Paper Planes

Cinephile deep dive

The take

Robert Connolly directs. Tristan Milani behind the camera. Nigel Westlake scores. Nick Meyers cuts. Runs lean at under 100 minutes. Produced in Australia. Dialogue in English.

Trivia

Things worth knowing

• 1Released 12 years ago.
• 2Directed by Robert Connolly, shot by Tristan Milani. Note their partnership — DPs and directors often return to each other across a career.
• 3Original score by Nigel Westlake. Worth a dedicated listen after — most great films lose half their impact without the score.
• 4Editor Nick Meyers shaped the rhythm. On an edit-heavy film, the editor does more to control your pulse than the director.
• 5Sam Worthington and Ed Oxenbould and Deborah Mailman carry the top of the cast.
• 6Marketing tagline: "If at first you don't succeed, fly, fly again!".
• 7IMDB entry: tt3328716 — still the authoritative cross-reference for credits and trivia.

The technical file

Cinematography

Tristan Milani

Original score

Nigel Westlake

Editing

Nick Meyers

Production design

Clayton Jauncey

Runtime

96 min · 1h 36m

Aspect ratio (typical)

1.37:1 (Academy)

Status

Released

Box office

$7,646,700

Original language

EN

IMDB

Paper Planes (2014) ↗

Also by

Robert Connolly

• 
  Three Dollars

  2005 · ★ 6.9
• 
  The Dry

  2021 · ★ 6.8
• 
  Blueback

  2022 · ★ 6.7
• 
  Barracuda

  2016 · ★ 6.7
• 
  Deep State

  2018 · ★ 6.7
• 
  The Slap

  2011 · ★ 6.6

Stills · wallpapers

Selected frames

Full-resolution frames — open one to save it as a wallpaper.

Wallpaper Wallpaper

Trailers & featurettes

Watch the pieces

• 

  ▶
  Official Trailer

  Trailer

Community reviews

What people are saying

• Reno2015-07-08
  ★ 6/10

  A hope of flight to begin life again in the sorrow. Sometimes we wanted to like the movie, because it was inspiring, family friendly, great cast, performances and so on, but something stops you. Not because of hatred, but the other end of the dislike, i.e., too much tenderness and packed with full of cliches. This Aussie film was one those, a very good concept and I would definitely recommend it, especially for children and families, but seemed everything was plain with no surprises. Partially based on the real events. A young boy named Dylan who lives in Perth, the Western Australia with his dad discovers his skills on the paper plane making and launching. Soon begins to focus it on the professional level by aiming for the junior level competition to represent his country in the upcoming world championship held in Tokyo. How far this unexpected success would take him and how it would help to fix his grieving family is the entire story. Right from the beginning you would know all those going to happen in the length x breadth of the movie. So the spoilers and synopsis won't hurt much if you are yet to watch it. Even the characters planned like that way. For example the boy's friendship with a hawk was not coincidental for this particular movie theme and also his grandpa was a world war 2 pilot. I already lost my interest at that point, but I was unable to dislike this little cute and rare film. I carried on because the boy's courage and passion for the paper planes was not just for his ownness, but everyone around him that gives a change to change. "Okay. Here's my advice. Study everything that flies. (Snaps fingers)" There are plenty of mini sub-plots. Anti-bullying was one of the best things and the three different kinds of friendships; a boy from the neighborhood, a girl from the competition and with a bird. The father was kind of depressing and a bad example, but had a good reason for that. That boy's every action was directed to his father to make him look back. Well, the father was Sam Worthington, whose role was insignificant compared to his star value. It influenced to raise the movie value, especially the marketing which makes people come and watch it, but overall he was decent. Okay, fine, to this point all I said about, but missing realism was unable to accept. I'm talking about the flights of the paper planes. It's not like 50 years ago, today we got the very best CGI at production level, that mean you can't omit the actuality and go for the extravaganza. That would work well for commercial films, and this was not one of those. It was suppose to encourage the kids and it did in a way, I appreciate that. Not the best children or Aussie flick that I saw in this mansoon. Eventhough I had a mixing feeling on this, I quite enjoyed watching it and I hope your opinion would differ to what I said in this review. 6/10

  Read full review ↓

Production companies

Who made it

• 

  Arenamedia

  AU

• CA

  Cameraquip Australia

• DD

  DDP Studios

  AU

• EM

  EMIG

• 

  Screen Australia

  AU

• 

  ScreenWest

  AU

• SO

  Soundfirm

  AU

• 

  The Australian Children's Television Foundation

  AU

Key crew

• Still PhotographerJane Bennett
• Still PhotographerDavid Dare Parker
• Script SupervisorMelissa Hayward
• ProducerRobert Connolly
• Executive ProducerJonathan Chissick
• EditorNick Meyers
• Production DesignClayton Jauncey
• Executive ProducerGary Hamilton
• Executive ProducerYing Ye
• CastingJane Norris
• Executive ProducerEric Bana
• ProducerLiz Kearney
• ProducerMaggie Miles
• Executive ProducerAndrew Myer
• Executive ProducerBernadette O'Mahony
• OtherDylan Parker
• ProducerGeorgina Pope
• OtherJames Norton
• Executive ProducerMark Woods

Themes & keywords

What it's about, really

• paper airplane

Release history · US

When it landed

• Theatrical (limited)2015-01-07· Palm Springs International Film Festival

Also known as

International titles

• Paper Planes - Träumen Emus vom Fliegen?DE
• Aviãozinho de PapelBR
• Chartina aeroplanaGR