The film's title 'The Hard Word' refers to a form of Australian slang (cant or cryptolect) that the film's central protagonists use when speaking to one another in prison or "on the job". This speech is known as Retchab Klat (Rech-tub kay-lat) 'Butcher Talk'. Words are written backwards while digraphs and plural endings remain intact. It developed among butchers as a way of covertly ogling or making fun of certain customers without attracting attention. It is an old-time butchers' language that is still used in some small rural Australian towns today.
The Melbourne robbery was inspired by the 1976 "Great Bookie Robbery". Six men targeted bookmakers at the Victoria Club while the bookies had gathered to settle accounts after a day's racing. The take was estimated at between $14 and $16 million. The precise figure was never established; the bookmakers were reluctant to reveal how much they had lost for fear of attracting the attention of the tax authorities. The six thieves subsequently became targets for other criminals and for corrupt police demanding a cut. By 1987 all the known perpetrators were believed to be dead — either killed by other criminals or by police, or having disappeared. The money was never recovered.
The book about 'the joys of modern marriage' that Dale recommends to Frank is Philip K. Dick's Confessions of a Crap Artist.
Producer Al Clark began assembling the cast by first approaching Guy Pearce to play the lead role of the eldest brother, Dale. The two had originally met when Clark produced 'The Adventures of Priscilla, Queen of the Desert' (1994), about seven years earlier, and both had been waiting for the right project to work together again. Pearce was drawn to the film for a number of reasons. He explained that the prospect of working back home, reuniting with Al, tackling such a very funny script and portraying the tightly knit trio of brothers — their intense devotion to one another — was particularly appealing.
Scott Roberts, who wrote and directed the film, drew his idea for the three brothers from the 1950s American television series 'Bonanza'. He commented: "I was always amazed by those three brothers who looked and seemed totally different and yet you absolutely believed they were brothers." In 'The Hard Word', Dale is the clever one, Mal the decent one and Shane is, well... the f***-up.
Producer Al Clark took to the film's script straight away. He said: "What I liked above all was its unpredictability. There are a dozen moments when I had no idea what would happen, and it delivered. Add to that characters who speak in their own voice from the outset and a genre that appeals to me. It was irresistible." Writer-director Scott Roberts recalled: "I'll never forget the day I saw Al approaching our customary Bondi rendezvous, intoning the fateful line: 'Well, I think I hear the starting gun being loaded'."
The fact that Scott Roberts had no prior directing experience did not faze producer Al Clark, who commented: "Working with a director on his debut is invariably a leap of faith. The constant question is this: if you surround the director with a particular blend of talent and judgement, what are the chances of something exciting emerging?"
Rachel Griffiths was director Scott Roberts's and producer Al Clark's first choice to play Carol, the deliberately seductive wife of Dale (Guy Pearce). Clark commented: "I was convinced that she and Guy would strike up a chemistry, that something would be sparked between them. There are plenty of star pairings that simply don't work, just as there are some that do. It's not down to who they are as individuals but to what transpires when they're brought together. I imagined that the coming together of Guy Pearce and Rachel Griffiths would create an intriguing on-screen combustion — and it has proven to be so."
First cinematic collaboration of cast members Guy Pearce and Rachel Griffiths. It was something both had been looking forward to. For Griffiths, knowing Pearce was to portray her husband made her approach the project differently. She said: "The script had a great kind of rollicking crime feel and I'd never done anything like that, but the element I was most eager about was working with Guy." The pair later reunited on the television miniseries 'When We Rise' (2017).
Like the origin of many a "true" tale, the kernel of The Hard Word came to writer‑director Scott Roberts in a dream. "I'm in a safe house with several associates. We've just hijacked a lorry full of cash. Everything has gone smoothly and nobody's been hurt. We wait for someone else to turn up before we divide the haul. A car pulls up outside. We all tense. I go to the window and part the curtains. I feel a deep, biochemical sense of relief. It's only the police." Almost simultaneously, Roberts heard an actual account of a gang of bank‑robbing brothers who once operated out of a New South Wales remand prison and who were being run by corrupt police officers they couldn't shake off. Once the box was opened, the first draft was produced quickly, in March 2000.
On the screenplay, writer-director Scott Roberts said: "I had long wanted to tell a story in which 'crime pays'. 'Something for Nothing' is a universal daydream, and crime presents far better odds than the lottery. There is a subversive lure in the notion of getting away with it, particularly when the law seems to carry more than a whiff of systemic corruption. And that sits naturally in Australia, with its anarchic, underdog battler ethos."
'The Hard Word' centres on three brothers who attempt to break free from their criminal cycle, only to find the law — and even their own solicitor — doing everything to preserve the status quo. Under its genre surface the film is actually more concerned with the people than with their deeds. Writer-director Scott Roberts regards it as fundamentally a story about mateship: "The brothers are constantly up against it and can rely only on each other because those higher up who run them cannot be trusted. By sticking together and trusting one another, they achieve grace under pressure."
