Directed by, written by and starring a whirlwind by the name of Leah Purcell, “The Legend of Molly Johnson” (aka “The Drover’s Wife: The Legend of Molly Johnson”) is a harrowing portrait of a woman and her children alone in the late 19th century Australian frontier.
Already the mother of a small brood, Molly is pregnant when we first meet her. While her beloved husband is away driving sheep, Molly, armed with a single-shot rifle, is left alone in the Snowy Mountains to tend to the farm and the children. They all live together in a glorified hut.
To the tune of Salliana Seven Campbell’s Australian country score, Molly makes fast work of a rogue bull threatening her children and keeps a keen eye on a coach arriving at her door, its occupants lured by the smell of the bull’s smoking meat. They are wounded war veteran Sergeant Nate Klintoff (Sam Reid) and his sickly wife Louisa (Jessica de Gouw), a feminist journalist, whose sister was killed by an abusive husband. Nate has been hired to be a policeman at a new, nearby town, its expansion funded by a single, rich family.
