he's trying to convince himself he believes all this, but given his actions through the film, the casual cruelty and violence he inflicts on even people who helped him, Eric really thinks he's on to something. It's also possible he's just trying to get himself killed, for lack of more appealing options.

Rey is so stupid at times that when he manages to do something competent I have a hard time believing it. He's probably most a dumb young man trying to be the tough guy everyone says he has to be, and mostly failing miserably. He's not cut out for that sort of thing.