CW: Graphic depictions of death, abuse of power, violence, profanity

Kriv Stender’s The Correspondent has three things Aussies love: a dramatic true story, a beloved hero and a significant amount of swearing. I was a little worried going into the cinema that I was about to see a film with a conflict I’d seen a million times before. It’s different from most films about the Middle East produced after the War on Terror, however. A foreign correspondent working for Al Jazeera is arrested by the Egyptian government whilst working in Cairo. He’s held there amidst a sea of corruption and must wage a brutal battle against the flawed legal system to make it home. This feature ended up pleasantly surprising me. It tells its story with nuance and empathy towards everyone involved. The (mostly) true retelling of Peter Greste’s saga focuses on the value of perseverance and solidarity—I felt everything alongside Greste’s character, and the film gripped me throughout. 

Shot in New South Wales, the film manages to faithfully recreate a variety of locations across Cairo. I was able to see an advance screening of the film followed by a Q&A with Greste and Stender, alongside lead actor Richard Roxburgh and producer Carmel Travers. The audience was quite impressed with how authentic Stender had managed to make the setting feel—multiple people who’d lived to or been to Cairo praised his efforts, and everyone wanted to know exactly how he’d done it. One audience member summarised it succinctly: the “place felt really spookily, eerily,” like Cairo. The simple answer is the production found colonial prisons and buildings in NSW from a similar period and style to real locations in Cairo. As Stender told us, however, there’s more to it than that. A place isn’t just what it looks like, but what it sounds like. The cacophony of people in a courtroom, the echoing of Greste’s boots across the metal floors of silent prisons, even the chattering of locals in the street work to make a setting feel real. The sound design was impressive, it immersed the audience into the world of the film with complex, subtle details.

We follow Greste in his fight against wrongful incarceration and corruption, and through his perspective we also explore how local journalists and freedom fighters can be silenced through manipulation of judicial and political systems. The most interesting aspect of The Correspondent was its exploration of how different people can be victims of the systems they live under. Travers told us that Stender “really believed in the story,” and the different levels of power and control explored through the film are really intriguing. There was incredible detail in choices big and small, from the “bumpkin”ness of Greste’s hat to casting Arabic-speaking actors for Arabic language roles. I don’t have a lot in common with Peter Greste, a middle-aged reporter wrongfully arrested in Egypt, yet Stender managed to make me care incredibly deeply for the man. He’s a fighter, empathetic and loyal to his fellow reporters—he doesn’t want to win if they can’t. It’s incredibly frustrating when Greste is betrayed, even as he refuses to betray others, but it also makes it impossible to not root for him.

The Correspondent is an important piece of media, both in its exploration of threats to journalism and its status as a quality Australian film. The film shows the importance of good reporting, not just in the written material but the character of a good reporter. Greste’s true(ish) story succinctly showcases why we should support journalism. The independent insight into Cairo’s corruption is what drives the story and makes it actually possible—without a wide broadcast of his injustices, Greste would never have found the support of the Australian people. The film is a story of teamwork and endurance in the face of hardship; a political drama worth the watch.

Cinema Nova hosted a MEET THE FILMMAKER Q&A event for The Correspondent on the 30th March 2025. The film is now showing at Cinema Nova. For more information on Cinema Nova, please follow the links below.

Cinema Nova

380 Lygon St, Carlton VIC 3053

https://www.cinemanova.com.au/

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