We are at the front door of November, ready to knock and to celebrate, one of the year's best films has arrived in cinemas.
It's from a first-time Australian filmmaker, and it's called Babyteeth.
Warning: Prepare to have your heart ripped clean from your chest in a way you may never quite forget.
Eliza Scanlon better be nominated for all the awards as the central character of Milla. Seriously ill, uniquely special, she's luminous and melancholic in the same moment. In one of those moments she meets Moses, a strung-out addict. Moses is clearly not the kind of boy to bring home to mum and dad.
But these two are not your usual mum and dad.
Essie Davis and the continually astounding Ben Mendelsohn are lurching and reeling their way through their grief and pain, and between them deliver one of the most memorable couples I've witnessed on screen.
Lace them all with a hypnotic soundtrack and script full of bursts of colour and rage and hope and life, and you have something quite exceptional.
I'm still recovering from this devastating debut.
The flawless performances, the colour-drenched and drained polaroid aesthetic, the lightning in a bottle feel in the telling of a cinematic story. Stunning.
5 Stars.
