South Solitary

First published on 27 Jul 2010. Updated on 27 Jul 2010.

Miranda Otto has brought her star quality to movies including The Lord of the Rings, War of the Worlds, Human Nature and Danny Deckchair. But on the set of her latest and arguably best film, South Solitary, it was a scene-stealing lamb that attracted the most admirers. "Little Bill was the pinup of the shoot," Otto recalls with a laugh. "Everyone was in love with him. In the makeup trailer there were photos of him everywhere."

The sight of Otto clutching her woolly co-star opens Shirley Barrett's new movie. It's 1927 and Otto, as Meredith Appleton, a 35-year-old spinster, is accompaniying her lighthouse keeper uncle Wadsworth (played by her father, Barry Otto) to a posting on a remote Southern Ocean island.

Wadsworth is appalled by the lack of discipline on the island and sets about making changes. The previous head keeper has shot himself and the lighthouse has since been run by two assistant keepers: George Stanley (Rohan Nichol) and Jack Fleet (Marton Csokas). Fleet is a shellshocked war veteran and keeps to himself. Stanley is married with three children but immediately starts flirting with Meredith.

"At the time many of the young men had died at war so there were a lot of women left on their own," Otto explains. "My character is probably thinking that she will most likely never get married. She's someone who's starved of affection; she lost her mother young and got stuck with an uncle who's very strict. And she can have her head turned very easily by a kind word from any gentleman."

Barrett wrote the part with Otto in mind, having cast her once before in her debut feature, Love Serenade (1996). A magic realist comedy of two small-town sisters competing for the affections of an oily DJ, Love Serenade won the Camera D'Or in Cannes that year and gave Otto's acting career the boost it needed at the time. "I felt I'd been pigeonholed in things I didn't really like and I was thinking, ‘Do I really want to do acting?' Then I got Love Serenade and it was such a great character it made people look at me differently."

For South Solitary, Otto and Barrett collaborated on fleshing out the main character's backstory, combing the Mitchell Library for 1927 photographs and newspapers. "It was wonderful reading the help columns for things like dry hands. We take for granted washing machines these days and forget how much life was a struggle for people. We also started writing letters to each other. Shirley said, ‘I'll pretend to be Meredith's friend, Myra,' and wrote me these hilarious letters and posted them and I'd write back."

Otto's stock rose considerably after she played the heroic Eowyn in two Lord of the Rings movies and three years ago she was cast as the lead in a Sex and the City/Desperate Housewives hybrid called Cashmere Mafia. Then the Hollywood writers' strike came down and the show was cancelled after only seven episodes. "I would have loved to have done it a bit longer," she says. "It was a pleasure to work on stories about women and I miss the fact there isn't anything like that on television any more."

In 2005 she had a daughter, Darcey, with husband Peter O'Brien, and has focused on making films in Australia including Blessed and In Her Skin. Otto has never won an AFI award, but that's a situation that South Solitary should remedy. Not only does she get some heart-rending scenes, it's a showcase for her skill at understated comedy. Otto, however, is quick to channel praise to the film's writer-director. "Shirley's writing is so funny and she has an original viewpoint on things. Just when you think things are about to get sentimental she'll have something really odd and funny happen." Nick Dent