Lonesome is a new feature film by Award Winning Australian director, Craig Boreham, exploring sexuality, loneliness and isolation in a world that has never been more connected. 

Casey, a country lad running from a small-town scandal, finds himself down and out in the big smoke of Sydney. When he meets Tib, a young city lad, struggling with his own scars of isolation, both men find something they have been missing but neither of them knows quite how to negotiate it.

The silhouette of a cowboy appears on a sunburned horizon. Dusty jeans, cowboy hat and a backpack slung over his shoulder. This is Casey, 25, thumb outstretched hoping to catch a ride. A truck pulls over and he jumps in the back. It takes him another few hundred kms. We see him at a roadside truck-stop diner snatching an abandoned half eaten burger from a table. He opens Grindr on his phone and gets a message from a passing trucker, and ends up in a grimy toilet cubicle.

Back on the highway, Casey grabs a ride from a camper van. More and more houses begin to dot the landscape and soon we are passing into a suburbia that bleeds into the big bad Sydney city. He heads to the harbour to take in the view. The sun is setting and the lights of the cit sparkle. He hits the streets and crashes a house party, walking on in like he owns the place. He makes some small talk with the city folk and swipes some booze before skipping out to avoid the party host. Back on the street Casey looks for a spot to crash.

His Grindr chirps a message alert, and he’s off again. Down a sketchy alley, up some dank stairs and a door slightly ajar. He loses himself in a threesome with a young guy, TIB, and an older muscular Zaddy type. The sex is intense, and Casey falls in a heap after it’s done and slips into a sleep that is peppered with dreams of his lost past. Some hours later Casey wakes in the bed. The room is dark, lit only by streetlights outside, but he can see Tib’s face in the glow of his phone screen. He is still naked sitting in an armchair, focussed on the screen cruising.

They make some awkward small talk and Tib tries to get a read on this country boy who clearly doesn’t know the rules of a random hook-up. He isn’t used to guys sticking around after sex and even though he is trying to give him the hint to scram, there is some chemistry between them.

Casey is back on the street. He makes his way to the train station and again jumps the turnstile. Soon he is walking a dark suburban street in a beach side suburb with the ocean before him. He drops his phone into his hat and leaves it on the sand as he walks into the waves and out into the depths.

Back on the train, he takes out his phone and keys in a number he knows from memory, his mother. She tells him he can’t come home and shouldn’t call again. He hits the streets trying to make some cash to survive, when his Grindr dings again. It’s Tib asking him if he wants to crash at his place and make some cash. They soon realize they are more the same than different, going through the difficulties of life.

InAvailable from Dark Star Pictures and M-Appeal

About the Author

Bryen Dunn is a freelance journalist with a focus on travel, lifestyle, entertainment and hospitality. He has an extensive portfolio of celebrity interviews with musicians, actors and other public personalities. He enjoys discovering delicious eats, tasting spirited treats, and being mesmerized by musical beats.