The film "Jindabyne" (d. Ray Lawrence) features several crucial differences from the short story by Raymond Carver on which it is based. The most critical of these is that the dead woman in Carver's version is white, whereas the dead woman in the movie is aboriginal. Since the central conflicts in the narrative stem from the men's relative disregard for the body, having a white corpse facilitates the short story's existential perspective on the meaningless of life that transcends cultural barriers. In contrast, Lawrence's decision to make the body aboriginal makes the story specific in time and place; Australia has a complicated history of race relations between whites and aboriginals, which the movie directly invokes to explore an ongoing political situation.
Another difference between the short story and movie concerns character perspective. In Carver's story, Claire is the narrator and the narrative flows from her first-person perspective; the story becomes about her experience of the girl's death and what it signifies for her relationship with her husband. However, "Jindabyne" is told from multiple characters' points of views, which fuels the political exploration of racial tension from a broader perspective of different characters and communities -- including the aboriginal family of the dead girl. This allows the viewer to take in a bird's eye view of the whole situation because there are so many character reactions to consider.
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