My Brilliant Career
Criterion Collection Edition #973
Directed by Gillian Armstrong • 1979 • Australia
Starring Judy Davis, Sam Neill
For her award-winning breakthrough film, director Gillian Armstrong drew on teenage author Miles Franklin’s novel, a celebrated turn-of-the-twentieth-century Australian coming-of-age story, to brashly upend the conventions of period romance. Headstrong young Sybylla Melvyn (Judy Davis, in a star-making performance), bemoans her stifling life in the backcountry, where her writerly ambitions receive little encouragement, and craves independence above all else. When a handsome landowner (Sam Neill), disarmed by her unruly charms, begins to court her, Sybylla must decide whether she can reconcile the prospect of marriage with the illustrious life’s work she has imagined for herself. Suffused with generous humor and a youthful appetite for experience, MY BRILLIANT CAREER is a luminous portrait of an ardently free spirit.
-
My Brilliant Career
Directed by Gillian Armstrong • 1979 • Australia
Starring Judy Davis, Sam NeillFor her award-winning breakthrough film, director Gillian Armstrong drew on teenage author Miles Franklin’s novel, a celebrated turn-of-the-twentieth-century Australian coming-of-age story, to brashly upend the co...
Extras
-
MY BRILLIANT CAREER Commentary
Recorded in 2009, this commentary features director Gillian Armstrong.
-
Gillian Armstrong on MY BRILLIANT CAREER
In this interview, recorded in Los Angeles in 2018, director Gillian Armstrong talks about the way the success of MY BRILLIANT CAREER shaped her own career in film.
-
“Ciné regards”: Judy Davis
In this April 10, 1980, episode of the French television series “Ciné regards,” actor Judy Davis shares her thoughts about self-expression through acting and the limits of the cinematic medium.
-
Luciana Arrighi on MY BRILLIANT CAREER
In this interview, recorded in Los Angeles in 2018, production designer Luciana Arrighi talks about her first collaboration with director Gillian Armstrong, on MY BRILLIANT CAREER.
-
One Hundred a Day
In this short film set in the 1930s, a young woman faces a long day at work at a factory, after having a secret abortion. Gillian Armstrong directed ONE HUNDRED A DAY in 1973, during her last year as a student at the Australian Film, Television and Radio School.
