THE APPOINTMENT 1994

SYNOPSIS

A traveller suffers a destabilising, arbitrary deterioration of vision at Brisbane's Central Station. He stumbles around with increasing desperation before finding somewhere to safely sit. A Russian man searches the station looking for him. They fail to connect. A delirium overtakes both. The traveller slips into a daydream of a sexual encounter in a hotel, and the Russian falls into a narcoleptic episode, where he at once surrenders to a strange dream populated by a multitude of bearded men. Eventually they find each other.

At the same time, two unidentified speakers, a woman and a man, recount a personal story of a crippling and painful loss of sight which parallels their growing involvement with the political changes overtaking the unnamed Eastern European country that is their home. Their story is constantly interrupted by increasingly incoherent loudspeaker messages, which suggest a political rally, or, a chronic state of miscommunication.

CREW

writer, director MERILYN FAIRSKYE
director of photography WAYNE TAYLOR
editor PETER WILLETT
sound post production SOUND AUSTRALIA
camera assistants  PAUL HENRY, JASON TOLSHER
production assistants DEE WEALANDS, SANDRA SELIG, JAN-NELL WEAVER, SIMON HUMPHRIES, BEN OSBOURNE

CAST

the Russian  ROBERT WOODHOUSE
woman in hotel  SAMANTHA VALLANCE
woman in station  JACKIE MC KIMMIE
flute player  DANIELLE MEDEK
youth  RICHARD HUNT
railway cleaner  MARGARET TURNER
voice overs  OGNIAN PISHEV, EWA DREW

Produced with the assistance of the Australian Film Commission and ETV, Queensland University of Technology
Betacam SP, 11 minutes, colour, stereo sound
(c) 1994 Merilyn Fairskye