Abandoned by his father after his mother dies, young PS lives in suburban Sydney with his aunt Lila and her husband George. While they lead a modest existence, PS is happy with them. However, his contentment is derailed when Lila's wealthy sister, Vanessa, returns from England and takes an interest in PS.
私语, Тише, он может услышать
Australia
USA
Australia
USA
Careful, He Might Hear You is a little seen but well-regarded classic of Australian cinema. Directed by Carl Schultz and based on a novel of the same name, it tells the story of a young boy named P.S. (Nicholas Gledhill) who is caught up in a custody battle between his two aunts in Depression-era Australia. There's the working class Lila (Robyn Nevin), who, along with her good-natured husband, has provided a warm and loving home for P.S. for most of his life; and there's Vanessa (Wendy Hughes), who is wealthy and refined but cold and lacking in all classic maternal qualities. Young P.S. is shuttled between the two worlds of his aunts, and experiences all the joy and pain of…
In Careful, He Might Hear You, even the humble marmite sandwich is loaded with torrential significance.
Careful... in some respects is disagreeable, a slightly dodgy, highly melodramatic and deeply hysterical story of a young boy in custody feud. But that is also life, and it is in the filmic telling that Careful... resonates, and spellbindingly so. Rarely has a child’s perspective been so insightfully conjured up, flooding the film with nostalgic light, towering ceilings and half-heard and understood adult conversations and interactions. When raised on a diet of animated, purposeful child performances, it is the bewildered portrait of a real childhood here that shatters such artifices of familiarity.
The score on display here is seldom matched in Australian cinema for…
One of the greatest and least sentimental films about childhood and one of the best, yet most undervalued, of Australian pictures, Carl Schultz's "Careful, He Might Hear You", taken from Sumner Locke Elliott's best-selling book, is about a young boy, known simply as PS, (terrifically played by 8 year old Nicholas Gledhill), caught in the middle of an acrimonious custody battle between his two aunts after his mother's death and his abandonment by his father. It's a very simple, straightforward film with excellent performances from Wendy Hughes and Robyn Nevin as the two women in question, John Hargreaves as the returning father and Peter Whitford as his uncle.
Schultz films it so that we see everything through PS's eyes and…
Ranking Every AACTA Best Picture Winner
1983 Winner
This was a fresh take on the ‘worldly relative comes and transforms the life of a young child’ genre. Sure it hits the tropes—new school, learning upper class hobbies like horse riding and grand piano lessons, giant house with maids—but the Aunt Vanessa that takes young PS away from his adoptive mother (another aunt) is very different. Instead of being either an obvious improvement or overtly evil (generally the two options) she’s something I never expected to see—a femme fatale. Style that would today be described as ‘cunty’, mysterious motives, pointed barbs, and a penchant for smoking. Wendy Hughes rules as Vanessa. The drama that unfolds as PS comes to life with…
Stunning, emotional story of a custody fight between two sisters over their orphaned nephew.
It's a triumph of production design and John Seale's breathtaking cinematography emphasises the child's POV. Visually, everything feels big and overwhelming. Melodrama done perfectly.
A remarkable cast are all at their career bests - Nevin, Hughes and in a small but pivotal role, the incredible Hargreaves.
A story of personal (and also cultural) identity, unforgettable for its central performance from Gledhill. It's one of the great pieces of child acting in cinema.
an incredibly special adaptation of a wonderful novel. all the child actors are fantastic especially Nicholas Gledhill. a very rich text
Stunning. A film of almost unrivaled mastery in the childhood experience. Lensed by John Seale in a wash of hushed pinks, yellows and browns, this sumptuous and textural drama feels so wonderfully lived in in a way that Australian period pieces have a unique ability to be.
This one slays me every time with it's emotional theme of a child torn apart by petty adult whims.It packs a wallop! Based on the novel of the same name -this is rare cinema that gets inside a child's head and makes us see the machinations of the adults around him through his eyes. Almost like a tragic fairytale, wicked Queen and all. But the Queen is an aunt , and not truly aware of her full wickedness. And therein lies the layer of true tragedy. You hate her for taking the boy P.S. from his beloved "family", another hausfrau aunt and uncle who truly love him. But you feel sorry for her too-the haughty/wicked sister that is... for her…
Two sisters, one of whom is working class and down-to-earth, one of whom is inexplicably very wealthy and seemingly living in a parallel gothic universe, fight over the custody of a child, literally nicknamed "P.S." At first this seemed like a slightly slow, old-fashioned period drama but as soon as Vanessa established herself it began to get weirder and weirder. What with her hysterical fear of thunderstorms (which I can't mock that much because I'm embarrassingly afraid of strong winds) and her amazing 30s outfits and house, and then P.S being raised as a little fancy lad, and all the sweeping, swelling music and people rushing onto trains and boats, this movie transformed itself from a standard period drama into something gothic and sublime and more than a little camp, if not extremely gay. The movie that should have launched a thousand drag acts, if you will.
I want that bathroom.
A little boy, PS, who's mother died in childbirth has been left with his working class Aunt Lila to be raised while his irresponsible father works in the outback. After several years, his wealthy Aunt Vanessa (Wendy Hughes) returns from Europe and demands joint custody, which she claims is what the boy's father wants. She bullies Lila into letting PS live with her during the week, but clearly wants full custody for herself ... perhaps as a ploy to renew her brief relationship with his father. A beautiful looking film that has a strange, feverish, melodramatic tone. The one downside is that it's ostensibly about PS, who is one of the least interesting characters in the film.
In my top 10 favourite Australian movies. Wendy Hughes, Robyn Nevin and John Hargreaves, my God.
