Actor Willem Dafoe weighs into Thylacine debate

Actor Willem Dafoe has weighed into the Tasmanian Tiger debate - is it or isn't it?

In his latest film, The Hunter, Dafoe plays a mercenary sent to Tasmania by a pharmaceutical company to hunt for the last surviving Tasmanian Tiger.

In reality, the 'tiger' was hunted to extinction by Australian settlers, with the last captive specimen dying at Hobart Zoo in 1936. Since that time there has been thousands of unconfirmed reports of sightings, and Dafoe for one remains optimistic about the Thylacine's survival.

"I feel a little like a child, but I like to think there is and when you see all that wilderness you think, it's possible," he said. "It's a little bit like I remember when I'd go fishing as a kid, I'd look out at the water and I would envision the big fish that I was going to catch."

Director Daniel Nettheim says he hopes the next witness has their mobile phone ready.

"Science tells us that really the animal couldn't have survived up to present day, because it lacked the critical mass for breeding," he said. "But so many people on the island believe in it, and so many people claim to have seen it, there is this kind of collective need for it to still exist."

Tassie Tiger thriller wraps shoot in Tasmania

Filming on the psychological thriller The Hunter, starring Willem Dafoe, Sam Neill and Frances O'Connor, has just finished for the main scenes on a hill outside Deloraine, half an hour west of Launceston. Scenes were shot on location earlier on Mount Wellington.

Dafoe, a dual Academy Award nominee, plays a mercenary sent from Europe to hunt the last Tasmanian tiger in Daniel Nettheim's adaptation of Julia Leigh's popular novel.

Early production images from filming in Maydena, the Florentine Valley and the Central Plateau show the move will reward the film handsomely -- and Hobart was even able to be substituted for Antwerp in some scenes.

Dafoe was a relaxed presence on a tight set that was occasionally populated by extras playing themselves -- forest-living environmentalists.

"I like very much films where you're every day on the set; it has a really good benefit because you relax and you feel very little pressure to interpret," he said.

"You feel much more comfortable just being present and receiving the story, in a sense. The story can take you some place -- you don't have to force it."

The Hunter, due for release late next year, has solid international prospects with such a cast, which includes Dan Wyllie, Callan Mulvey and rising star Morgana Davies. It is the strongest project among several recent Tasmanian films.

The Hunter sets his sights for Thylacine

Hollywood has descended upon Tasmania in the form of actors Willem Dafoe and Sam Neill, who are part-way through filming scenes for the new psychological thriller The Hunter. The picture above is a still from one of the scenes already shot.

Based on the book by Julia Leigh, filming will be underway until December 2010 in the last place the Tasmanian Tiger called home before its extinction.

But what's the book about?

The story revolves around M, the main character of The Hunter, a 'mystery man' searching for the mythical thylacine, the Tasmanian tiger. Assuming a false identity, that of Martin David, Naturalist, he presents an everyman figure, pursuant of unknown objectives.

A biotechnology corporation has employed him to find the animal for its own hidden purposes, and he has arranged to board with the Armstrongs, a family who live on the edge of the Central Plateau, a vast wilderness area in Tasmania. When he arrives, he finds the family bereaved by the recent disappearance of the father, Jarrah, a scientist, up on the plateau.

Jarrah's wife, Lucy, is grief-stricken and leaves her children, Sass and Bike, unsupervised, as she spends most of her time in her room in a drug-induced stupor. M will use the Armstrong house as the base camp for his frequent trips into the wilderness, and he must rely on the children to raise the alarm should he disappear on one of his journeys.


The interplay between the various 'missing' and 'mystery' beings in the book is cemented by the spectre of the lost Jarrah Armstrong, for whom M becomes a sort of 'substitute'. Fundamentally, though, M is the antithesis of Jarrah, for where Jarrah's science is about preservation, M's is about destruction; where Jarrah loved his family, M's feelings towards them remain obtuse. M is not naturally comfortable in a family situation, and for him the role of substitute is just that, a role. It is as if a part of M is missing - the part which feels compassion, or real love.

The legendary tiger is 'missing' too. Its elusiveness has made the tiger an iconic figure: the town is named Tiger Town, there is a Tiger Creek, the local butcher has on display a stuffed thylacine pup. It also raises the question of the tiger's presumed extinction: is this a tragedy or a necessity?

M has a dream in which he is pursued like the animal he is searching for; he is a figure who embodies the dichotomy which the tiger represents. About to commit what many would consider a monstrous act; he is also dangerously attractive.

The 'last' tiger's plight raises complex questions - is survival always a preferred option? Is extinction necessarily bad? No answers to these questions are offered - they are simply raised in an effort to highlight the uncertainties implicit in existence. The tiger also represents the 'beast within' us all. As M becomes more obsessed with his quest, he assumes the nature of his quarry.

Tassie Tiger thriller coming Down Under

A feature film starring some big Hollywood names will be shot in Tasmania later this year.

The Hunter is billed as a psychological thriller.

Oscar nominee Willem Dafoe will play the lead: a mercenary sent to find the last Tasmanian tiger.

Alongside him will be another big name, Sam Neill, who has starred in a number of Hollywood blockbusters including Jurassic Park.

http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2010/07/23/2962857.htm