BODY WORK
A film about people who touch dead bodies. Morticians, embalmers, grave diggers, nurses and others describe their work in 'a down to earth manner'. The filmmakers describe it as a 'layperson's guide to the crafts of embalming and autopsy ... (which) investigates and revels in the most taboo of taboos'.
Stylistically, Body Work is consistent with a recent genre of Australian documentary most successfully developed in Cane Toads. The self-conscious, stylised and imaginative treatment sets up a mechanism of distance which renders the banal, in this case the morbid, into comedy. This is a fun-filled horror documentary from last year's festival award winner, David Caesar. -OH)