MWFF Critics Lab Reviews Chicken
As part of this year’s MWFF Critics Lab, our fabulous mentees were issued with a writing challenge: Watch the short film Chicken (Alana Hicks, 2019) and write a 150-word capsule review. The group got together, workshopped their writing and collectively agonised over every single word they had written about the film. The result is brilliant: five incisive reviews that showcase a variety of perspectives. Talk about cultivating a critical voice!
Chicken
Exploring racism and belonging in the context of everyday life, Chicken is served with a wryly humorous and memorably gentle approach. The opening scene guides us through a snug living room, where high-school-age Barbara (Mariah Alone) is whisked away from the telly by her Papua New Guinean mother Rita (Wendy P. Mocke), to help get a grocery refund. When Barbara realises the supermarket cashier Dion (Mia Evan Rorris) is ill-meaning, she takes control of the situation and inspires Rita to stand up for herself too.
From the soft warmth and shadows of the living room to the murky greens of a windowless supermarket, director Alana Hicks foments an uneasy sense of existing between seperate worlds. But Barbara and Rita’s mutual support and assertiveness, combined with the film’s humour, allows us to focus on the characters’ ultimate triumphs. When they return home, there’s a sense of comfort in the familiar – and in their newfound bond – alongside the impression that racism is an ongoing battle for them both.
Paul Burns
Alana Hicks’ Chicken speaks loud and clear to the experience of mixed-race and migrant children, unmasking the not so black-and-white world they must navigate for themselves and their parents. At Shelly’s - a nostalgia-inducing 90’s corner store - teenage Barbara and her Papua New Guinean mother meet with racial microaggression, gaslighting and condescension while striving to rectify their overcharged groceries. While the affair itself is bitter, the subtle fire of the mother-daughter dynamic warms the screen with a charm and sass that compels compassion for the patience they tirelessly spend in the face of racism. To authentically depict an everyday experience so frustratingly relatable to many is not always effortless. Hicks, through a recipe of her own, succeeds by crafting both nuanced dialogue and humorous performances that neither exaggerate nor underwhelm the story. By the film’s symphonious closing, one could only wish Chicken could always be served like this.
Victoria Lonergan
An astute picture of casual racism under the green-tinged fluorescent lights and canned muzak of a suburban grocery store, Chicken is touching, funny and thoughtful. Australian Papua New Guinean filmmaker Alana Hicks offers an incisive vision of the myriad ways racism manifests in everyday life – from condescending sneers of snide teenagers to beauty standards so severe a young girl would straighten her hair with a clothing iron. Yet ultimately, this is a story about love between a mother and daughter. From the moment the film crackles to life on a cosy living room, the tender relationship between young Barb (Mariah Alone) and her mum Rita (Wendy Mocke) drives the narrative. Both actors' warmth and rhythmic delivery is at the heart of the film's playful comedy. Their quick-witted dialogue and (many) knowing looks, capture the distinct intimacy of familial love amidst a shared battle.
Lily Rodgers
Onscreen depictions of racism often focus on visceral acts of violence—like Down Under’s 2016 portrayal of the Cronulla riots—and while such events underpin the colony's endurance, they fail to show us how racism is a fixture of ordinary life. Enter Chicken, whose campish humour teases out the racist and economic tensions embedded in the mundane.
In 1990s suburbia imbued with nostalgic fluoros, Barbara (Mariah Alone) is waiting for The Simpsons to start when her Papua New Guinean mother, Rita (Wendy P. Mocke), realises she's been overcharged for groceries. Exasperated, Barbara accompanies Rita back to the store, only to discover this was far from a misunderstanding.
Oscillating between sincerity and absurdity, Chicken finds its humour in exaggerating banality, underscored by the dreary reverberation of the grocery store PA system. Through the warmth of Barbara and Rita's relationship, it locates an awkward kind of optimism in their shared refusal to be exploited.
Taylor Mitchell
If you’re scared, you’re a ‘chicken’ – but it’s them who muster the courage to dodge a slew of oncoming threats, just to get to the other side. That’s the battle faced by a Papua New Guinean mother-daughter duo in Chicken, whose relaxing night in is disturbed by a conniving checkout-chick.
The film’s creator, Alana Hicks, has cleverly immersed a sensitive topic of racial discrimination in a humorous hunt for justice at the local grocery store. Following the mother and daughter as they deflect nasty words and sly moves with inspiring use of wit and perseverance, ignites an edge-of-your-seat contest.
Both key story points and comedic punch lines are revealed through the camera’s focus. Similarly, the mother-daughter duo uses their gaze to subtly point out their innocence with quiet confidence, in their mission to get what they deserve but unfortunately had to earn. The message; actions speak loudest.
Isabel Donohoe
Chicken screened as part of MWFF’s Opening Night 2022. Catch the trailer here: