Directed by Fred Schepisi • 1978 • Australia
Starring Tommy Lewis, Freddy Reynolds, Ray Barrett

One of the most powerful films to address Australia’s history of racism and exploitation of its Indigenous people, Fred Schepisi’s acclaimed adaptation of the novel by Thomas Keneally follows the downward spiral of its title character (Tommy Lewis), a half-Aboriginal, half-white young man whose mistreatment at the hands of a white family he marries into pushes him to the breaking point. Inspired by a shocking true story that took place in 1900, THE CHANT OF JIMMIE BLACKSMITH is a searing and subversive attack on a shameful national legacy.