Roger Ebert at Cannes: "So far my favourite is innocence, a touching work by the Australian master Paul Cox, about a couple who were each other's first true loves, and meet again after 50 years. Julia Blake and Charles Tingwell, actors who are both 70-ish, bring a heart-stopping passion and risk to their renewed love affair. This is not a formula film with phony setbacks and a happy ending, but a truthful, philosophical film about what love means, what time means, and how time can steal love or deepen it." High praise from one of America's most respected critics. Once more Cox conquers the international circuit with a film that avoids trite subject matter, or pat conclusion. This is one of two Paul Cox films being screened at this year's Festival as a salute to the director.

'Bud' Tingwell is exceptional. Truly a national treasure, he has been delivering compassionate, heartfelt and naturalistic performances since the 1940s! Tingwell's pairing with Julia Blake (Mushrooms MIFF 1995, Paul Cox's My First Wife 1984 and Man of Rowers 1983) is gifted casting; the pair seem to genuinely be rekindling past passion. Moving and uplifting in its depiction of a love that transcends the years, this is another fine entry in the Cox catalogue.