Oranges And Sunshine

One of the most rewarding aspects of film is that it can inform as well as entertain. Oranges And Sunshine is such a film. It brings to light a little known and quite astonishing story of British state paternalism at it most callous and it does so with grace, commitment and intelligence.

Based on the book of the same name by Margaret Humphreys as well as official documents, it shows how the British government carried a programme of “relocation”  of tens of thousands of orphans, illegitimate babies, and children of poor families to Australia where they were variously handed over to various state and religious  institutions or, for the more fortunate ones, foster families. As the film’s title nicely touches on, you might say: “So where’s the problem?  Isn’t a new life in Australia infinitely better than a being consigned to a drab future on the fringes of English society”? True enough, but the thing is that these children were often wrenched from their mothers (literally in the case of those born out of wedlock), their family histories as good as buried and they were also often treated harshly. In some cases, they were sexually abused. No amount of sunshine and oranges can make up for the psychological effects of this ill-treatment.  With the programme only ending in the 1970s, the issues started emerging in the 1980s when many of the children were grown up and beginning to uncover what had happened to them.

This is how the film begins, with Humphreys (Emily Watson), a social worker in Nottingham, being approached by a young woman from Australia looking for her parents. Initially sceptical about what appears to her as far-fetched accusations, Margaret eventually realizes what had gone on and this leads her to become a tireless advocate for this “stolen generation”. Emily Watson is exactly right in the part of an ordinary woman caught up in an extraordinary set of circumstances who rose to the occasion with complete dedication and at no little cost to herself. In the main support roles, David Wenham and Hugo Weaving both give moving performances as the film switches between their individual stories.

Directed by Ken Loach’s son, Jim, Oranges And Sunshine is a fine work in social realist style. It works with broad strokes to address our sense of fair play and is committed in its critical anger but it is neither tendentiously manipulative or intemperate in its passion.  It is a fine film that everyone should see if only to be reminded of the never-ending folly of institutional authority.

FYI: The subject had previously been dealt with in the 1992 ABC mini-series, The Leaving of Liverpool, and in a book by journalist, Alan Gill, Orphans of the Empire (1997). The Christian Brothers paid large sums of compensation in 1993 to over two hundred of the boys from Bindoon, whilst official apologies were offered by the British and Australian governments in November 2009.  Humphreys received a CBE in 2011.

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