AustLit

'This article explores the discursive context surrounding John Curran’s recent adaptation of Robyn Davidson’s Tracks (1980), suggesting that the mutual imbrication of the film and its source texts works against the grain of recent trends in adaptation studies that seek to distance them, and to consider screen adaptations as independent creations. At the centre of the red carpet at international film festival premiers as well as the broader publicity campaign promoting Tracks stands author Robyn Davidson, whose nuanced understanding of the adaptation process and savvy relationship to the media have enabled her to retain a firm grip on her original material, at the same time as establishing for herself a pivotal role in enunciating the film’s greater significance and authentic ‘Australianness’ for both local and global audiences. Davidson’s role impacts, ultimately, on the positioning of the film in terms of genre, character, nationality, history, race, and gender politics and ecology—as well as making the adaptation process an explicit subject for discussion in Tracks’ wider articulation and framing.' (Publication summary)