

It’s a premise right out of Wake in Fright: a pair of penniless down-on-their-luck foreigners arrive in a backwater Australian town located in the middle of sun-baked, dirt-slathered, sweat-stained nowhere.

Here there is just a pub and a swimming pool. And of course, the locals.

The characters we meet at the titular watering hole are fair dinkum. They work hard and they play hard. Many talk like Mick Taylor, drink like Barry McKenzie and appear to have an understanding of foreign cultures comparable to Crocodile Dundee. And that’s where things start to go wrong.

Director Pete Gleeson’s documentary, Hotel Coolgardie, explores what happens when two 20-something Finnish backpackers, Lina and Steph (who asked for their surnames to be withheld), land in the small Western Australian town and begin working at the pub, living upstairs. They experience Australian culture, that’s for sure. Just not, as they say, the kind they put on the brochure.

“Racism got a whole new meaning for me in Coolgardie,” Lina recalls, speaking over the phone from her home in Finland.

“It was really hard to be there, knowing it wasn’t right, what they were doing to us. But we had just been robbed in Bali and didn’t want to lose the job, because we needed the money. So we had to bite our tongues and be nice and polite, then cry behind closed doors.”

After watching the film, racism isn’t the only “ism” that comes to mind. Upon their arrival the Finns are described as “out of the packet” by the hotel manager, who declares his customers “grow a new leg” when “fresh meat” comes to town.

One of the first questions this incongruously true-blue, stranger-than-fiction, human meme-maker of a publican asks his new employees concerns Finnish cuisine. Or as he puts it: “You eat seals and shit, don’t cha?”

Which is nothing compared to interactions with other locals. One sloshed patron early in the running time suggests he should go to bed with one of the bartenders, because his penis is very small and thus it would be “short and painless”. In terms of unwanted advances, there’s plenty more where that came from.

‘Every day we got to hear that we were stupid. Or dumb as a horse’: Lina serves customers at Hotel Coolgardie.

“I’ve been thinking about the reasons for their behaviour. Maybe they were showing off, or scared of being hurt,” says Lina. “I don’t know if they are even aware they are being sexist. It did feel like we were being objectified. Every day we got to hear that we were stupid. Or dumb as a horse. Something like that.”

On the question of whether she harbours any regrets about her time in Coolgardie, Linda responds: “Oh yes. Yes I do. I will never go camping again. Never, ever, ever, ever again. That night changed the course of the rest of my life dramatically. That is something I would go back and change if I could.”

What she is referring to, revealed in the documentary’s final moments, is best left for viewers to discover themselves. It is leaves a very bad taste at the end of a film in which violence never breaks out, but there are several moments when it feels on the cards.

“It was very much more intense than we anticipated,” reflects Gleeson. Prior to production the director visited the hotel from time to time. He envisioned making a film about foreigners adjusting to the norms and expectations of Coolgardie.

“It was supposed to be a subtle observation as to how that worked and where the line was in that transaction. Where the subtle power dynamics and latent expectations of the place were for these new comers. I thought that might speak to something about Australian culture, or culture in general,” he tells Guardian Australia.

“Then what happened is, these Finns arrived and they appeared not to be trying to fit in as much as the patrons would have liked them to. By not really wanting to play the game, or interact the way they were expected, they kind of became this blank canvas for people to project their own simmering inner conflicts on to. The film took a whole different turn after that.”

The behaviour of the men in Coolgardie is undoubtedly unsettling, though the film wasn’t made from a feminist perspective. Among Gleeson’s inspirations are the documentaries of American film-maker Frederick Wiseman, who is known for a fly-on-the-wall style.

The big question is whether Hotel Coolgardie is a microcosm of broader Australian society. Like the reception to Wake in Fright, it has struck close to the bone for some. But unlike the dirt-baked 1971 masterpiece, Coolgardie residents depicted in the film can hardly be relegated to the realms of fiction.

“We’ve had people walk out and say: if I wanted to see something like this I’d go to the pub 20kms down the road, or I’d go back to my own job,” says Gleeson. “And we’ve had people totally outraged at what they’re seeing on screen, as if it is something they thought never existed.”

Adds Lina: “It’s real. It’s us. It’s not a movie. Like, we’re not faking it. It was emotional to see the film. It was filmed several years ago and I had forgotten a lot of what happened. Then when I saw it, all those feelings came back. I was crying, and I was angry. I was also laughing a lot.”

Lina and Steph, the young Finnish backpackers who found themselves in an outback horror.

Shire President Malcolm Cullen claims the area (including the hotel, which is under new management) has moved on. He recently told ABC News: “We thought it might have been filmed 10–12 years ago.”

To that Gleeson, laughing, responds: “What, the dark old ages of 10 years ago? Are they still with us? That’s up to the audience to decide.

“For me, if you’re part of something you love – whether it’s a country, or a footy team, or a management team, or anything – if you love it, I think you should be able to shake it around a bit, pressure test it, make sure it’s the best that it can be. You should be able to hold it up to scrutiny.”

Hotel Coolgardie is currently screening in Australian cinemas. Consult the website for up to date screening information.