MAGPIE: A tender journey into the broken heart of Australia

Once upon a time in the outback...

It’s 1990. Jim Macken talks to trees. He dances around the fire and has made peace with the flies. The broken-hearted Irish backpacker has gone walkabout in the Western Australian bush. The scorched land is hurting. The summer rains never come and temperatures soar.

On a rare trip to a remote inn, an assault brings Jim’s day to a premature close. He sleeps outside, across the wide front seat of his beat-up truck. A body lies in the dirt. The evidence, much of it manufactured, suggests Jim is a killer and Kelly Porcini, the disillusioned barmaid, is an accessory to murder.

Fearing for their lives, Jim and Kelly flee into the hostile interior of the continent. Along the way, the young couple find a beautiful but damaged country. There is the possibility of love and the opportunity for betrayal. Ultimately, an ancient and indigenous Dreamtime landscape may decide how their stories end.