Cinema Papers no. 55 January 1986 (2025)

OCR

AG FA-G EVAER[...]

ISSUES: Geoff Gardner looks at the history of film
festivals in Australia, and wonders what fu[...]... ..42

PIIIIDIICTION: A comprehensive round-up of what's
now in production in Australia, with speci[...].,44

TECIINICALITIES: Fred Harden looks at some of the

tempting new hard— and software on show at[...].. ..58

FILM AND TV REVIEWS: Full-length reviews of

Anzacs, Archer, The Brother from Another Planet,
Fran, Goonies, Kiss of the Spider Woman, Official
Story, The Perfectioni[...]till Point and Turtle Diary. Plus shorter reviews of all
the recent releases .........................[...]n.

ISSN 031 1-3639

Articles represent the views of their authors and not necessarily those of the
editor. While every care is taken with manuscripts and materials supplied to[...]the publishers can accept liability for
any loss or damage which may arise. This magazine may not be repro
duced in whole or in part without the express permission of the copyright
owner. Cinema Papers is published every two months by MTV Publishing
Limi[...]ames Stewart, born in the small
Pennsylvania town of lndiana 77 years ago, and a man
whom John Ford on[...]s to Paul
Kalina about how he turned the drabness of wartime
Sydney into the glittering neon world we[...]test filmshave
opened in Australia within a month of one another .... ..26

SANTA’S LITTLE HELPER: Derek Meddings, one of

cinema's most respected special effects men, tal[...]wear, toys and tie-ins have
become as much a part of the film business as the
movies that inspire them[...]W: Belinda Meares on the trials

and tribulations of bringing the news from Mururoa .....36

HOME MOVIES: Movie of the Week host David
Stratton gives a special preview of the films you’ll be
seeing on SBS in 1986 .....[...]............................. ..39

cinema Papers is published with
financial assistance from t[...]

lndustry panel to ch[...]ns". More than just a casual nod
in the direction of such schemes — which
have been legally possible for some time
under the provisions of Division TOBA of the
income Tax Assessment Act — but falling
short of the kind of formal, intergovern-
mental co-production treaties that exist in a
number of European countries and
Canada, the scheme is something which,
according to Australian Film Com[...]AFC has
existed.

And, though the precise timing of the
announcement — less than two months
after the announcement of the curtailment
of the 133/30 tax concessions which
prompted the boom in film and miniseries
production of the early eighties, it must
obviously be seen as part of a plan aimed at
minimizing the effects on product[...]ans
Union and the Screen Production Associa-
tion of Australia, with the Australian Screen
Directors’ Association and the Australian
Guild of Screen Composers also involved in
the negotiations — is for a trial two-year
period only, during which time it is
envisaged that up to fourteen international
co-productions can or may be made.

It is, in fact, a remarkably flexible arrange-
ment. One of the Commission's guiding
principles, says William[...]rd
and fast co-production treaties, into which it
is hard to build considerations as to the
quality of the project. And, although a
majority of Australian financial and cultural
equity has to be achieved “over the life of
the programme", individual co-production
deals may see this fall as low as 40%.
“What is significant about the accord,” said

Commissio[...]ms,
announcing it in Melbourne on 15
November, “is that it provides a set of
ground rules from which to negotiate each
co-production".

As a number of local producers have
noted, the balance of the thinking behind
the co-production agreement is cultural
rather than economic: the need for each[...]be ‘vetted’ by a panel reporting
to the board of the AFC seems, if not
designed, at any rate likely to deter an influx
of overseas (predominantly American)
money looking f[...]and labour.
The agreement will not suit the kind of
‘offshore’ deals which are generally co-
productions in name alone, a number of
which were made across the Tasman in
New Zealand at the turn of the decade. But
the agreement may also, a number of pro-
ducers fear, make more genuine deals
hard to[...]tative Noni Hazlehurst.

the increased chances of distribution in the
co-producing country which ar[...]procedure for submitting proposed
co-productions is relatively simple in its
outlines, but could well[...]licated — and time-consuming — in the
details of its application. In the first instance,
partners[...]an application to the Film Develop-
ment Division of the AFC on a thirteen-page
form, on which the questions range from
the culturally general (“How is the subject
matter of relevance to Australia’?”) to the
financially precise (“Give all sources of
funds, both Australian and overseas, to be
used i[...]non-cash contributions
exceeding $A5,000, eg. use of studios, air
tickets, use of facilities, deferred payments,
etc.?”).

Applications will be considered by a
panel of eight, meeting at least three times a
year, with the possibility of phone hook-ups
in cases of special urgency. The panel will
make recommendations to the Board of the
AFC, If the project is approved, the AFC
and the overseas authority involved will
draw up a memorandum of understanding,
which may not then be substantiall[...]ll also
have to sort out all the usual conditions of
employment of overseas artists and tech-
nicians prior to the drawing up of the
memorandum. Once the memorandum has
be[...]

Indeed, as first hints of the agreement
began to appear, the AWG was still holding
out. In the final instance (though this is not
spelled out in the agreement),the Guild has
apparently won an overall percentage of
66°/o+, as against the 50°/0+ applying in
other categories. This is presumably since,
while other categories — prod[...]ting and crewing — can have
varying proportions of Australian and over-
seas components within a sin[...]pts are concerned.

What the agreement does state is that,
where a script is to be filmed “substantially
in Australia" —[...]ian. The agreement also provides for
notification of the AWG if this is not to be the
case, though the AFC does not promise to
be bound by the AWG's approval or other-
wise in such cases, merely declaring that it
will be “taken into account".

The degree of flexibility within this section
seems symptomatic of the agreement as a
whole, not least in the methods by which
the percentage of Australian creative
involvement is to be determined. Although
creative equity is to match financial equity,
the former will be det[...]rather than in each project (though the
threshold is, in each case, 40%), and will be
calculated with reference to heads of
department, lead actors and principal
supporting roles.

How this will work out in practice is diffi-
cult to predict, though one prominent loc[...]up there shuffles the deckchairs”.

The notions of “someone up there"
taking decisions has been an[...]for concern about the proposal, since the
notion of AFC approval, though
undoubtedly essential in government eyes,
tends to raise the spectre of the least
favoured option when the alternatives to
1OBA were being discussed last winter: that
of federal or state film bodies deciding who
gets the money. "[...]e therefore endeavoured to
encompass a wide range of industry
professionals in the decision-making
pro[...]nnounced in mid-November, only the
broad outlines of the panel were estab-
lished: it was to comprise[...]presentative
(Penny Chapman, newly appointed head of
the Special Production Fund and now also
styled as ‘Director of Co-productions‘) and,
where applicable, a documentary maker.

At the time of going to press (5
December), six of the remaining seven
posts had been filled, and the panel is
expected to consist of Erroll Sullivan (pro-
ducer), Nick McMahon (director of sales
and marketing at Crawfords), Noni Hazle
hur[...]be named.

The main uncertainty about the success
of the programme, however, seems to
hinge on the kind of overseas bodies with
whom a memorandum of understanding
can be drawn up. The relevant legis[...]10BA) refers to agreements with
“the Government of another country or an
authority of the Government of another
country". This seems to point almost
excl[...]in the UK. It would seem, under
a literal reading of the definition.to exclude
the United States — o[...]an
the Corporation for Public Broadcasting,
which is government-funded —- and even
British TV companies like Central, which
has been heavily involved of late in co-
productions with other English-speaking
countries.

At the beginning of December, the AFC
admitted that the flow of applications for the
first deadline (13 December)[...]by the panel, and another
two in the offing.

One of the titles to be considered by the
first meeting of the panel is Roadshow,
Coote & Carroll's The First Kangaroo, of
which no further details are currently avail-
able. And producer Brian Ftosen is also
considering submitting Not for Glory, Not
fo[...]-million, four-hour miniseries
about the breaking of the four-minute-mile
barrier, which would be a co[...]efilm would be a
major partner.

Ftosen, however, is uncertain about. the
provisions of the agreement, and may
choose to make the miniser[...]rst concerns the panel, and the fact
that details of a project have to be worked
out with the unions before an application is
made. “The idea," he says, “is that it was
an accord, and you didn't have to go[...]the panel, which would then
decide on the merits of a particular applica-
tion."

Ftosen‘s second worry has to do with the
conditions attached to the approach to an
overseas body, and it is a concern shared
(though in less detail) by several of the
producers approached by Cinema Papers
for com[...]e entered into by a
producer until the memorandum of under-
standing has been drawn up, which means
th[...]parties, incurring considerable
expense in doing so. then wait for the
decision-making process to tak[...]e.

Also, he says, the fact that overseas
finance is apparently not able to be used as
a guarantee of return to Australian investors
in a project (effe[...]9 September projects
are increasingly dependent), is likely to
make the funding of television productions,
on which the possibility of ‘blue sky’ returns
are minimal, especially ha[...]point.

Rosen’s observations carry a good deal
of weight, since they come from a producer
already s[...]AFC‘s
scheme was announced. But he was, at
time of going to press, still very much
considering making an application in time
for the first deadline of 13 December. And
other producers, although unsure of how
the details of the scheme may work,are
clearly doing likewise. In a time of
moderated panic for the Australian film and
television industry, the opening of a new
door seems to be receiving a cautious
welco[...]oduction baro-
meter-, introducing a new analysis of
exhibition in Australia; and making a
regular feature of the policy that we

launch in this issue: regular reviews of
TV miniseries and telemovies, instead of

just theatrical features. Given the
changing face of Australian production,
this is no time for Cinema Papers to be
film chauvinist![...]e shall
be doing something we have long
wanted to do: improve the quality of the
paper we print on. The magazine will

The hil[...]t point —
should be substantially improved.

To do this, we have, unfortunately, to
do two other things at the same time: for
technical reasons, we will be reducing
the overall size of the magazine, to
215mm by 300mm, the same size as[...]nyone
who takes out a subscription before the
end of January 1986 — will continue to
receive the mag[...]er that, the subscription rates will be
going up. So, take out or renew your
subscription now, and get the new
Cine[...]s for

weekend workshop

“Welcome to the Temple of Doom (as some
have come to know it), where many of you
will learn to suffer,” said Bob Ellis in hi[...]“For, to take on comedy-writing in
this country is like embracing a religion or
adopting a strong, precocious child."

The analogy may not seem to fit the
concept of comedy, but it aptly conveys the
state of the genre on the Australian screen
over the past[...]from the Dark Ages which eclipsed
the traditions of the Sentimental Bloke. Dad
and Dave, and the Barry McKenzie movies.

The establishment of the Comedy Fund
by the Australian Film Commission[...].

The first session focused on the genre's
lack of success and the possible reasons
for this. Paneli[...]dy.

Producer Bob Weis said that. "although
there is a myth that Australians have a great
sense of humour, it is difticult to find
comedy that reflects our present society",
while Geoffrey Atherden, writer of Mother

%. it

and Son, attributed this to the fact that we
are a society still in transition, so that our
screen images have not yet comfortably
caught up with the present.

Bob Ellis and David Cummings (of the
Grundy Organization) contrasted the local
lack of defined, recognizable types with the
British and[...]these have been established by long tradi-
tions of stage and screen. Australians‘ traits
of honesty and egalitarianism (or the desire
for it) have also deprived us of much poten-
tial material. “There is a hatred of conver-
sation in the Australian soul,” claimed Ellis,
“so that the comedy which works best is the
soliloquy — the man standing up in an
audience and talking to himself, like Hogan,
Gunston, Humphries or Gillies.”

The misgivings about narrative comedy
have resulted, Atherden pointed out, in a
chronic lack of opportunity for writers,
actors and directors to[...]cripts to set up a
Bicentennial monument”. What is in short
supply is experience. The high risk of
comedy has resulted in shoestring pro-
ductions a[...]Just as it was all beginning to sound like a
tale ofof Wills
and Burke, related, with some embarr[...]

Weis, of course, had been Dalkin‘s pro-
clucer, and he highlighted the importance
of “staying with the movie until the
audience walk[...]point where they could be pre-
sented to a panel of producers, provided
some great opportunities for[...]zarre.

‘Pitching the Proposals’ to the panel of
producers proved to be a very entertaining
sport, somewhat reminiscent of a gladia-
torial combat cheered on by the masses,[...]ienced the situation
before.

As representatives (or victims) from each
group attempted to sell the concept to a
panel consisting ofdo
you expect to generate laughter with
characters like this?", “lsn’t this budget
excessive?” and so on rolled out like a
barrage of bullets. It was obvious the panel
members were role-playing themselves
with relish.

The general message of the session on
marketing was: there is an interest and
demand, or so they say. It's a hard market,
yet a lucrative one[...]ch must be done prior to approaching
the networks or the film bodies, and also
spoke of the necessity for a clear and pro-
fessional pres[...]ters on writing for the
ABC which, at this stage, is by far the most
encouraging of the networks.

Though comedy-writing may be a har[...]ly
are, had the chance to exchange ideas,
stories of failed scripts, divorces and other
misfortunes, t[...]for survival, and to meet the
‘high priests’ of television and film. And the
owners of the California Mountain Lodge
(where the weekend[...]press which surrounded
the competition screening of Bliss in
Cannes last May, it is a pleasure to be able
to record an on-going succe[...]audience
stayed for the discussion, and the film is
due to open, through the Recorded
Releasing Compa[...]hey contracted
in a freezing London, which became so
bad that Lawrence had to be taken off the
plane f[...]61,648 8

4/12 65,000 9

I Executive director of the Australian Film
institute Annette Blonski has[...]be to complete co-
editing and writing a section of a book on

4 — January CINEMA PAPERS

women and[...]the AF|‘s status —
financially and in terms of its membership,
in both of which areas there has been
growth — Blonski bel[...]ld have liked to see more
development in the area of exhibition, she
asserts that programming has improved
substantially at both of the AFl's cinemas.

For the future, Blonski hopes[...]and pro-
grammer for television.
I It's that time of the year when annual
reports begin to emerge in bulk. Heading
the recent batch is the Australian Film
Commission's Annual Report 1985, which
is accompanied by a fourteen—minute video
presenta[...]Channel Annual
Report 1984-85.

I A second series of telemovies is cur-
rently being organized by the Australian
Chi[...]xplicably chosen to break up and
air in a variety of timeslots on apparently
random days — the ACTF[...]nds, has recently been
tabled in Parliament.

Two of its main recommendations are an
$11.4-million bui[...]e.

Other recommendations include the
development of the Archive into a national
preservation centre for screen and sound
media; creation of a national record of Aus-
tralian production; legislation measures to[...]n, Time in our
Hands recommends the establishment of
Archive offices in every state.

Response to the[...]he report as an important
step in the development of the Archive.
industry organizations, including th[...].

I Following Chris Muir’s resignation as
Head of Drama at the ABC, three new
appointments have been made. All three
producers will work under the title of ‘Acting
Co-ordinating Executive Producer’, wi[...]ourne.

I Burbank Films have recently sewn up
one of the largest local export deals for a
package of animated films. The worldwide
distribution licens[...]al Productions (US) guarantees
payments in excess of $4.5 million, Bur-
bank titles currently in produ[...]Ray Meagher Best Actor in a
One-off Drama. Palace of Dreams
scooped Best Actor in a miniseries (Henry[...]airs Pro-
gramme to the ABC National for coverage
of the Murphy trial, Best Comedy script to
the write[...]n-musical series to
that series. Taking advantage of the oppor-
tunity in its makeshift programme repo[...]ver, the ABC devoted
almost as much time to clips of The Gillies
Report as it did to its appalling coverage of
the ceremony.

I Entries for the Tenth National Y[...]977, aims to encourage the potential film-
makers of the future by increasing their
understanding of the skills of filmmaking.

There are two sections to the festiv[...]ng entries on Super 8
with a maximum running time of 20
minutes; and a video section. For the latter
category, entries may be on U-matic or 1/2"
tape, with a maximum running time of
fifteen minutes.

The closing date for entries is 23 May and
information about applications can be[...]een Community
Learning Centre.

I Former director of the Melbourne Film
Festival Paul Coulter has join[...]will be to promote
Ronin's summer releases, Kiss of the
Spider Woman and Loose Connections.
I Following good reviews in a host of
prominent daily newspapers, the New
Zealand production The Quiet Earth (fea-
tured on the cover of Cinema Papers No
53) has opened in the US to beco[...]ionados would
cringe» but, following the success of
Amadeus, more Mozart records have
been sold in the past year than in the entire
history of the recording industry. its mara-
thon theatrical grosses do, however, seem
desined to draw to a conclusion with the
Christmas release of the title on video. *

Contributors

Rod Bishop teaches film at the Phillip
Institute of Technology.

Marcus Breen is a Melbourne-based
journalist, freelance writer an[...]writes about film
for the Los Angeles 7'imes and is Holly-
wood correspondent for the Washington
Post and other publications.

Paul Byrnes is film reviewer for the Sydney
Morning Herald.

Rolando Caputo is a freelance writer on
film.

Lorenzo Codelli is a freelance journalist
based in Trieste, a contri[...]t for the International
Film Guide.

Mary Colbert is a freelance writer on film.

Ray Comiskey is film critic for The Irish
Times.

Brian Courtis is a freelance script con-
sultant and writer on film and television.

Simon Cunlifte is a London-based free-
lance journalist and contributor to LAM and
City Limits.

Geoff Gardner is a former director of the
Melbourne Film Festival and currently a
member of the Melbourne Film Festival
Board.

Sarah Guest is a director of the Australian
Council for Children's Film and Television
and a board member of Film Victoria.

Fred Harden is a film and television pro-
ducer and has a regul[...]nical information in The Video Age.

Paul Harris is cohost of Film Buff’s Fore-

cast on 3RRR and a regular contributor to
The Age.

Sheila Johnston is a London-based writer
and film critic for LAM magazine.

Paul Kalina is a freelance writer on film.

Geoff Mayer is a lecturer in film studies at
the Phillip Institute of Technology.

Justin Macdonnell is executive director of
the Confederation of Australian Profes-
sional Performing Arts (CAPPA).

Brian McFarlane is a lecturer in English at
Chisholm Institute.

Belinda Meares is a New Zealand-born
freelance writer working out of Paris.

Tony Mitchell teaches film and theatre at
the University of New South Wales.

Mike Nicolaidi is a freelance writer and
contributor to Variety.

Dieter Osswald is a journalist and contri-
butor to Filmecho.

Bill and Diane Routt are a couple of Mel-
bourne academics.

Tom Ryan lectures in medi[...]views film for the SL0 Sunday show.

Jim Schembri is a journalist at The Age.

Peter Sohmideg Spent th[...]ters, trailers and radio advertising.
Mark Spratt is a freelance writer on film.

Antoinette Starklewlcz is an animator,
director and designer.

David Stratton is host of Movie of the
Week on SBS TV and reviews films for
Variety.

R.J. Thompson is a freelance writer on
film.

Associate Producer Brian Douglas
Director of Photography David Eggby

Journey to the Da[...]ndsay Gazel, Judith West, Stanley Sarris
Director of Photography Michael Dillon

Annie’s Coming[...]Brealey

Executive Producer Don Harley

Director of Photography Mick von Bornemann A.C.S.

Produced b[...]tional
Director Simon Wincer

Executive in Charge of Production Richard Davis

Savage Islands

Pr[...]Fairfax

Production Supervisor Ted Lloyd
Director of Photography Toni lmi

Th[...]ard Ruble
Production Manager Irene Korol
Director of Photography Ernie Clark[...]Dawson
Production Manager Jill Nicholas
Director of Photography John Seale

Douglas Lei[...]ETION GUARANTEE BY MOTION PICTURE GUARANTORS INC. IS REINSURED BY LLOYDS OF LONDON

Rambo

Changes seem to be the order of the day in
a number of major movies, both those in
production and ones long-since completed.
The studio in the firing-line is Universal.
Steven Spielberg's production of The
Money Pit, which was shot in New York
over th[...]weekend saw the re-teaming (at the
Universal lot) of director Richard Benjamin
and stars Tom Hanks and Shelley Long.
Scripted by David Giler, it's the saga of a
relationship that faces its greatest challenge[...]was originally planned as a Christmas
release. it is one of a trio of Universal pro-
ductions that were withdrawn from[...]nding. He has said that Universal chief
operating officer Sidney J. Shelnberg
wanted it changed -—[...]leaded his case in trade ads and
during a segment of the CBS Morning
News. Universal pleaded its case[...]pplies to domestic release:
Twentieth Century-Fox is handling foreign
distribution, without incident.[...]elled
by a Daily Variety advance review as “one
of his best", is being discarded in favour of

6 — January CINEMA PAPERS

a score from Tangerine Dream, the
German synthesizer-rock band.

It is an effort, says a source close to the
film, to ma[...]I poss-
ibly say about all this? I think it's one of the
best scores I've ever written; certainly, it's
gotten me some of my best reviews. l
shouldn't really comment on th[...]ncluding a sweeping
ballet — that one associate of Scott's called
‘monumental’. Audiences outsid[...]t,
but the version with the Tangerine Dream
music is set for a spring 1986 release in the
US.

Elsewhere, a Rambette is on the way:
blonde adventure queen Sybil Danning[...]e
one toting the weaponry — “everything
short of the neutron bomb," said a spokes-
man — in order to rescue an American
being held hostage. The outskirts of LA will
portray a South American country.

‘‘If Stallone is ‘America's No. 1 hero’,
then say hello to America's number one
shero," promises Danning, who is also to
strike some heroic poses as hostess of a
series of features for USA Home Video. To
debut in January,[...]ng segments, dressed for
the particular occasion. If it's a gladiator

Second blood: Sybil Danning, so[...]film, she'll break out her black leather bra; if

it's a swashbuckler, she'll pose as a
musketeer. Said Danning: ‘‘I can promote
the kind of cinema I prefer — ‘movies’
instead of ‘films’. And l can be available to
the publi[...]lso continues to make
himself available. The star of 1985 (during
its first five days of release, Rocky IV
scored a staggering $31.7 milli[...]Vajna, Rambo‘s worldwide grosses
are in excess of $200 million) is currently
before the cameras in Cobra. Now

shooting in and around LA, it marks a
change of pace for Stallone. That is, he
keeps his shirt on for all but a scene or two.
And, in place of his Flam-bow and boxing
gloves, he's packing a sp[...]or short
— who's obsessed with solving a series of
creepy murders. Before blasting a psycho
killer i[...]the killers and becomes
their next target. Cobra is hired to protect
her. What he doesn't know is that a fellow
cop is one of the bad guys. George
(Rambo) Cosmatos directs; he[...]toner, another cop thriller to star Stallone.
who is in discussions about the script for
Rambo Ill.

B[...]s its glitter, but the UK box office

shows signs of recovery

There's trouble down at Goldcrest, the[...]unner in
the Great British Film Revival, Chariots of
Fire. Playing for ambitiously high stakes in
a hi[...]mit and
beyond with three major productions, none
of which can be expected to start gener-
ating revenue before the end of the year.

Roland Joffé-’s Killing Fields foll[...]ute Beginners has nudged over the
top to the tune of £2 million ($4 million) —
according to directo[...]it was under-
budgeted from the outset. The film is due in
Australia around Easter.

Hugh Hudson's Re[...]open in New York and Los Angeles before

the end of the year, so as to qualify for Oscar

consideration, meanwhile[...]ound £6 million ($12 million) over budget.
Worst of all, having cut corners on the usual
completion g[...]ldcrest was left to pick up the
tab.

The villain of this particular piece seems
to have been chief ex[...]less than popular with
his colleagues. When head of production
Sandy Lieberson terminated his contrac[...]move which would have entailed
his taking charge of both the managerial
and the creative sides of the company. The
Goldcrest board unanimously reje[...]the good guy: Jake Eberts, the
original architect of Goldcrest's success,
whom Lee had unceremoniously[...]everyone hopes will save the
company.

But there is much dark muttering that, in
flying too close to[...]relations between the film
industry and the City of London, will usher
in a crisis of confidence for the industry as a
whole. Whether Eberts can quash that
anxiety is still to be seen.

Perhaps, though, this media-generated
panic is not entirely justified. Although
Marek (Another[...]al, elsewhere the autumn has
seen a positive glut of new productions.

Half Moon Street. based on Paul[...]s Bob Hoskins as a racist chauffeur
in the employ of a black prostitute.

The current weakness of the US dollar
against the pound has acted as a di[...]to US-financed productions. although
Gene Wilder is directing and starring in
Haunted Honeymoon, a sp[...]cts wizard
Frank 02 has begun work on Little Shop
of Horrors, a film version of the off-Broad
way and London stage hit. Also on t[...]stray into World War I, which wrapped
at the end of October.

Alex Cox, who made his startling direc-[...]tain to shoot Sid and Nancy
Love Kills, the story of Sid Vicious and his
girlfriend, Nancy Spungen. Paul Mayers-
berg, writer of The Man who Fell to
Earth, Eureka and Merry Chris[...]ed Heroine. And Bill
Douglas's Comrades, the tale of the Tol-
puddle Martyrs, a group of farm-workers
who attempted to found a trade union[...]the production
front has been mirrored at the box office
where, in defiance of last spring's gloomy
prognoses (see my column in[...]pped records in his opening
week at the beginning of September but —
due, perhaps, to massive media[...]ughly routed by the female contingent
in the form of Susan Seidelman's Desper-
ately Seeking Susan, wh[...]are on Elm Street, Litelorce,
Pale Rider and (one of the biggest openers
of the year) Mad Max: Beyond Thunder-
dome, w[...]

1985 has not been withou[...]ering what all
the fuss was about. From its point of view,
the opportunity to see indigenous movies
(albeit of uneven quality) in cinemas
throughout the country[...]the return to producers has already
exceeded that of the country’s previous
biggest indigenous money[...]e until this year.

Mr Wrong has become something of a
cause célebre in that it was by-passed for
dis[...]in Auckland and
Wellington. Producer John Maynard is now
four-walling it personally in New Zealand's
less populous South island, in an effort to
ensure it is seen by as many people as
possible.

Earlier in t[...]Lisa Harrow and Mark Pilisi,
picked up its share of fans, as did the
Gibson Group’s children’s film, The Silent
One.

This out-pouring of films from a country
as small as New Zealand (pop[...]e interpreted as a logical end to the first
stage of the industry's development. An
artificially inflated boom, halted by last
year's 30 September cut-off of tax benefits
for private investors, generated eno[...]Seventeen features came from this
boom, a number of which would have
benefited from more development before
going into production. Out ofof the NZ
Film Commission, David Gascoigne. “The
push towards 30 September 1984 meant
depletion of the reservoir of projects and
energy. It takes times to build up again."

One area of priority for the Commission
has been to build up the number and range
of projects worth developing, and it is sur-
prising how quickly turnarounds can begin
to happen. As of early September, the only
firm start for a new K[...]ford and produced by Reynolds; and
Ngati, a slice of life across the cultures, pro-
duced by John O’[...]anuary/February.

Elsewhere, too, there are signs of growth
and optimism. Auckland producer Lloyd
Phillips, of Phillips-Whitehouse Productions
Limited, which has just completed a six-part
television miniseries. Heart Of The High
Country, has announced a co-production
feature film project with Filmline inter-
national of Montreal, based on events sur-
rounding the sinking by French secret
service agents of the ‘Rainbow Warrior’.

Arnie Gelbart, the Canadian screenwriter
of Montenegro, is already here and at
work on the script, and a New[...]ts audience in Wellington and
Auckland.

director is expected to be named shortly.
Filming will begin in April next year.

There is also strong interest in the
prospectus recently r[...]w have
made it into the cinema — in force, what is
more. With the American film, Buddies,
first off[...]more are promised,
including two from the doyens of German
gay filmmaking, Rosa von Praunheim and
Fra[...]has been sold. Set
up in 1972 by such luminaries of the ‘new
German cinema’ as Wim Wenders, Werne[...]difficulties by 1976, and only survived
because of the financial involvement of
Rudolf Augstein, publisher of the news
magazine, Der Spiegel.

A series of failures saw business going
downhill again, howev[...]proved a flop, and the row over the
distribution of Paris, Texas did not create
much sympathy for the company, which
was generally (if not entirely accurately) per-
ceived as the villain of the piece.

In a surprise move, Augstein has now[...]z, a former
managing director and presently owner of
another distributor, Futura, which handles
Edgar[...]o merge.

On a brighter note, the runaway success
of Otto — Der Film, mentioned in my last

column, has, if anything, increased. Around
eight million people[...](for the Golden Bear), the inter-
national Forum of Young Cinema, the
Children's Film Festival, New G[...]onths immediately prior to the festival. U-
matic or VHS low-band videocassettes may
be submitted for[...]se, based on Umberto Eco’s bestselling
The Name of the Rose, is under way for
Neue Constantin Film, with Frenchma[...]ng and Sean
Connery starring.

Also in production is Momo, based on
another novel by Michael (The Never-
ending Story) Ende. Momo is about time
thieves. Mario Adorf is in the lead,
Johannes Schaaf is directing, cinemato-

papers, more than 100 in Au[...]ndinavia and Europe.

While all this new activity is heartening,
however, Gascoigne has no intention of
letting go the nettle of government encour-
agement for private investment in the
industry.

"Direct funding of the Commission bythe
government (boosted to $NZ5.[...]urrent financial year) does not allow
the number or range of feature films that
one would desire,” he says.[...]ght to
producers from private investors."

graphy is by Xaver Schwarzenberg, and
most of the film will be shot at Rome's Cine-
citta. And,[...]For the record: in several major cities,
Amadeus is now into its second year, with
Diva also still en[...]e, Cinema Papers tries to
give the original title of a film and its English
title. But we can only do this with films for
which an English title of some kind exists.
So, rather than give approximate trans-
lations of titles (or, worse still, explanations
of the word-play in a title), we give English-
langu[...]lms that have
been screened outside their country of
origin or at major festivals. This means that
most of the films in the ‘Around the World’
s[...]

political wrangies

A long spell of fine weather is generally
blamed for having kept the French from[...]t rate among 16-25-year-olds
probably has more to do with the trend.
Business is down 12% on the same period
in 1984; and, though[...]rancais and Garland Produc-
tions, while the fate of Parafrance still hangs
in the balance. The Gaumon[...]summer are
now being applied under the direction of
specialized production finance companies
called S[...]ive side, progress towards
independent television is stalled by political
wrangling and administrative[...]omised. In selected
main centres, a cable network is slowly
being put into place, but to date only
550,000 households have been connected,
which is well short of projections.

Undeterred by these trifling setbac[...]participate in the communications tech-
nologies of the future. A grandiose ‘Carre-
four Internatio[...]aris in

October. At the opening, a gigantic wall of
televisions screened non-stop programmes
from fif[...]try was the Féte du Cinéma,
held on the weekend of 20-22 September.
With tickets going at two for the price of
one, attendances shot up by 72%. Promo-
tional events were also part of the pro-
gramme: an open-air premiere screening of
Akira Kurosawa’s Ran at the Georges
Pompidou Centre, a gala screening of Abel
Games 1927 classic, Napoleon (with live
orch[...]ent conducted by
Carmine Coppola), and an auction of
accessories and costumes worn by
France's favourite stars.

On the production side, an interesting
batch of productions is in the pipeline.
Fréderic Andrei, who played the postman
in Diva, is currently directing his first film,
Paris Minuit,[...]starred in
Techiné’s Cannes entry Rendez-vous, is
teaming up with Tchéky Karyo of Les nuits
de la pleine lune (Full Moon in Paris),[...]Among the more established names,
Alain Resnais is due to start shooting his
new film, Mélo, based[...]n-
Jacques Beneix (Diva) are also in progress,
as is Conseil de famille, a film by Costa
Gavras starr[...]a contract with Gaumont
to make three films, one of which will be
taken from Dostoyevski’s The Poss[...]mbo. A View To A Kill
has a steady following, Ran is notdoing as
well as expected, but the American
co[...]look like being hits.

Desperately Seeking Susan is popular,
less so Alamo Bay directed by Frances
own Louis Malle. An[...]lman; another
comedy, Trois hommes et un coutfin, is
also doing well for Coline Serreau. Thierry
l’Hermitle (My New Partner) is back with
Anémone in Le mariage du siécle, a
sp[...]n with No-Man’s Land, a look
at the banal lives of border smugglers, and
ex-reporter Raymond Depardon is
receiving mixed reactions to his first attempt
a[...]Gloom, anguish and sex on the big screen, oceans of

nostalgia on the small

On the production front, the Italian autumn
is beginning to look like a season of dis-
content. Established filmmakers of different
generations and widely varying
approach[...]have been inspired by
his near-fatal heart attack of three years
ago. In it, Marcello Mastroianni play[...]ank employee who comes back to
life twice (shades of Bliss), always at lunch-
time, and always to eat[...]in 40 years, and rediscovers the simple
pleasures of the local way of life. Their
candid mutual affection is rekindled, but the
Neapolitan is killed by his son's kidnappers.

In an ambiguous ending, Scola gives the
audience the option of imagining a third
resurrection for the character.[...]on on the buddy genre,
exploring only the surface of their many
problems.

The most typical and coherent offspring
of late sixties cinema, Nanni Moretti (once
the king of the so-called ‘new comedians’)
has, with La messa e finita, produced a
grim portrait of his generation's lost ideals.
Moretti plays a pri[...]land,
who tries to rescue the terrible existences of

his old friends.

Through his desperate eyes, we get a
moral vision that is never too narrow —— he
is the most non-Catholic pastor to be put on
the screen in this hyper-Catholic country —
and is finely spiced with sarcasm. Moretti’s
style as a director is still elementary,

though: his growing social[...]accompanied by imaginative
visual resources.

it is difficult to imagine what Tinto Brass
could stil[...]eroticism, after the enormous commercial
success of La chiave (The Key) two years
ago. Now, however,[...]ter in
Go|doni’s La locanderia: hardcore images
of overweight flesh, pictorially embellished
so as to be acceptable to the censors and
family aud[...]unexplored, and it
evokes in the viewer memories of La
grande bouffe (Blow Out).

In the same sub-genre of erotic vehicles
come Giuseppe Patroni Griffi’s[...]’s lntemo berlinese.
Lacking the (relative) joy of Brass’s film,
they equate sex with evil, tortur[...]e Fred, delayed until
January, has been left out of the Italian
Oscar nominations. Maccheroni was
selected instead, by Luigi de Laurentiis,
head of the national Oscar commission and
producer of the film. There was a storm of
protest in the press, but to no avail.

Due on primetime Sunday television
soon is Cinecitta Clnecitta, a five-part RAI
show built around the many faces of Vittorio
Gassman by various writers, and directed
by Vittorio Sindoni. It is a trip through the
studio's glorious history, and Gassman is
joined by an army of stars, including Fanny
Ardant, Mastroianni, Mlou[...]easons, promises to cele-
brate the 90th birthday of the cinema at the
end of December with a non-stop, 24-hour
marathon of rare and unusual films. The
second channel will[...]networks are competing with their usual
avalanche of films, but are stepping up the
commercial[...]

Varna, by the Black Sea, is sometimes des-
cribed as the Soviet b|oc’s answ[...]ilors walked, it looked more like some-
thing out of Death in Venice.

Suffering from an electricity crisis, Varna
nevertheless turned on all the lights of the

Palace of Culture and Sport to welcome its
international gu[...]y,
not just with professionals, but with
hundreds of families, teenagers, sailors and
workers.

Perhaps that is the clue to the nature of
eastern European animation: its childish
simplicity and directness, coupled with
sharp criticism of the system, is able to
communicate with its large audience on
many levels. It seems that, in the Soviet
bloc, it is animation and not live action
which is the visual expression of man's
desire to rise above the bounds of his day-
to-day life. In the graphic symbol lies[...]e western eye, the films appear
stylistically out of touch, stuck somewhere
between the forties and the fifties. Graphic
innovation is almost absent, as is the use of
computer animation. With modern tech-
nology in the graphic arts out of their reach,
the Bulgarians, in particular, attac[...]n‘ # flew through the day's events
on the wings of animated imagination,
conjuring up impossible associations as in a
dream, where there is limitless freedom of
action and space.

The prize-winning A Tale of the Road,
from Bulgaria, directed by Henri Koulev,
again dealt with the fantasy of freedom, via
a boundless road of travel and experience.
And the feature prize went[...]Varna retrospectives were
memorable — the work of Soviet artist Yuri
Norshtein for his haunting, poetic imagery
of love and war in A Tale of All Tales; and
the films produced by John Halas f[...]estival, which filled
venues in the city for most of its eight-day
run in mid-September.

The programm[...]and recent work by Irish filmmakers.

Centrepiece of the Festival was Heimat,
Edgar Reitz’s massive drama of German
histony. Other big hits in an eclectic and[...]s valedictory Ouerelle, and
Luis Puenzo’s study of the desaparecidos
in Argentina, La historia ofici[...]cance).

Last-minute additions were the premiere
of Route 66, a new documentary by John
Davis, and My[...]his year’s
Edinburgh Festival.

Best Irish film of the Festival —— and
brought back by popular d[...]story by Sean 0 Faolain, directed by
Thaddeus O’Su|livan, and starring Bob
(Dunera Boys) Hoskins and Brenda
Fricker, star of the highly-acclaimed tele-
feature, The Ballroom of Romance.

The idea for the Festival came from the
organizers of the theatre event, who asked
Michael Dwyer, film critic of The Sunday
Tribune, and Myles Dungan of RTE, the
state television service, to compile a p[...]ed for next year. It will run for a
fortnight and is scheduled for 20 November-
4 December (overlappin[...]ns are planned.

Ray comlskey

sheer magnitude of his output: some 2,200
films from the Halas and B[...]nimation on offer was (with
the notable exception of Australia) rather
poor — though this is, no doubt, due to the
fact that the two previous[...]—
showing, perhaps, that the beauty and
message of animation lies in the image, not
the spoken word.[...]thetics and
content". Modesty, and the sheer lack of
space, forbid me from saying another
word.

Antoi[...]n-
tained, as usual, something for everyone.
"One or two of the more commercial films
are here to bring the Festival to the attention
of a wider public,” explained Festival
director Ji[...]t
admitted, it should be said that there are
lots of different audiences out there, who all
deserve th[...]ticipate.”

With over 130 films, including some of the
latest offerings from the US commercial and
independent cinema, a season of ‘New
Oriental Cinema’ (programmed by Tony
Rayns), British films, a selection of fine
documentaries and a Godard retrospective
to[...]ck to the Future and Pale Rider, plus a
selection of marginally ‘smaller’ films with
some degree of studio involvement, but
which could also lay claim to
‘independence’: The Purple Rose of
Cairo, Desperately Seeking Susan,
Mishima and Kiss of the Spider Woman.

Bridging west and east was Dim Sum: A
Little Bit of Heart, Wayne Wang's delight-
fully affectionate portrayal of a Chinese
American family. Focusing on the relati[...]an) and daughter (more American
than Chinese), it is a film which poignantly
straddles the two culture[...]insights into both.

Heading the impressive list of films in the
‘New Oriental Cinema’ section wa[...]y breathtaking, this striking film tells
the tale of a soldier/folklorist who, in his
quest for songs[...]with them develops, he begins to
sense the depth of the division between his
own life as a soldier and a party cadre, and
that of the peasants.

Qingmel zhuma (Taipei Story), from
Taiwan, is about the tensions at work in a
traditional socie[...]e’s Half Life (to be featured in the
next issue of Cinema Papers), and Ameri-
can Greta SchilIer’s[...]tertaining and imaginatively put-together
account of gay life in America before the
Stonewall riots, w[...]burgh was represented almost
entirely by the work of Jean-Luc Godard.
Included in a retrospective mini[...]51); the latter, reported on from Cannes
(No. 52) is an intermittently amusing,
typically convoluted treatise on the busi-
ness of filmmaking and the detective genre.

Ironically ([...]Nic Roeg (Insignificance)
and Ken Russell (Crimes of Passion) have
already been discussed here (something
which could be said for most of the Edin-
burgh films). Not so Derek Jarman.

Britain's leading independent film[...]ransferred to video, then blown
up to 35 mm, this is a film of extraordinary
images and textures, overlaid by a[...]eare's sonnets.

But perhaps the biggest surprise of the
Festival was Stephen Frear's televisio[...]

So, howdowedo it? _
lt’strue, we have no pilots. We're not
that sort ofdo is make a single
phone call.

To Budget Air Services[...].

A replacement generator, a special
camera lens or even livestock.

Whatever it is, wherever you want it,
one call and you can consider the job done.

And at Budget there is more...

There's the expertise. You won't find
a team with a greater knowledge oftheir
business. . .so we’re off to a great start.

Then there's the technology. Our
computer file of charter aircraft is the largest
in Australia...litera|ly everything f[...]er thing you won't find
anywhere else. The spirit of Budget.

That’s our commitment to excell[...]

In the male-dominated field of cinemato-
graphy, Jan Kenny is a rarity. Her work as
director of photography on Fran completes
a trailblazing record and marks, in industry
terms, an official recognition of her status
and expertise. With each step along th[...]BC and AC, before and after cinemato-
graphy. Out of necessity, BC — her first life
— included sports teaching, stage manage-
ment and a number of jobs in peripheral
areas of film. She tried, for instance, at the
Commonwealt[...]era was as production
assistant. Cameras were out of bounds to
women.

Her ‘second life‘ began in[...]ned
bid to break into cinematography. By a
stroke of luck — a contact with the South
Australian Film[...]And, by setting
the precedent, he opened up a lot of oppor-
tunities for me. I really owe him Thy care[...]uely, that has
worked for me, because I've gained so
much solid experience. And, with that
under my be[...]rk.”

Kenny’s work has spanned a wide
variety of projects: documentaries, short
dramas, commercials, TV series and
specials, and a significant number of
features such as Backroads (1977), The
Picture Show Man (1977), Harlequin
(1980), The Killing of Angel Street
(1981), Goodbye Paradise (1982) and We
of the Never Never (1982).

Her philosophy has been to stay in there
and do her best; and she believes that the
major turning[...]scheduled for the
job fell through the glass roof of the Sydney
University swimming pool. “Of course,”
she jokes, “there were those who cla[...]for a DOP on Fran.

Kenny recalls the experience of working
on the film as extremely enjoyable. She
speaks highly of writer/director Glenda
Hambly’s “talent and c[...]all that was needed. Added to
that was the bonus of working with Noni
Hazlehurst: so multl-talented — much more
than an actress. She contributed to the
vision in so many ways, and her energy on

the set gave eve[...]umentary
look in Fran," Kenny adds, “not set-up or
choreographed. She didn't want people to
be conscious of camera or lighting. We
ended up with a slightly flat look.[...]d the style complements that. its
not a showpiece of my work, but it's what
was required.

"What I hope I'm achieving now is an
ability to light the picture for the director so
as to suit the total vision. That’s a quality I
admire enormously in Russell Boyd: his
style changes so much on every film he

does. Other strong infl[...]how can one not learn from
him? He has to be one of the best in the
world. And Geoff Burton, especial[...]over from
him as DOP on her latest project, Land of
Hope, a $4.5-million miniseries for JNP to
be shown on Channel 7 early next year.

Land of Hope is the story of the labour
movement in Australia, from unionism to
the election of Gough Whitlam — 1892 to
1972 — seen through the eyes of the Quinn
family over a number of generations. The
drama spans ten one-hour episodes. The
first six were shot by Burton, and Kenny is
currently working on the last four.

Sixty[...]career as a director. This has included a
series of war dramas — The Sea Shall Not
Have Them (1954)[...]Loved Me,1977; and
Moonraker, 1979) and a number of stage
adaptations: Alfie (1966), Educating Rita
([...]n
producer, I've been able to control the
content of my films. And I have a great
admiration for writers who sit in front of a
piece of paper. For myself, I find writing a
very lonely o[...]al side. On
my last film as an actor, The Divorce of
Lady X (1937), Alexander Korda offered
me a job a[...]dustry on an international footing, with a
series of historical dramas that began in
1933 with The Private Life of Henry VIII.
An ambitious entrepreneur, Korda rais[...]unds to build Denham
Studios, which were then one of the biggest
in Europe.

“I got rapid promotion,” Gilbert
remembers. “By the age of nineteen, I was
a first assistant director. Then[...]hley, Frank Capra and William WyIer."

At the end of the war, Gilbert found work
directing commercial[...]dependent producers then.”

Like many directors of his generation,
Gilbert worked on the quota quick[...]cheap British films designed to meet
the letter, if not the spirit, of legislation
aimed at promoting indigenous filmmak[...],
did nevertheless manage to train a genera-
tion of British filmmakers.

"It's difficult these days f[...]ilbert directed Albert RN, the
first in a series of eight films about the
armed services which extolled the virtues of
heroism and patriotism, but which cul-
minated in the downbeat realism of Opera-

tion Daybreak, a box-office failure in wh[...]d lived
through the war, either on the home front or
in the services. It was natural that I should
gra[...]ial triumph,
however, was a film truly indicative of a later
era, Alfie (1965), produced by his own
co[...]pite such
precedents as the international success of
Tom Jones five years earlier. Studio exec-
utives[...]ert overcame this suggestion (the title
role was, of course, played by Michael
Caine, who shot to star[...]rience a major disappoint-
ment after the release of Alfie. “Paramount
bought my company from me, an[...]e to start, Para-
mount rescinded the permission. So I
handed the project over to Carol Reed, who
subs[...]Award."

This was not the only big disappointment
of the sixties. Three years earlier, Gilbert[...]

“We are shooting fast," she continues:
“an episode every ten working days. So
there is the added challenge of coming up
with five minutes of quality material per day
and making it look as go[...]ing the rushes‘, l‘m happy to say the
quality is there. We even set a record last
episode, of seven minutes 50 seconds in
studio shooting for the day."

What of the future? "My goals are pretty
simple," says Kenny. ‘'I'd like to be in a
position to pick and choose what I work on.
I still don't get as much of that as I would
like. But life's pretty good at t[...]d I feel that I've paid my dues. l‘m a
feminist of my own brand and, when I
chose to follow this lifestyle, I knew it would
be difficult. So there is no point in bitterness
and in dwelling on the har[...]y example, by
getting on with the job to the best of my
ability, not by hitting people on the head
wit[...]it's time we stopped looking at what
women can't do and focus on what they
can do. Sure, some jobs are inappropriate,
but not because of gender. We should be
making films side-by-side a[...]erty, No Bail for the
Judge, it was an adaptation of a thriller by a
retired judge called Henry Cecil,[...]nre made popular by recent successes
like Anatomy of a Murder (1959).

“My star was George Peppard,"[...]de-
pendently,’‘ Gilbert says. “I have seen so
many casualties of the studio system, going
back to the days of Rene Clair, In the case
of Educating Rita, I had bought the play in
a joint[...]letion, and the studio chief
admitted their error of judgement.”

Not Quite Jerusalem was also indepen-
dently financed, but Gilbert concedes that it
is becoming increasingly difficult to raise
finance for films in Britain at present, and is
preparing to shoot Run for Your Wife, an
adaptation of a successful West End stage
farce, as an American film.

His other upcoming project is also
American: a film about Josephine Baker,
the famous singer—dancer of the twenties,
with Diana Ross in the lead. “Bak[...]s working in films. To the superstars,
television is a comedown —— which is
absolute nonsense when you consider the

vast aud[...]s

Front Lines —- High Profiles

The non-hero is back

Scott Glenn, actor

In the eighties, the American cinema, tiring
of blustering, Gene Hackman-like villains,
has evolved a new, pared-down brand of
non-hero: angular, taciturn, powerfully built
and[...]Bronson was
probably the model; but the new batch of
non-heroes often give the impression of
having, unlike Bronson, a brain. And a lot of
them have been played by Scott Glenn.

Neither ca[...]r
between moral poles. In Urban Cowboy
(1980), he is the ex-con who moves in on
Gi|ley's bar, masters[...]ebra
Winger. He may be a real sonofabitch, but
he is so much more interesting to watch
than John Travolta[...]) goes to
Kevin Kline, a much cuddlier gunman, it is
Glenn who seems most in tune with the film,
fitt[...]anyone
who has seen these films that Scott Glenn is
an ex-Marine. A few minutes’ conversation,
however, and the notion of a Iatterday Alan
Ladd begins to fade: Glenn is also an
English graduate from a top East Coast uni-
versity (William and Mary, in Virginia), a life
member of Lee Strasberg's Actors Studio,
a man with fourteen years of stage experi-

ence behind him, and a friend of Sam
Shepard's (whom he considers “without
any question the finest American playwright
alive, if not the finest playwright alive any-
where").

It[...]ersonal Best
(1982); Glaeken Trismegistus, a kind of
supernatural Lone Ranger in Michael
(Miami Vice)[...]Stuff
(1983). j I I

But choice has something to doof my experi-
ence, when I read a script. It happens
before my heart or my mind do anything: it
comes from my solar plexus. What is it that
makes your foot start moving when you
hear a piece of music, or makes you sali-
vate when you walk into a kitchen[...]this to
happen, though it obviously wasn't always
so. Though his movie career dates back to
1972 (a sm[...]soldier who followed Ronee
Blakley around — it is only since
Apocalypse Now (1979), in which he
pla[...]Colby, that he has felt really
sure about what he is doing.

"As an actor, one of the things that
happened to me in Apocalypse is, I got
confidence. When I went over there, my li[...]just scratching

around, being rejected by a lot of casting
people in television. After every rejection, I
would pretend that it didnt mean anything
to me. But I'd always feel, ‘God, what did I
do wrong?’ And then, after working with
Francis an[...]e me; and I swore that would never
happen again." So now, the family travels
with him.

The only time[...]couldn't stay on that one: I left."
But that kind of immersion is, Glenn feels,
the only way to work. ‘‘It soun[...]re
all surrounded by teachers, and all we have
to do is keep ourselves open to the fact and
we'll learn.[...]ivard either, says his wife. He developed
a habit of checking out every restaurant
they went into for possible sources of
danger, quick escape routes and instant
cover.

“A|so," admits Glenn, “I have, for good
or bad, an atavistic interest in and appetite
for we[...], 1982). ‘‘It came and went.
It was the story of an American and a
Japanese who adopt each other a[...]to
a martial arts film."

Glenn's taste for guns is also presumably
well served by Silverado, in which his
Emmett is pretty handy wrth a social
weapon. But the idea of the film as a revival
of the western doesn't really appeal to him,

“It seems to me that, if a film is good and
exciting and it makes you laugh and cry,[...]se it was an original. But, after it,
every three or four years, there were about
a hundred copies, and all of them went into
the toilet financially.

“You t[...]show people
something they've never seen before, or
you lose them emotionally."

Nick Roddfck[...]

His politics are simple, direct and
conse[...]But neither
money, time nor fame have robbed
him of his sense of humour, his funda-
mental decency, or his consideration
for others. It’s as if his Jefferson
Smith in Frank Capra’s Mr Smith
G[...]go, had stepped down from the
screen to remind us of the virtues of
simpler days. No wonder John Ford
once said: “People just seem to like
him”.

He epitomizes, as did so many of
Capra’s films, the idealized home-spun
qualities of the small-town America
into which he was born (Indiana,
Pennsylvania, on 20 May 1908): do
your duty, and do the job in hand to
the best of your ability. It was typical
of him that, even at this age, he should
come out of retirement to stomp the
publicity trail for the re-issue of one of
his biggest hits from the fifties, The

14 — Ja[...]t
he couldn’t have done it for a better
example of his work than this rather
flabby biopic of the Swing Era
band leader who disappeared over th[...]But at least it
provided the opportunity to talk of
other things: Alfred Hitchcock,
Ronald Reagan, Lo[...]m),
his favourite bad notice, his favourite
movie of all those he has made, how he
feels about today’s world, and what
his life is like now. As always, his sense
of humour and of what was fitting was
never far from the surface.

Like so many of the early stars, he
began on the stage, joining J[...]," he says
good-naturedly, “and I got one which
is my favourite. I was in a play in New
York and I played the part of an Aus-
trian Count, so you know I needed the
money. This was in ’33, f[...]It was a very pleasant
thing: I robbed my brother of all the
money in his bank and I’m going to

Fro[...]lish, to the present, when his distinctive, back-
of-the-palate mid-Western drawl has become a part of every
night-club impressionist’s repertoire, James Stewart is a kind
of one-man history of Hollywood. More than just a star,
Stewart is an American institution. As patriotically

immutable as Mount Rushmore, he has made his mark in
every kind of film, from college-kid musicals in the thirties,[...]gh the play like a
befuddled tourist on the banks of the
Danube’.

“This worried me,” he continu[...]ork
who was good at voice lessons and
everything, so I went to her and said,
‘Would it be possible for you to give
me a slight accent so that it suggests a
little of the Austrian? I don’t want to
go further than t[...]effect — ‘I can’t teach you
an accent, but if you ever want to learn
to speak English correctly[...]her name,
and she was around for a long time.”

So was Stewart, but elsewhere. Not
long after, and w[...]at MGM. The contract
system, though it was a form of legal
slavery which enabled the studios to
keep a[...]encer Tracy’s The
Murder Man in 1935.

“I was so busy acting I never really
thought about it. You worked every

day of the week, and when they
handed you a script and said, ‘You’re
going to do this, day after tomorrow’,
you did it. You didn’t say that you
didn’t like the quality of the part,” he
adds wryly. “But I was very for[...]at Univer-
sal with Margaret Sullavan, the
remake of Seventh Heaven (1937) for
Fox, Vivacious Lady (19[...]be they did it because they
didn’t know what to do with me and
got some pretty good deals,” he say[...]began to get things
right for Stewart at the end of the
decade. He made two movies with his
ol[...]

again to

promote the re-release of The Glenn Miller story

(1953), Ray Comiskey talk[...]e repercussions to his studio
contract at MGM. “If you read
between the lines of the contract,” he
says, “there was a law that, if for any
reason you turned down a picture and
you[...]en, when I went
into the army — I never thought of it,
luckily, but I was in the army almost
five ye[...]sued them and won, and that
phrase was taken out of the contract.
My contract ran out the second year I
was in the army, so when I came out I
was a free agent, and my agent sort of
advised me to stay independent
because, looking back, I think he had a
feeling that the days of the major
studio may have been numbered.”

What Stewart omits to say is that he
was among the first of the top Holly-
wood stars to enlist. He volunteered,
because of previous flying experience
— planes were a great hobby of his
—for the US Air Force, but was turned
down[...]under-weight for his height. By going
on an orgy of eating, he was finally
accepted in March 1941, ni[...]g their craft, and shielded them
from the agonies of choice. How did
someone like Stewart, who had simply
done what he was told, cope with the
business of selecting roles for himself
after the war?

“I[...]I knew at MGM and the other
studios. It was sort of a combination. I
never felt that I did the thing[...]ad it and I’ll
decide’, you know. It was sort of
almost like taking a vote.” Being inde-
pendent[...]with Frank Capra in
1947. “I had done a couple of success-
ful pictures with Capra, and he had
been[...]g the
war, about the reason we were fighting

and so on” — a reference to Capra’s

acclaimed Army documentary series,
Why We Fight, the first of which,

Prelude to War, won the Best
Documentary Oscar in 1942. “And I
think maybe I had sort of an advan-
tage there because of Mr Smith, which
I did the year before we started[...]n businessman —
honest, but facing ruin because of
local finagling — who contemplates
suicide until a white-haired Henry
Travers — one of Hollywood’s more
unlikely angels —- is sent from heaven
to show him how much worse off t[...]red well with modern
critics. Why does he like it so much?

“Well, it’s a lot of things,” he says
slowly, “thinking back: the[...]the way it was developed.
It wasn’t from a play or a book. It
wasn’t from an actual happening.
Aft[...]ter, and it just said,
‘Remember, Frank, no one is born to
be a failure’. And then, in another
let[...]A life in the movies: left, James Stewart as
he is now; above, with Eleanor Powell in
1936’: Born to Dance.

else, and he said, ‘No one is poor who
has friends’.

“Frank took these two[...]wonderful writers, and
said, ‘See what you can do to make a
picture about this’. They were
deligh[...]ee weeks
they had a first draft between the three
of them, because Frank helped them. I
think maybe this is the reason I like it,
because this is pure movie, you know.
This is not born from anything. This is
pure creation.”

He would seem to be mor[...]

Was not this much mor[...],
and walls and furniture specially con-
structed so that they could be moved
out of the way of the cameras?

“We just did it as he told us,”[...]a.
Uh, maybe he couldn’t get

UP

line, because of those long takes — not
ten minutes, but about 920 feet ofso they wouldn’t make
any noise, and the sound peo[...]u can’t make it; it sounds just
exactly like it is — a wall moving on
rubber wheels’. It didn’t bother Hitch-
cock. He said: ‘We’ll do the first take
for the camera, and take all the m[...]did it for sound. And there were only
about five or six places where we had
to re—dub, because of timing and every-
thing. We’d done it so much that we’d
almost unconsciously gotten so that
every line was repeated exactly the
same.”

But Rope, surely, was the epitome
of “getting sort of psychological about
it”? He looks at me unblink[...]them five bucks to come in,
because the movement of the camera
and the walls and everything was much[...]propen-
sity for practical jokes? “What he’d
do on the movie was just work. His
practical jokes w[...]itch said, ‘Would anybody like
hors d’oeuvres or anything to eat?’
And we all said no. And then[...]ome?’ And we said yes.”

Stewart was also one of the first of
the major stars to say yes to something
else. With Hollywood in the grip of its
long, postwar box-office traumas, he
negotiat[...]he worked for a smaller
salary, plus a percentage of the profits.
It was a path soon followed by other[...]lenn Miller
Story alone. No doubt it was only one
of several factors contributing to the
eventual demise of the studio system,
but it confirmed the prescience of his
agent, who, in the mid—forties, saw
that the heyday of the big studios was
coming to a close.

Would he,[...]s, like to see
the big studios come back? “That is
the real way to make movies,” he says

warmly. “But I think the idea of the
major studio coming back is impos-
sible from a cost point of view. The
expense of having dozens ofdo think that
some kind of concentration of talent,
like Chaplin, Fairbanks, Pickford and
Gri[...]pielberg, for instance: I wouldn’t be
surprised if he got a studio together.
Everybody said when tel[...]es tack
again. Had he ever hankered after the
job of President, or is that only for
second-rate actors? The answer come[...]t into politics. When
he was running for Governor of Cali-
fornia, I went with Ronnie Reagan on
the tr[...]How does he
feel about the Hollywood pheno-
menon of children writing nasty books
about their famous p[...]s caring? “I think you have certainly
named all of the problems that we
have. The violence is terrorism. I think
it’s a tremendous problem all over the
world. I don’t know what it is,_or
whether us human beings are starting
to show our real colours, but I think
it’s something that is very disturbing
for everybody. It isn’t the idea of
accusing different people: it’s
happening to all of us. You know, it’s
amazing: in the last couple of years
I’ve been getting more fan mail from
kids[...]the 50 years I’ve been in the
business, and all of them sort of dwell
on this fact: that they’re in trouble,
that there’s too much violence, that
they’re sick of the violence on tele-
vision.And they lots of times pick out
It’s A Wonderful Life —— that it’s sort
of anti-that.”

It seems the star’s homespun appeal,
redolent of stability and moral cer-
tainty, and his values f[...]her and write a book,
Poppa Dearest?’ ”

mood of America today. But is there
not a paradox there? He himself took
part in one of the worst wars that ever
happened. Does he have any under-
standing of what he went into then, or
was it simply out of his love of flying?
“I just looked on it that I was asked to
serve my country, and I felt it would be
my duty to do so. And I still feel that
way about it. I felt that[...]y own
son. He graduated from college at the
start of Vietnam. He didn’t want the
draft: he enlisted.[...]get to be good at
his job, and then, on the field of
battle, to behave himself in a gallant
manner. You can’t say that’s a tragedy
—- a loss. We think of him every day —
but not a tragedy. He served hi[...]d genuinely
surprised at the thought. “No. This is
an odd number, 77. What is 77?
Sounds like a soft drink or something.
No, I’m going to wait for 80,[...]

Kathleen Tu instant K
began her Rio : ’ the mean streets ii!
.. and u[...]ncing .

?<i'Lzi's HONOR. »

Critifs will
Turner ha

stori. lri PRIZZJ S HON , iiielicu Huston plays[...]uiidaughtpr at the don
a '.'€V1Q€U¥lC€ It is her
" Walk

thi: Luilit and

wronged woman who ge[...]er in a
Aniencan cinerna'5
r. DLSYIIICIILQ in

He is among

regarded directors. I-.<.tir.g armng his crc
Treasure of the Sierra Madre" Itor -chi:
Academy Award[...]

when yo[...]lead role in the new Australian movie Rebel, she is

Debbie Byrne is in town for the day
and Melbourne’s media has b[...]ne in the room jangles persistently
as a reminder of the radio stations,
waiting their turn in line for radio
interviews. Then there are the TV
crews, not so patiently standing by to
set up the lights for their place on the
agenda.

At the centre of the activity, Byrne
appears happily, even vibrantly, at
ease. Alternating booster shots of
coffee with a supply of cigarettes, she
seems to be in her element. It’s
Monday, the day after her only time
off from the rigours of the stage
musical, Cats, and she had flown into
town at ten o’clock the previous night,
with a full day of interviews to smile,
chat and ponder through befo[...]lla’s costume for the night’s
performance. It is a daunting schedule,
but for this actress/singer/dancer,
gruelling schedules have been a fact of
life since the age of twelve. For one of
the original members of the Young
Talent Team, this is par for the course.

One sixth of the founding Young
Talent Team brigade, Byrne is effec-
tively the only one over its consider-
able number of years and teamsters to
graduate to a buoyant adul[...]. Reflecting on her early
days with the Team, she is convinced
of their importance to her current suc-
cesses. “The only thing I’ve canned
about Young Talent Time is that it
stuck for so long,” she says. “The
actual experience was p[...]Byrne as
Kathy, on stage at theArr Raid Club, one of
the main sets in Rebel.

of the discipline involved. A lot of
people don’t realize: we worked
bloody hard on[...]doing. I knew what
a director was talking about. So all I

“I’m sure there are a lot
of people in the public
eye who have stuffed up
as m[...]fore they
became public figures,
whereas I had to do it all
the way through”

had to worry about was[...]her current status as a 28-year-old
single mother of two has had its
highly-publicized rocky periods for
Byrne, who is disarmingly forth-
coming for someone who has been
repeatedly bruised by the prying of the
media.

“From the age of twelve, I’ve grown
up in public," she says. “I’m sure
there are a lot of people in the public
eye who have stuffed up as m[...]the difference between the one-camera discretion of a
film set, and the multi-camera intrusions of television.

became public figures, whereas I had
to do it all the way through. All I was
doing was growi[...]he extent that
she can rightly be regarded as one of
the country’s most accomplished
female performe[...]ng television shows, sung
her way to the ‘Queen of Pop’ crown,
earned acclaim on the stage for Cat[...]eature debut in
Rebel.

And, though the diversity is admir-
able — maybe even unique — in Aus-
tralia, it appears more the product of
spontaneous than premeditated
decision-making. “I didn’t say, ‘Oh,
now I want to do theatre’. I never said
that. I said, ‘Now I want to be Grizza-
bella’. It was the role. If I hadn’t
gotten that role, I wouldn’t have gone
for another part in Cats. And I
wouldn’t do Charlie Girl, because
there’s nothing in it for me.”

The role of showgirl Kathy McLeod
in Rebel, originally intend[...]y it,” she says. “Rebel
gave me the chance to do things that
I’d worked at doing for a long time[...]— Ross Coleman, Michael
Jenkins, Roger Kirk — so I felt secure.
I would have been crazy to knock back
an opportunity like that.”

The role of the leading light at the
Air Raid Club — an oas[...]itated Byrne’s
participation in the development of the
film from its early stages. “I was
involved[...]s before shooting,” she
recalls. “I saw a lot of growth and a lot
of changes.” One change was Kathy’s
occupation,[...]anything wrong with
that, because the basic story is still
there.”

Roger Kirk’s costume design wa[...]l, I was wearing cotton period

“In film, there is one
camera and it’s incredibly
silent. You can[...]ety performer to
actress, was an intensive series of
acting and voice classes. “I worked
with[...]

It seems that Emanu[...]Byrne’s talent — made primarily on
the basis of the passion that she can
invest in her songs —[...]n an effortless

“Matt wasn’t on home
ground, so it was
probably more difficult for
him than it wa[...]oncedes, “but
not seriously. I didn’t want to do Cop
Shop. I’d spent years on TV and I was
reall[...]fidence from the
familiar, while offering a range of new
challenges. “Working on a film is just
as grinding — the schedule is as grind-
ing — but film is more subtle than tele-
vision. I guess that, working with a
cameraman, a film cameraman, is far
different from working with video.
The way they shoot film is so exposing:
they can see you so much closer. It’s
like the cameraman is literally in the
scene with you.”

Though Byrne concedes that her TV
experience is confined to variety work,
her summation of the performer’s rela-
tionship to the studio camera is reveal-
ing. “The camera is a domineering
figure,” she asserts. “It’s t[...]hese lights that blink at
you, and there are four of them on the
set. If you’re working at the Channel 9
studios, you’[...]you. It’s not
sensitive to you. In film, there is one
camera and it’s incredibly silent. When
you are performing in front of some-
thing like a Louma crane, you’re not
aware of it at all. And you don’t have
to look at the bl[...]rever you think your eyeline
should naturally go, or where your
eyeline has been directed to, rather
t[...]. It was a situation that
could either intimidate or validate a
fledgling actress and, not surprisingl[...]PAPERS

blew my lines. I knew my work very
well. If you’re nervous or feel insecure
about something, then you do your
homework very thoroughly, because
you need a[...]ble
in what you’re doing. You make sure
nothing is going to throw you.”

In some ways, Byrne’s familiarity
with a number of the crew members
and Dillon’s inevitable status[...]private jokes.
But Matt wasn’t on home ground, so it
was probably more difficult for him
than it wa[...]ven though he was
more experienced in film. A lot of
people were very warm towards him,
and I’m sure[...]acking. I experienced it
when I went to London to do The Cliff
Richard Show. It was the first time in[...]acting debut.

While Dillon was cast in the role of
the outsider, Byrne readily embraced
Kathy’s position as one of the girls in
the Air Raid Club troupe, particular[...]y be
described as a thoroughly exuberant
smashing of a type-cast mould. “Julie
is great,” Byrne comments, “she’s
very intelli[...]b. She’s a very funny lady:
Rebel showed a side of Julie that
people haven’t utilized. She’s a real
comic, and she plays the little tart so
well! You’re not disgusted by Joycie:
you forgi[...]child-
hood in order to describe the sensa-
tions of acting, in a manner that might
alarm those devote[...]you
need it to be real. In that way, it was a
lot of fun, because you get to test your-
self, to see w[...]y refusing to be drawn into
any neat descriptions of easy or diffi-
cult scenes, Byrne recalls one fairly
inno[...]that became taxing
for reasons that have more to do with
spirit than lack of it. “lt’s the one
where Matt and I are being[...]and
pushes me against a wall. We did that
for two or three hours. I guess I got
pushed around for fift[...]shows it on
stage. That's where she

gets off”

so repetitious. It wasn’t a terribly
dramatic thin[...], but I started to feel
like I wanted to come out of character
and hit back. There were moments
there[...]racter at all.”

Byrne chuckles at the prospect of
Kathy slugging back, subsequently
noting that the[...]ine may not have resorted to a
violent exhibition of her feelings, but
used the stage as an emotional[...]with many necessary dramatic
ironies in film, it is the most cautious
character who lands in the most[...]hat freaks her out. It’s like,
‘Hang on, this is not supposed to go so
wrong. I was being so cautious and
wonderful!’ ”

For Debbie Byrne,[...]e prepares for the
next interview — another cup of coffee
and another cigarette —— she happily
declares that she has no plans for
future projects, or even a well-earned
rest after her stint in Cats c[...]rest better when I’m
working. I can relax more if I’ve only
got two days off a week. I’l1 relax more
than if I have three weeks. I just get
very fidgety and n[...]ebel in the States . . .” And the
ominous signs of a working holiday
begin to appear. «k

FILM ROBOTS OF THE FUTURE
HAVE ARRIVED AT FILMWEST!

With the versatile KEM K800 you can easily transfer
16 mm or 35 mm film to video or lay sound direct
to your video pictures.

THE
NEWXTR

FROM AATON

FROM L _ THE PORTABLE CAMRAIL is simple to handle, easy to assemble and despite

its light weight is very tough. It can be put upside down to[...]

The stage play, No Names . . . No
Packdrill, first came to the attention of
Rebel’s producer, Phillip Emanuel, at
its premiere in 1980. It is a sardonically
comic view of life in wartime: a young,
recently married woman[...]known
only as Rebel, whose nightmarish
experience of the war has led him to
become a deserter. Between[...]y motive for helping
them counterpoints the theme of
suffering. The eventual resolution
hinges on -the values of loyalty,
political allegiance and, ultimately,
se[...]tradition
that a culprit would not be identified
or punished so long as he returned
something he had stolen.

To come to Rebel, the film, from
Rebel, the play, is peculiar: Kathy, a
mail-sorter in the play, is now a singer
in an all-girl band; the claustropho[...]nd
expansive exteriors; and the realistic
setting of Kings Cross in 1942 has been
transformed into a s[...]m
concerned, you can never
go far enough”

kind of story. Whereas film adapta-
tions of plays like Insignificance and
Come Back to the 5[...]reproduced their theatrical form,
Rebel’s shape is that of the Hollywood
backstage musical.

Such, it would seem, is the sort of
film that the producers originally
envisaged. Wha[...]his own right, his consistent style
makes him one of Australia’s most
inventive and innovative desig[...]to a location and says, ‘Right, we
will get rid of that wall there. We will
paint the whole place, c[...]was that the director
wanted to use long lenses, so that he
could place the camera a long way

“Mat[...]t we were doing”

back. After looking at Scales of
Justice, which Jenkins directed in
1983, Thomson[...]n Silver
City,” he says, “and brought in lots of
photos of Nissen huts. And I suddenly
thought, ‘That’s what we should do:
maybe throw up a temporary structure
for the nig[...]n that way. There were
seven openings in the side of that
building. I was thinking of seven-letter
words to fit into the facade, and
suddenly thought of ‘Victory’. I set it
up on a model, showed it[...]ulous. It took
till about then before we’d kind of
collided, in terms of my being given a
free rein. That was the beginning of
the whole style and look of the film.

“Michael was incredibly supportive,[...]ile under-
mined what we were doing. But,
because of our director, we won the
day. It was just like th[...]rs earlier,
when people would say, ‘You can’t do
that!’ and I’d say, ‘Why not?’ ”

Thoms[...]bel not be a tradi-
tional period film. Whilst it is
grounded in a tangible historical
reality, the fi[...]ake its most poignant and
brilliant effects. Many of the sets are
littered with junk, reflecting the
carriage and waste of the 1942 war
effort. It should be remembered, too[...]In the film, the bustling and
overcrowded streets of Sydney are a

CINEMA PAPERS January -— 23

* * W K in
The Untold Story

For 4 weeks the staff of Cinevex saw so many camels, they
felt like part of the Wills and Bourke expedition without

even lea[...]through yet again.

At Cinevex everything we can is our best.

CINEVEX FILM LABORATORIES
15-17 Gordon[...]r ENG/Film Fluid Head
Systems take the gamble
out of camera support.
Lightweight, easy to set
up, quic[...]ag.
Sachtler
virtuosity
in design and
performance
is matched
with unrivalled
durability and reliabilit[...]\.

unbeatable. A comprehensive
range of accessories completes j
the picture. The Sachtler range
of fluid heads caters for all

budgets and requirements-
so if you want to get ahead,
get a Sachtler![...]

The most striking aspect of the
film’s design is the Air-Raid Club,
which is where all the musical numbers
take place. It is a corrugated-iron con-
struction, painted in vivid reds, and
cluttered with neon, bombs made of
glass and lead suspended from the
roof, a makeshi[...]hey prize. That world
in Rebel hopefully had bits of both,”
says Thomson. Throughout the film,
there is a playful juxtaposing of
different technologies — the hi-tech
look of neons in a makeshift environ-
ment — and aesthetic forms. In the
brothel, for instance, there is an
almost audible clash between the
rusted chains[...]ake
people believe that the reality on the
screen is similar to a reality that
they’ve experienced s[...]hions.

Also remarkable about the film’s
design is its combination of form and
function. Inside Kathy’s apartment, a
model of the Sydney Harbour Bridge
serves as a room divider, while on the
mantel stands Luna Park. One of the
massive billboards that line Victory
Street h[...]Australia: Fight
for it!” under a huge picture of the
Harbour Bridge. This “graphic,
theatrical r[...]as Thomson
calls it, replaces the need for a view of
Sydney, while still adequately locating
the film.

As in Michael J enkins’s best-known
work, Scales of Justice, Rebel takes
place in an identifiable, ye[...]ame real to us on the set.”

When Thomson talks of the
“aesthetic fertilization” of film and
theatre, he is talking both autobio-
graphically and of his approach to
Rebel. In 1983, he directed a short
film, Night of Shadows; photographed
by Russell Boyd, it used de[...]tting, to move to a different
‘position’. One of his favourite
moments in film is in One From the
Heart, when Frederic Forrest is re-
united with Terri Garr, and the dim

The boys[...]he sits comes up
full. “In the theatre, we make audi-
ences believe that what’s taking place
is where they are told it is.,In Rebel, I
wanted it to feel, not just that you[...]involved.

“We chose the colour red for what it
is: it’s passion, anger. . .The interest-
ing thing is that Bob Herbert’s stage
directions for the play actually say that
it takes place at ‘the red end of the
experiential spectrum’. That doesn’t
mean[...]in-
credibly drab and, I mean, why bother
. . .? If you want the turbulence, ifof red in the film. “Because it is
such a strong colour, it begins to take
over. It[...]over into props
and costumes . . . Tl1at’s kind of
passing the buck, but I don’t mean it
like that.”

Peter James, too, is aware of the
difficulty of red: it’s hard to expose
and can easily over-sa[...]and backlighting
create a very evocative effect; or one of
Thomson’s favourite images: Ray
Barrett sitting[...]old, whilst a red ring
falls around him.

The use of long lenses, Louma crane
and steadicam has also g[...]ormat-
“:even though,” says Thomson, “a lot
of it is out of focus, a lot is purely
texture. One of the first shots we
filmed was looking down past[...]ic, because you
were looking at nearly 400 metres of
detail, but all flattened out on the
screen in the most wonderful way.”
Interestingly, for reasons of budget,
only a small set could be constructed
for[...]arguably the weakest in the film.

As a director of music clips (he’d
just returned from filming Apollonia
6) and designer of stage musicals
(Jesus Christ Superstar, Chicago) and
opera, Thomson is acutely aware of

“Bob Herbert’s stage
directions for the play
actually say that it takes
place at ‘the red and of
the spectrum’ ”

the connection between musical com-
position and design. “I don’t believe
you can do a musical film without the
musical numbers worked[...]suggestions for Rebel. “I
thought the only way of making the
song ‘Don’t Sweetheart Me’ work[...]rett in a frock.”(It’s
worth noting that this is the song
where the girls are dressed in military[...]roles were a
bit too ‘good’: like in Cabaret, audi-
ences want to know that ‘heroes’ are
also vu[...]a Film,
whenever that might be, he wants the
end of Rebel to be the starting point.
That means[...]

There is an easy equation that English-
speaking filmgoers tend to make: if a
film is subtitled, it’s an art movie; if
it’s in English, it’s commercial — or at
any rate commercially intended. This
makes life a little difficult for the
producers of over half the world’s
films; if they are to have any chance of
a release onto the lucrative English-
speaking market (mainly, of course,
the United States), they have two basic
options: dub, or accept defeat. If they
do get a subtitled release, then their
film, whether it’s about two people
discussing theology in a room, or two
thousand people re-enacting the
Trojan War to a full orchestral score,
is likely to end up in an art house.

Dutch director[...]released in Australia
by Roadshow towards the end of
November with a combination of
discretion (its explicit violence meant it
was gi[...]), his
sixth film, De vierde man (The Fourth
Man) is scheduled for a more limited,
art—house release just after Christmas,
through Newvision.

They are, of course, quite different
films: Flesh and Blood is set in the six-
teenth century (“a medieval Wes[...]PAPERS

Verhoeven calls it), while The Fourth
Man is firmly modern, set in the Dutch
seaside resort of Vlissingen (Flushing
in the history books) in the off-season.
It is Dutch-made (and subtitled); Flesh
and Blood is English—speaking, made
in Spain and largely financed by
Orion. But the two films do share a
few things: murder and disfigurement,
a strong sense of the occult, a fair
amount of quite explicit sex (or they
did in their original versions), an
evident desire to shock, and as strong a
sense of style as there is to be found in
the work of any number of directors
with ten times Verhoeven’s reputation.

Paul Verhoeven is not a discreet
man. Nor would anyone who has seen
either of the above—mentioned films —
or such earlier Verhoeven movies as
Turks fruit (Turkish Delight, 1972) or
Spetters (1980) — expect him to be. In
conversation,he is given to illustrating
general points by referring[...]en extremely intimate
personal experience, and to do so at
the sort of voice-level one associates
with garrulous drunks who sit next to
you on trams. He is also outspoken
about the reaction his films have[...]few hackles.
The Fourth Man has caused its share
of offence (as well as picking up
prizes). And, in H[...]cluding cinematographer Jan De Borzt, on
the set of Flesh and Blood.

organization was set up to combat the
harmful influence of Spetters — which
was, of course, doing very well at the
box office, or the Anti-Spetters League
would not have bothered.

But it would be as much of a mistake
to confuse the very direct way
Verhoeve[...]would be not
to look beneath the violent surface of
his films. Spetters, for example, the
film to wh[...]its
US and its British release, means
‘splashes of grease’, and refers (in
addition to being metap[...]ood stall run by the heroine
(Renee Soutendijk)—is a very serious
film about the schizophrenic state of
modern Holland, caught between an
innate puritanism and a headlong
embrace of the new. It is as honest a
picture of disaffected youth as Les 400
coups (The 400 Blows) or Rebel
Without A Cause. On the surface,
though, Spetters is a bikie pic, full of
people fighting, fucking and having
spectacular smash—ups. Such things
tend to get in the way of serious critical
consideration.

Coming from a country where it is
comparatively easy to make films but
very hard in[...]Verhoeven began his big-screen career
at the end of the sixties, after working
in television, “I di[...]her
young filmmakers at the time who had
done one or two feature films — very
arty ones but, from the point of view
of money (which producers are inter-
ested in) not v[...]n.
Rob hadn’t, because he was living in
Munich. So, she introduced me to him,
and he produced my first film, Wat
zien ik? It was called Business is
Business in the United States. It’s a
kind of comedy, but not interesting -
not something to be proud of. I hated
the subject, because I didn’t see how
you could do a film about it.” The
subject, in keeping with[...]s-
titution in Amsterdam.

The commercial success of the film,
however, and that of his next three
features — Turkish Delight, Keet[...]Soldaat ‘van Oranje
(variously known as Soldier of Orange
and Survival Run, 1977) — established
Ve[...]ably the only
‘commercial’ Dutch director. It is a
label from which he does not shy
away. “Mostly,” he says, “I prefer to
doof films I wanted to make lay
between David Lean and[...]nd the editing and
the whole thing: I’d like to do films
like Lawrence of Arabia. But I could
never do that in Holland!

“Because you’re influenced[...]a completely different person, and my
background is Dutch. In Holland,
there has always been this tendency to
be realistic, though they hate to admit
it. If you look at Italian paintings from
the seventeent[...]see someone pissing in the
background. But in one of Brueghel’s
most important paintings, ‘The
Prodigal Son’, there is a small panel
with a whorehouse, and a man is
coming out and pissing against the
wall. I’m st[...]se that scene in
his picture?

“I suppose there is a kind of tension
in me, a will to do these things. As a
child, I always wanted to shock: that
kind of feeling is very fundamental to
me, I think. When all the oth[...]e playing with a ball, the
only thing I wanted to do was take the
ball and throw it in the water. That
was my game. I thought it was fun,
because everybody was so interested in
their game, and I wanted to disrupt[...]unch and say, ‘Look that way!’ ”

The kinds of films Verhoeven has
wanted to make — and has ma[...]ment.
And, in a country where a fair propor-
tion of every feature’s budget comes,
of necessity, from government funds,
being an enfant[...]very time. In the end, I shot my
original script, of course, but it’s really
«terrible that you hav[...]st successful films in Holland
over the past five or six years. And
again, they said, ‘No, co[...]

Ironically, Th[...]spite all its outrageous
scenes — including one of homosexual
fellatio in a mausoleum, with the
pass[...]n’t find this
strange at all. “The Fourth Man is
stylized in obvious ways, and every-
body sees it as arty or whatever — the
photography, the camera movements.
So the critics liked the film. That’s the
whole th[...]s losing all vitality. The
whole cultural luggage of Europe is on
our shoulders, and it’s pushing us
down.”

A lack of vitality is not the charge
one would make against The Fourth[...]its heavily Chiaroscuro lighting and its
moments of outrageous symbolism.
Based on a bestselling novel by an
author with marked right-wing
tendencies, it is the overheated tale of a
writer (Jeroen Krabbe — the slob,
Sandor, in[...]poetry reading, and
becomes caught up in a number of
interlocking sexual and occult occur-
rences, which are centred round the
mysterious patron of a beauty parlour
(Renee Soutendijk), who has somehow
presided “over the death of her three
previous lovers. Gerard, the writer, is
obviously lining up as No. 4. There is
also a beautiful young man, Herman
(Thorn Hoffman[...]Reve) hopes to seduce via the

beautician.
Gerard is, of course, homosexual,

but he managed to get it on[...]o Verhoeven.
“Gerard’s a writer. He has a lot of
imagination: he’s looking at the mirror
behind her, and her back is just a back.
It has no breasts, so he can project a
male image. It’s a strange sit[...]g. I
don’t consider sex the main thing in
life, of course, but it’s a real possibility
for express[...]ys amazed that people fucking
each other in films is so completely
boring.” To remove all traces of
boredom from the film, Gerard cele-
brates orgasm with a cry of “Through
Mary to Jesus!”

The other important[...]ects are produced by the
unstressed juxtaposition of elements
one would not expect to find in the
same[...]tie
together the loose ends was the direct
cause of a number of critics dismissing
Spetters. “What we wanted to do,” he
says, “was indicate moments — not
give[...]ind them, but just say ‘Pak! Pak!
Pak! There it is!’ If you’re interested,
you can find out what’s behind it. If
you think it’s superficial, just take it as

su[...]Man, the occult
scenes — basically premonitions of

disaster — are treated in the same way:
they are as much a part of the film as
the more obviously ‘realistic’ se[...]s,”
says Verhoeven. “He has some tele-
pathic or prophetic powers: that’s a
normal thing. I accept that a guy has
some ideas of the future, although I
think these things are sti[...]ion between
medieval superstition and the advance
of medical science, with an abruptly
contradictory stress on mystical
powers, like that endowed on the
statue of St Martin by the central char-
acter, a soldier of fortune also called
Martin, and played by Rutger Hauer.
Flesh and Blood is a project that
Verhoeven and his regular writer,[...]s
Verslijs, who was executive producer
on Soldier of Orange and Spetters.
These three people have been[...]serial, which was also
medieval, but in the form of family
entertainment. Then, in 1980, after
Spette[...]n outline at the time. The Ladd
Company wanted to do it, so they gave
us the money to write the script. We
wo[...]more than a
year, but finally they decided not to do
it. So, I’d already lost a whole year.
Then it was wit[...]. And it
was the same thing all over again: a lot
of actors I sent the script to sent it back
saying t[...]al things: I think it’s a very
interesting part of life, and that you
can express a lot of human feelings by
showing how people do it.”

In Flesh and Blood, a multi-national
cast[...]associate, Rutger Hauer, who has
appeared in most of his films and owes
much of his initial fame to a
Verhoeven TV series; Australia’s Jack
Thompson and Tom Burlinson, and a
number of British and Spanish
supporting players — ‘do it’ quite
frequently. But the film is mainly
about the two things that its title
mentions; and, if Verhoeven had diffi-
culties in Holland, Hollywoo[...]ly plain-sailing either. At times
there are signs of the underside of the
greater financial and artistic ‘freedom’[...]ernment committees — beginning
to exert itself: if anything, Flesh and
Blood lacks the freedom of the earlier
films. “You can almost feel the han[...]back,” as a long-time

associate put it. But it is far from the
“slow-moving camera” of the
European art film — even the slow-
moving camera of The Fourth Man —
and it has about it a reckless[...]Verhoeven’s still
unrealized promise as a maker of big
films.

“I still think you have to describe[...]ame problem: they
considered him just as a writer of
thrillers. He refused to write as an
‘artist’[...]t, the less art you
make. Whether Turkish Delight or
Flesh and Blood have something to do
with art, I don’t care. But I care if the
film is still interesting in twenty years
— that, for me, is the only criterion. If
it’s still interesting in ten, twenty,
thirty years, then the film has some
power. It’s part of the culture.

“I think, too, that the chariot r[...]der The
Seventh Seal to be a beautiful film.
But, if I were asked, ‘What do you
consider the better cinematographic
art, the chariot race in Ben Hur or The
Seventh Seal?’, 1 would hesitate a l[...]

of Hammer Films, The House of

Horror — reveals no entry under Med-
dings. Lots of directors, a few actors,
even the occasional writ[...]ot even
Meddings’s mentor, the brilliant father
of British string-and-sealing-wax
effects, Les Bowie.

Film history is slow to admit its
artisans, preferring the more familiar
world of artists, even when dealing
with such works of craft as the
Hammer horror films, for which
Bowie and Meddings provided much
of the horror. “Les was a fantastic
artist,” says Meddings, “and he
always wanted to do all the effects on a
film. If it hadn’t been for Les, the
Hammer films would[...]soon
graduated to other, more ‘modern’
forms of special effects. And the
reason you should know him, if not his
name, is that it was Derek Meddings
who propelled Lady Pen[...]ound miniaturized cities and
through various bits of space in
Thunderbirds, orchestrated encounters
be[...]which he won his
Oscar).

Meddings’s speciality is miniatures,
and his shed at Pinewood is a mixture
of an Aladdin’s cave and a do-it-
yourself nut’s den, where lathes and
precis[...]y limited space with little
rubber frogmen (stars of the Bond
movie), working models of the glaive
used to such great effect everywhere
but at the box office for Krull (1983),
and pictures of reindeer. The reason
for the reindeer is that Meddings has
recently finished work on his b[...]listen that they spent $US50
million. Quite a bit of it was spent by
Derek Meddings.

The most strikin[...]his shed, given the films
on which he has worked, is how
definitely low—tech they both are.
Because Meddings belongs to what one
might call the ‘old guard’ of the special
effects world. Like Les Bowie’s, hi[...]p and moved on to
another picture. “Les was one of the
old school,” explains Meddings, “who
believed in making things out of string
and sealing wax or whatever. And they
worked! We’re still doing a lot of these
things now. I would prefer to do it that
way than get some complicated piece
of machinery which, when it goes
wrong, you take off the back and you
don’t know what the problem is: it’s
all transistors and microchips and god
kn[...]ork because
the elastic band’s broken’.

This is not to suggest that the result
is in any way amateurish — a word
that clearly doe[...]models and miniatures. “I’ve
always tried to do wind—backs in the
camera. That means a little m[...]day.
You at least know then whether it’s
worked or not, and you have a chance
to do it again. I like to have finished a
film knowing[...]it looks great.”

Though nowadays he uses state-of-
the-art equipment like computerized
motion-control cameras — and
winkled one out of the Salkinds, who
didn’t see why he should need one for
Santa if he didn’t for Superman — his
experience was g[...]; I’d been trained as an artist and
I wanted to do matte” —- the painted
glass plates that were placed between
the camera and the set, to add a dimen-
sion or an element that wasn’t really
there. “In thos[...]they used to have a fit
about the cost. Nowadays, of course,
they’ll spend $20,000 on a single

Sant[...]son, Derek Meddings and Derek
Cracknell, in front of the model elf village.

painting; it’s become v[...]ho had to be called in to
save something.”

One of Meddings’s most memorable
set of films — his work with the
pioneer puppet animat[...]e,
but with just as much passion, the
aficionados of Fireball XL5, Four
Feather Falls and Thunderbirds[...]want to get involved in weekend
and evening work, so he just pointed at
me and said, ‘He’ll do it!’ So I’d do
my day job at Shepperton, then grab
my little tin of sandwiches and go
down to Maidenhead and work unt[...]they said, ‘Come and join us: we’re

going to do a big series’. I was there
about ten years, and[...]TV viewers in
Australia will know —- and a lot of
others will remember — Thunderbirds
was characterized by an extraordinary
attention to detail. If someone has to
go from point A to/lpoint B, it’[...]ozen sub-
sidiary sets on the way, just like they
do in real films. “I know, I know,”
says Medding[...]t balmy. It
was a great time for myself and a lot of
these chaps that are now in the
industry in a sim[...]could. I
suppose we had to be young and stupid
to do the sort of work we did. We had
ten days to complete somethin[...]after
one stage and kept an eye on the other
two. If a car went down a road and
over a bump, it was sprung, so it didn’t
jiggle. We went to a lot of trouble with
things like that, to make it as con-
vincing as possible: in lots of ways,
there are few things in that programme
that[...]. But we used to
work like slaves.”

At the end of the ten-year span,
Gerry Anderson wanted to move[...]ooned, with Gregory Peck, won it.
They used a lot of stock footage,

CINEMA PAPERS January — 29

Since his last Bond — For Your Eyes
Onl[...]tion
with the Salkinds, a relationship which
has, so far, lasted for five movies: the
three Supermaus,[...], on which he spent a year
and a half. Discussion of his achieve-
ments is slightly stymied by the fact
that, when we spoke[...]ith a
human audience, not film tech-
nicians.”

If some of the effects are refine-
ments on things he’s d[...]ire Mares in
Krull — a film which counts as one of
his major disappointments. “It’s only
my opin[...]ut ten and, during that
time, Peter Yates had one of them re-
written, and it was very, very good —
there was a lot of excitement and a lot
of humour. But the company putting
up the money decided they liked the
first script, so we went back to it.
Somewhere along the line, the[...]: less an epic than a warm little
film, more full of ‘Aaaahl’ than
‘Ooooh!’ The flying reindee[...]else. And,
when one comes to consider the nature
of the problem — eight reindeer, with
thirty-two f[...]across the
sky and, for afters, to fly under one of
the bridges on New York’s East River
— the re[...]y CINEMA PAPERS

getting away from the normal run of
pictures I make, which are crash-bang-
wallop jobs. This one is supposed to
look pretty and romantic — or fairy-
tale, I suppose. The big problem was
getti[...]nvin-
cingly through the sky. There’s a
mixture of everything in that — real
reindeer, models, full-size models. But
the majority of shots we’ve done as
models, because you couldn’t have
done it any other way: reindeer do not
fly. When I started the picture, I was
very,[...]ng to make it convincing. And, I
need hardly add, so were the director
and the producers. They were ev[...]it.

“You’ve got to make the reindeer
look as if they’re alive. Superman was
alive. And, when yo[...]move their heads, but
you’ve got to get them to do it in a
correct, animal-like manner.”

Under st[...]y,
Meddings will not disclose the precise
details of how he did it. But he used
most of the techniques known to
(special effects) man. Es[...]the
same material that street signs are
made out of. The picture is projected
onto that and, because of the reflective
surface, you get a very, very bright
picture, and a lot of light coming back.
But there’s not enough light from the
projector so, although it puts the
picture over the artists, i[...]kground — on the
screen. When they are in front of it,
they mask that shadow —— but only
when th[...]motion-control camera,
very simply, what happens is, if you’ve
got something that’s supposed to be
flying, it will make a move, and the
camera will also do a movement, and
you get the impression of flight. The
camera will track in and then swing
o[...]ugh the
sleigh has flown towards you and gone
out of picture. But, in actual fact, it
will be in a static position, and part of
the movement will be created by a
motion—controlled arm, which will
make the sleigh turn or bank, but the
forward movement will be created by[...]e start
position and, when you see the two
pieces of film put together, you would
never know it had be[...]ce any more — in my opinion,
anyway: people are so aware now.
They’re all armchair critics. They c[...]watch films on television,
and because television is now so good,
you can’t hang strings and say, ‘Well,[...]ole new camera system called Show-
Scan, Meddings is not interested in
building his own camera equipme[...]that, really,
should I? Probably doing myself out
of a job! But he is a very, very talented
lad, and because his dad is also an
excellent camera mechanic, the two of
them have this love of cameras. For
me, cameras have got to be a tool
to do the job. You mustn’t treat them
like little gods. If you want to hang
them upside down on a piece of string,
you’ve got to be able to do it.”

If there is one real sense of frustra-
tion he does feel, however, it is at the
lack of continuity in the UK, which
affects both work and[...]s, and was all
set to go into the sequel to Winds of
War, called War and Remembrance.
“This was goin[...]lly,

“For me, cameras have
got to be a tool to do the
job. You mustn’t treat
them like little gods. If
you want to hang them
upside down on a piece of
string, you’ve got to be
able to do it”

I did, and for seven weeks I worked on
War[...]g all these shots,
and within three days, my side of it
had been put back one year, so now
I’m out of work. I’m panicking. I
turned down Little Shop of Horrors to
do the Winds of War thing, because
they seemed to be very, very k[...]oject and I’ve just
bought another house . . .! So, as of
this moment, Pmlunemployedl”

The other thing that worries him is
that the motion-control equipment he
persuaded the Salkinds to get for Santa
Claus is lying idle. “It’s all stored
away in a box so[...]ightens
me, because in America, with the
studios, if you can convince them, they
will get all this equ[...]ing films here to be made. I
think it’s because of our expertise —
and also because we’re[...]

The Independent Film Makers’ Fund is a special fund provided by the
State Government t[...]Arts and
administered by Film Victoria. The fund is set up to provide finance for a
limited number of short films of high innovative and creative potential
which will develop the talents and skills of Victorian film makers who can
demonstrate that th[...]onably flexible in its finance arrangements, but is
specifically seeking those film makers working in narrative or documentary
cinema or video who have displayed potential and whose film[...]opportunity to further express their
talents.

It is hoped that films or tapes, financed by the fund, will have some sale[...]eal to a market which includes conventional forms of
exhibition (broadcast TV, film festivals etc.).

The fund is, in the first instance, aimed at developing direc[...]s in other areas (for instance cinemato-
graphers or writers) may apply.

The financial limits of the fund will dictate that the films financed would
normally be expected to be of 30 or 60 minutes duration. It is not intended

that the fund be a low budget first[...]bmit a script, budget and
proposal for financing (if finance other than that provided by the fund is REFERENCES AVAILABLE’

envisaged). EXPERIENCE I[...]rms contact: SOCIAL ISSUES.

Kerrie McGovan, . OF LAWS

‘ Project Officer (Creative and MASTERS[...].B|Nl 255. IIIINIII Bflllill 2[I2li

DISTRIBUTORS OF ASSOTECNICA EQUIPMENT

ASSOTECNICA Scorpio[...]

y --t ,
/ _—_ 'O"\
V ‘.a'«‘ .

K...’

‘t

Today, we are used to the hundreds
of products that accompany any major
movie. In fact,[...]thout seeing a tee-shirt, a
game, some bubble-gum or an E.T.
mask. A popular E.T. toy was one
which ha[...]Lucas who really
seized on the enormous potential of
merchandizing, to the extent that one
could almost argue that his sequels
were really a way of merchandizing the
original Star Wars ad infinitu[...]ed with intergalactic
flotsam and jetsam: models of the
‘Millenium Falcon’, R2-D2s, C3POs,
Wookies and, of course, Darth Vader
masks and light swords. Whate[...]ulded and mass-produced in
plastic, put in a book or on a record,
photographed or postered, chewed,
licked or sucked, was done for Star
Wars on an enormous sca[...]ion.

But, what comes first, the merchan-
dizing or the film? Take the Ewoks —
cute cuddly little[...]s

You ’ve seen the movie, now wear it: some of
the consumer durable: — from Goonies
Band-Aids[...]se- and galaxy-
trained) first appeared in Return of the
Jedi. They were perfectly suited to
merchandizing, so naturally they got
their own movie. Again part of a
series, it was called Caravan of
Courage -—- An Ewok Adventure.
Invent a cute ch[...]e being churned out in
Taiwan and their own movie is in pre-
production.

Other films, like the Star Trek
series, weren’t quite so successful with
their merchandizing. Naturally, suc-
cess with the spin-off depends on the
success of the film, and not all films
are suitable targets[...]oned
on them.

Another thing you need (and plenty
of it) is confidence. A lot of people are
committing a small fortune to your
film. A lot of people will also be
buying expensive licensing ag[...]really
happen on quite such a large scale, but
we do have our merchandizing success
stories. Man From[...]dible suc-
cess story from a merchandizing point-
of-view.

Fred Gaffney of Gaffney Inter-

national Licensing, based in Mel-
bourne, handled the merchandizing of
Snowy River and Phar Lap. He claims
that together[...]in retail sales.
Snowy River cost in the vicinity of
$7 million, with an advertising budget
of $400,000. According to Gaffney,
merchandizing add[...]bishi
used the film in conjunction with a
launch of its new Colt range ofis as important as the right script,
and that getting the licensing right is as
important as getting the film right. In
Australia, however, Gaffney claims
that this side of the film business has
dwindled, and that there is a lack of
co-operation from production com-
panies and producers. Merchandizing
just doesn't have the same sort of
credibility here as it does in the States.
“We[...]able correlation between the top-
grossing films of all time, and the fact
that all, without exceptio[...]o came out. Imagine seeing
the very first ‘book of the film’ or
your first bit of Disney memorabilia. It
wasathrill, it was new,dif[...]g marketing pheno-
menon —— the merchandizing of a city
in the ‘I (heart) NY’ campaign. It has[...]n used for countless other
products, because that is exactly what
New York became: a product that
could be gift-wrapped and carried
away with you.

Sandra Gross of Yoram Gross Films
is involved (via Gaffney) with the mer-
chandizing of Dot and the Kangaroo,
with soft toys, flick-books[...]cass-
ette/ book combination. Like Gaffney,
Gross is adamant that we are not
taking merchandizing seri[...]were there, the Pink Panther was there
and dozens of other characters that
were available for licensin[...]charac-
ters for merchandizing have been
animated or drawn ones, because they
are easily adaptable for[...]d Snoopy. With Dot
and the Kangaroo, Sandra Gross is out
to create a national children’s charac-
ter[...]ling-
ton, have been handling the merchan-
dizing of films such as Return of the
Jedi, Dune, Ghostbusters and most
recently, S[...]i.

Nouveau International, who are
now moving out of the volatile mer-
chandizing area, looked after some
Star Wars products, in the form of
towels, sheets and pillow cases.

Gaffney, who is now in the throes of
merchandizing the latest Bond film as
well as Ra[...]release in three months’ time. But,
by then, it is too late to cast the mer-
chandizing net far enough: an average
lead time is about eighteen months,
which allows time for the creation and
development of various product lines
and plenty of time for the major retail
outlets to order and stock your
products. All of this takes time and
planning, insists Gaffney.

C[...]there isn’t enough effort put
into this aspect of the film industry.
“Investors should demand more of a
film,” he says. “They should find out
what sort of merchandizing is being
planned. If more producers under-
stood merchandizing here, they would
see the benefits of getting involved.”

Perhaps the greatest merchandizer
and packager of all time was Walt
Disney. Mickey Mouse is about as
famous as Coca-Cola and seen in
about as[...]motion-picture. Film merchan-
dizing at its peak is dependent on the
film for survival. When the film is
gone, sales trickle to almost nothing.
There are, of course, exceptions; but,
generally, film merchandizing rides
high on the crest of the wave created
by the film. Once the wave runs out of
energy, you’re left high and dry.
That’s why timing is absolutely vital:
this year’s hot merchandizing property
is next year’s collector’s piece of movie
memorabilia. The Stars Wars tee-shirts
have[...]and worse for wear on top
shelves and at the back of cupboards.
The film gives these products life: it[...]are putting the business onto
‘show business’ is that they should be
consulted as soon as possible[...]ge. They can evaluate the
merchandizing potential of the film
and, if there is something marketable,
they can get to work on it[...]oney and
time (not necessarily in that order). “If
the film’s release is timed well, and it’s
the right property,[...]

El I enclose a cheque made out to “Cin[...]ok”

El Please debit my Bankcard/Mastercard

Ba"k°ar°N°- []lZll:l Ell:l lZllZllZl DEllZlDE]El
Ma[...]al for
location and production office use — and is being published in
conjunction with B.L. Kay Publishing of London, who bring out
the internationally renowne[...]ncluding New Zealand as well as Australia
— and is being distributed internationally by Kay’s. Your listing
— or your advertisement — could be on the desk of every major
film, video and television producer in the world.

The 1986 Production Yearbook is a pocket-sized mine of
information on the Australasian film and video industry, with
names and addresses of all major production companies, rental
and facili[...]lance
professionals.

Forget the phone book: this is the one book you really need!
Order now and get it for $19.95, instead of the cover price of
$25.00.

Surname ..................[...]

It was full of enthusiasm that a team of
independent television journalists left
Paris ear[...]ect that they
would be the ones to bear the brunt of
the only real battle that was to be
waged at Mururoa. In the place of
Greenpeace’s traditional stroppiness,
the might of the entire French state
was used to tip the balance in an
already uneven match between a

handful of ‘non-aligned’ reporters and
a collection of ‘loyalist’ local auth-
orities.

Prior to the[...]ich
had attracted universal attention as a
result of the ‘Rainbow Warrior’
incident, the fledgling[...]phant deal with
Greenpeace for exclusive coverage of
the event, to be filmed from the
vantage point of the protest vessel
(Gamma had also offered a camera-
man for one of the French naval
vessels, but this was turned dow[...]such other
independent reports as would come
out of the area would be from the
defence correspondents[...]a sophisticated system
for the rapid transmission of its
images, Gamma succeeded in out-
bidding its m[...]. Guaranteeing worldwide
distribution in a matter of hours, the
prize-winning method consisted of
installing a transmitter on board the
boat to tra[...]ere, another Gamma
team, working from the studios of
World Television Network, would

36 — January C[...]he
film into the global networks.

This procedure is not new — it was
apparently first devised by French tele-
vision for the intermittent coverage of
trans-Atlantic yacht races — but it is
so costly that it is seldom used for the
coverage of news events. During their
earlier campaigns at Mu[...]aplane that landed next to the boat.
In the event of rough seas or the hot
pursuit of a French frigate, this some-
times proved to be a[...]ce Gamma had succeeded in con-
vincing Greenpeace of the superiority
of their system, they then had to come
up with an eq[...]work,
CNN, agreed to form a pool for the
purchase of a series of five documen-
taries at $US7,000 each ($4,000 for[...]ion.
Despite the enormous expense and the
element of gamble involved, the
chance to winkle their way i[...]ance-Outremer in
Tahiti. Thus reassured, the team of
reporters had every reason to be
confident. Proba[...]eaving for the South
Seas was the rumoured apathy of
Greenpeace. Were the battle-weary
ecologists inti[...]itable
French armada waiting for them at
Mururoa, or were they simply
unmoved by it? Would the
protago[...]. “I
arrived in Tahiti ten days before the
rest of the team,” recalls David Carr-
Brown, “to put[...]French Defence Minister, who
resigned in the wake of the‘Rainbow
Warrior’affair — “got the axe[...]ped talking to me
altogether, and there was a lot of
tension with the High Commissioner
and the local[...]ion.” Carr-
Brown has since discovered that all of
this was calculated. From Paris, the
explanation was that the problems
Gamma was having were the fault of
the local authorities. “In reality,” he
says,[...]esided over by the High
Commissioner and composed of civil
aviation authorities, customs officials,
le[...]ey were immediately

expelled. They had no visas, of course,
but they would never have been
granted th[...]should pretend his plane
had broken down, he got so riled he
came round! The same thing goes for
his[...]was threat-
ened with having his licence revoked if
he flew for us. But he did, and now he
has the m[...]ed with finding another way to
get our films out of Tahiti. Unfortun-
ately, the director of ANZ in Papeete
is also the Consul! He was sym-
pathetic, but he sai[...]o hot by then,
since negotiations for the release of the
‘Turenges’ were already under-way.
Later, I did manage to persuade an
ANZ pilot to transport one of our
tapes, but his attempt got aborted, I’m
not[...]the TVNZ guys
had a 24-hour hassle to get it out of
customs.”

Gamma’s other big problem w[...]

Pie in the sky? This is how it should have
worked, if the combined might of the
French state had not had its way.

Second Gam[...]to plane circling
overhead.

In the aftermath of the sinking of the ‘Rainbow Warrior’, the
presence of a Greenpeace vessel to protest against the

French nuclear tests on Mururoa atoll looked like being

of the year’s top news stories. In fact, it turned out to be
pretty much of a non-event, since the French effectively
blocked all but the blandest of official reports: lots of
pictures of President Mitterand standing under palm trees,
bu[...]hey came up against the full
obstructionist might of the French state in their attempts to

do so.

mayor of Nukutavake. But, by that
stage, the 20-man commit[...], which was obliged to fly at
4,000 feet, because of a rule pro-
hibiting civilian planes from flying any
lower in the vicinity of military
aircraft. They even invented a rumour
ab[...]d
grounded at Tahiti, waiting for them
to run out of fuel. As soon as they flew
back, the way was clea[...]the Gamma team had its fuel
problems, too. “One of the first things
I had done when I arrived down
t[...]k again. But
by flying loaded up with jerry cans of
fuel, we managed it. However, this
meant we ran the risk of explosion if
we turned the heating on inside the
plane, so the whole operation was
carried out at 0°. And,[...]— was confiscated because it
contained footage of Tahitian separ-
atists who had gone out to meet t[...]-order came through
from Gaston Flosse, President of the
local Assembly. The equipment was
costing us about $US3,500 a day to
hire, so I immediately got in touch
with Gamma in Paris, w[...]ties.

“After five days, nothing had

happened, so I sued the customs
myself in the local courts and[...]a
$6,000 daily fine had they kept the
equipment, so they let it go. I put it on
a UTA flight to Los[...]turned up in Paris on 4 November.”

By the end of the operation, Gamma
were $US100,000 out of pocket.“We
should have broken even from the sale
of the films,” says Carr-Brown, “even
though there were only four instead of
five. We are bringing another court
case against[...]over our losses.” None the less, the
Gamma team is pleased with its
footage of the meeting between the
Tahitian separatists and the ‘Green-
peace’, even if it won’t be shown in
France, where TF1 and Ante[...]are doing their best to minimize
the significance of the independence
movement in Tahiti, and were pet[...]ouble in Tahiti — which was, appar-
ently, more or less the crew’s intention
after the boat’s generator had broken
down.

From Gamma’s point of view, the
first pictures of the ‘Balny’ and the
‘Greenpeace’ were wel[...]Tahitian separatists, led by Oscar
Temaru, mayor of Faa. But Carr-
Brown and Brooks are a little con-
cerned that, because so little has been
reported of the barriers they faced,
they were made to look l[...]n fact,” adds Carr-Brown, “the
insidious kind of censorship we were
subject to was much harder to deal
with psychologically than the more
classic kind of conflict. We’d feel
better if people really understood what
we were up against. We could have
called the whole thing off — which is
what we were meant to do, but we
persisted, for professional reasons,
and for the good name of Gamma,
whichisworth preserving.” fir

C[...]

The support of
Australian film-makers
and their brokers has
made[...]and
Television Insurance Specialists

A Division of Terence Lipman Pty Ltd,
Sentinel House.

49-51 Fa[...]IIIIIIIHIIMIHIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII

isn’t the Bronx or Br jflyn, it isn’t even New York.
It’s inat[...]..... A .\Il(2HAl-ll. (»ZlMlN(‘) Fl_l..\I ,.
, or um. l)RA(;()a\Z" ’ _ r
I-1-_|()HN I ()l\[...]

The first ‘Movie of the Week’, which
used to be called ‘A Whole World of
Movies’, went to air on 1 February
1981; the fi[...]hown on
Sunday evenings. Then, at the begin-
ning of 1983, we moved to Mondays
and, at the same time,[...]ange. The programme
will still be called ‘Movie of the Week’;
but it will move to Friday evenings[...]hink, than Sunday),
and will become a combination of the
two formats: a season of classics, using
themes to link film presentations, and
the one-off ‘Movie of the Week’
format.

The line-up is one I’m extremely
proud of. For example, towards the
end of January, I start a series called
‘Modern Master[...]i’s glorious L’albero degli zoccoli
(The Tree of Wooden Clogs). That
season will also include Louis Ma1le’s
Le souffle an coeur (Murmur of the
heart), Akira Kurosawa’s first colour
film, Dodes’ka-den, and our final
screening of Bernardo Bertolucci’s
masterpiece, Il conformis[...]the season, but not as well-
known as the others, is Voskhozdhye-
niye (The Ascent),,_winner of the
Golden Bear at Berlin in 1977. It is an
extraordinary religious allegory by
Larissa Sh[...]series, to be presented in October and
November, of all-tirne classics. This
season will include Das Cabinett des
Dr Caligari (The Cabinet of Dr Cali-
gari), Bronenosets Potemkin (The
Battleship Potemkin), another screen-
ing of our debut classic, La grande
illusion, as well as[...]g about Academy Awards, I’m
presenting a season of four features
which won the Oscar for Best Foreign
Film. Two of these, I’ve shown before:
Bergman’s Jungfrulr[...]id Stratton’s movie seasons on
SBS provide most of us with many of our opportunities to see
foreign films. Stratton[...]-
vision firsts here: De Sica’s legendary
Ladri di biciclette (Bicycle Thieves) -
assuming that, by[...]ia and Latin America.
From Asia, we’ll have one of the best
of the contemporary Chinese films,
Chengnan jiushi (My Memories of Old
Beijing), a Grand Prix winner at
Manila three[...]s don’t exist.

Mrinal Sen’s Kharij (The Case is

Closed) is set in Calcutta in winter, and

him to give us a preview.

is the story of the sudden death of a
boy taken in as servant by a thought-
less, upp[...]tnam comes Lam Le’s
Poussiére d’empire (Dust of Empire),
an impressive reconstruction of the
period of Dien Bien Phu and the defeat
of the French, which was, in fact,
made as a co-prod[...]an
director looks at three women in three
periods of Cuban history; Joaquim
Pedro de Andrade’s outrageous
comedy, Macunaima — a wildly
anarchic farce of which the Marx
Brothers would not have been
asham[...]e, but much requested.

I realize that this piece is starting to
sound like a list of film titles, but I
can’t resist adding a few mo[...]ilm to let
us show the original Ukrainian version
of Teni zabytykhov predkov (Shadows
of Our Forgotten Ancestors), a beauti-
ful movie lon[...]o from Spain, one
from Hungary. The Hungarian one is
Pal Sandor’s Szerencses Daniel (Daniel
Takes a[...]bout a teenager caught up in the
Russian invasion of 1956. The Spanish
films are Demonios en el jardin
(Demons in the Garden), made in the
same year, which is probably the finest
work of director Manuel Gutierrez
Aragon, about an eccent[...]he Franco era; and Carlos
Saura’s dance version of Carmen.

There will be tributes, too, to
talented[...]ill
commence, on 27 December, with a
presentation of one of the most
famous films of Simone Signoret,
Moshe Mizrahi’s La vie devant[...]se father has killed
his mother. A tearjerker, it is also an
Oscar winner (Best Foreign Film,
1977). I[...]y crafted policier, Police
Python 357 (1976), one of the best
French crime films of the seventies, in
which she co-stars with her hus[...]in another
tribute film, scheduled for the middle
of the year. The film is Claude Sautet’s
Cesar et Rosalie, and the tribute being
paid is to Romy Schneider, for this was
one of her finest films. There’s also a
three[...]

Voskhozdhyeniye, Larissa Shepitko.

Movie of the Week — 1986 schedule

27 December
3 January[...]one Signoret.

L’albero degli zoccoli (The Tree of Wooden Clogs)/ Italy,
1978, Ermanno Olmi/Modem Masterpieces.

Le souffle an coeur (Murmur of the Heart)/ France, 1971,
Louis Malle/Modem Maste[...]6, Larisssa
Shepitko/Modem Masterpieces.

Dodes’ka-den/ J apan, 1970, Akira Kurosawa/Modem
Masterpie[...]m Masterpieces.

Teni zabytykhov predkov (Shadows of Our Forgotten
Ancestors)/USSR, 1964, Sergei Parad[...]Germany, 1979,
Volker Schlondorff/ Oscars.

Ladri di bicicletti (Bicycle Thieves)/ Italy, 1948, Vittor[...], Jiri Menzel/Oscars.

Poussiere d’empire (Dust of Empire)/Vietnam-France, 1983,
Lam Le/Asia.

Kharij (The Case is Closed)/India, 1983, Mrinal Sen/Asia.
Chengnan jiushi (My Memories of Old Beijing)/China, 1983,
Wu Yigong/Asia.

Insian[...]teau; and Le
testament d’0rphée (The Testament of Orpheus)/ France,
1959, Jean Cocteau/Jean Cocteau.

La guerre est finie (The War is Over)/ France, 1966, Alain
Resnais/Stars (Montand[...]aly, 1975,
Luigi Comencini/Mastroianni.

Cronache di poveri amante (Story of Poor Lovers)/ Italy,
1954, Carlo Lizzani/Mastraia[...]cember

Das Cabinett des Dr Caligari (The Cabinet of Dr
Caligari)/Germany, 1919, Robert Wiene; and Bro[...]Jacques Armand/Funny
business 2.

The full titles of the various seasons are: Tribute to Simone Signor[...]ime Classics; Funny

Business No 2.

The schedule is correct at time of going to press, but all film titles are su[...]

One of the first references to film festivals in my memory
occurred in a review of the so-called ‘Italian Film Festival’, held
at the P[...]aying that film festivals had been going downhill of late, and
this collection (of four films) provided further evidence of the
slide.

The fact that the ‘festival’ consisted of four unreleased Italian
titles sitting on Columbi[...]na,
Vanina) was neither here nor there: the smell of decay was appar-
ently about, and no one was going to be fooled by external
appearances.

For another decade or so, the Melbourne Film Festival could
sell out 4,000 seats (at giveaway prices) in a couple of days, and
David Stratton had not even arrived to[...]tandards in the world (and heat off
the challenge of a rival festival into the bargain).

Colin Bennett was in his element and at the peak of his
influence, supporting the Melbourne festival[...]it was somewhat
irrelevant. We occasionally heard of a short that won a prize
somewhere — Tim Burstall won something or other for The Prize
at Venice, which was at least[...]the
reasons were obvious. We had this collection of people who didn’t
get to see movies like these any other way. They were all members
of film societies, some of which had thousands on their books.

They went to[...]- January CINEMA PAPERS

exclusive prerogative of the Sydney and
Melbourne festivals, and there has[...]y. Where
does this leave the festivals? In danger of a
lingering death, suggests Geoff Gardner, unless[...]events that held out the claim to be the vanguard of modern
cinema, and the sole annual repository of a collection of (mainly
European) art films, culled from the primary sources of Cannes,
Venice and Berlin, and the secondary sources of the pages of Sight
and Sound, Films and Filming and Film Quart[...]hey were
not, in the European sense, marketplaces or prize arenas. Occa-
sionally, a film might be acq[...]have been provided by local distributors as part of some pre-
release campaign. Often, the latter wou[...]y Satyajit Ray, Michelangelo Antonioni
and a host of lesser lights. A far greater number of big names
never turned up at all, despite considerable effort. Discussion was
confined to the foyer, or the Acland Street and Rose Bay cafes.

Our whole perception of ‘current cinema’ was distorted by
ineffectual[...]nsors playing their abysmal part by banning films
of the quality of Viridiana or A bout de souffle (Breathless). For a
while, we t[...]a
(North and South) something somewhere. As well, of course, the
well-crafted narrative was predominan[...]until
Der Handler der vier Jahreszeiten (Merchant ofor
Raul Ruiz, or Marguerite Duras, or Jonas Mekas, or dozens of
others, during the desperate search for narrative.

The festivals provided a feast of Fellini, Szabo and Wajda, and
occasional b[...]

Just as filmmakers discovered Cannes at last, so did a plethora
of independent distributors and exhibitors. The reducing cost of
international air fares played its part as well,[...]European film would open here commer-
cially one or even two years after its European release or, worse, a
year or so after its London or New York opening.

Distribution practices started[...]stivals their first
tendency towards irrelevance. If the major European art films of
the year were not available, then the festivals were willing to
decide that minor films might do. From a desire to present a
broad international p[...]r, the view was taken — and, to a degree, still is —— that
the festivals need to ensure they are the first to present a range of
new narrative productions (predominantly from Eur[...]eir major purpose to be the premiere presentation of
new films by major filmmakers (in the best possible conditions) to
a group of subscribers who, although diminishing, remain willing
to pay for this so-called privilege. All other aspects of the
festivals’ activities remain secondary to this purpose.

The fact that this practice is increasingly unimportant and
irrelevant to those[...]tions were formerly able to
sustain the activity, is still not being addressed. We are aware of
the rise in art-house activity. SBS TV has provided a comfortable
additional source. There have been a range of lateral solutions
suggested for the problems this[...]and Los Angeles, to provide a sprinkling showcase of new pro-
ductions shortly to be released in the a[...]ea that a festival audience may provide good word-of—mouth
after a screening, particularly now that the audience represents
grlily a tiny proportion of those who might choose to see the

1 In.

My suggestions as to a way out of this situation would be
several. If we are to continue to have at least one organization
devoted to a generalist View of current world cinema, then, to
ensure its survival and provide it with the largest possible
audience, there is a need for a truly national organization,
present[...]. This would
involve government support, a degree of (financial) co-operation
with commercial distributors, the SBS and, if it ever gets beyond
muttering phrases about cultu[...]tional community ready to
travel for the purposes of seeing, meeting and discussing. This
development[...]nd have a
tendency to overlap.

Without the sense of a national view, and without efficiently
allocati[...]e limited resources, the festivals stand a chance of fading
away as a result of benign but misguided policies that seek to
maintain a vanishing idea/ideal. -k

CINEMA PAPERS January —— 43

At first, the mare sh[...]keep coming back into shot to calm her.
Once that is sorted out, the stallion begins
to edge round bet[...]I and the stallion are getting a little
edgy.

It is the opening scene in Yarraman's
$51/2-million the[...]hich the TV miniseries, Flambards,
was based), it is set in rural New South
Wales in the early eighteen-sixties. Origin-
ally a tale of heredity — of the importance
for the lronminsters, isolated 12,000 miles
from the home, of preserving their family
line — it has had the distinctly modern idea
of sexual surrogacy added to it.

Producer Steven Grives (who is co.-.

producing hisdebut feature with Yarraman
p[...]ducer) optioned
the book while he was playing one of the
leads in Flambards — Captain Mark
Russell ([...]explains help-
fully).

"Surrogacy," he says, “is something that
has been round since the Bible. But, if you
take the novel's theme of one man
dependent on another man" — losing an
a[...]ng accident, Harry lron-
minster (Rupert Everett) is obliged to rely on
young Ned Devine (Hugo Weaving[...]day.”

Both Grives and Appleby stress that this
is a people story first, and a period piece
second.[...]ipt‘, says Appleby, ‘'I thought, ‘Boy, this
is something rather special: it's not just your
stan[...]bout things
that matter." For Grives, however, it isif that's your story, you do it!’ But,
actually, you can't, because surrogacy
nowadays is done with that" he makes an
(arguably obscene) ge[...]it in with the husband just down the
road, which is what happens here."

Director Di Drew, 36 years old, ex-ABC
and with previous credits that include co-
directing the miniseries 1915, is fascinated
above all by the emotional tensions th[...]y high
drama: the film has a certain pitch, which is
risk-taking. It's not about being careful: it's
about confronting emotions, and you're
either right or wrong. There's no in-
between, no middle ground."[...]invoked in turning down the project. But the
kind of all-out approach that characterized
the great screen melodramas is obviously
what Drew is after. “Why play down the
degree of what's happening?” she asks.
“You might as we[...]characterizes
Grives's approach to the externals of The
Right-Hand Man. “What we were after
was an[...]ch you
could pick up and put down again in Surrey
or Yorkshire. But, on the edges of that, you
have Australia, always gaining, gaining[...]rtainly found the eccentricity:
Abercrombie House is the sort of building
that has gone from inspired Victorian
de[...]out ever
passing through beauty. Built, like much of
the surrounding area, in a kind of stone
found only around Bathurst and in the
British Lake District, it is also, according to
the houses owner, Mr Morgan, on a ley-
line — one of the imaginary lines that con-
nect places like Ay[...]and Stonehenge. "And he's convinced that
the kind of luck you get if you're on a ley-
line will impart itself to us," says Appleby.

Director of photography Peter James,
shooting his first feature since his AF|-
award-winning Rebel, is after a look that
suits both the house and the story, if not the
ley-lines. "It's the first really English[...]I
want a soft, burnt-out background — that
sort of Barry Lyndon-look, where every-
thing is candlelit.

“l'm using Kodak 94, and l'm rating the
film slower than it normally is. Colorfilm and
I did some tests, and decided tha[...]sing white nets on every-
thing, and a little bit of over-exposure helps
saturate the colour in the ex[...]at the same time, it's all seen
through the eyes of these very English
people."

In marked contrast to Abercrombie
House is the neighbouring town, which the
lronminsters all but own. This is being shot,
not in Bathurst — the proximity of Mount
Panorama has made that far too modern —
b[...]ny, but once home to 70,000 people.

"Abercrombie is totally un-Australian,"
says production designer Neil Angwin,
amid the lumber of a partly re-built Hill End:
“not a gum tree in sight. Hill End is exactly
the opposite — real Australia, though not to
the point of whacking kangaroos into the
middle of the main street."

Angwin, working with his regul[...]er Ken Hazelwood and scenic artist
Billi Malcolm, is reconstructing the place
from photographs. “The feeling we're after
is definitely not Five Mile Creek," he says.
“I'm hoping it will have the atmosphere, not
of bushranger movies and gold-mining
films, but of what a rural town was like in
those days."

To[...]e-
construction work at Hill End. Above,
director Di Drew with the ‘Leviathan '.

The other piece of reconstruction is even
more awesome: the Cobb and Co
‘Leviathan’ coach, which young Ned
Devine is driving when Harry lronminster
first spots him. That, too, is taken from pic-
tures. And, built by engineer Mik[...]inside and
on the back (depending on status) — is a
staggering 89 people. Like most other
things ab[...]iable feel to it. The ley-lines may
help; but, as of early November, the pro
duction didn't rea[...]

Formerly known as The Trailblazer,
Birdsville is the first theatrical feature from
PBL, and Carl Schultz is directing from a
screenplay by Robert Wales, with additional
dialogue by Bob Ellis.

The subject is basically that of an outdoor
adventure, set in the eighteen-nineties. But
Schultz is emphasizing the comic possibil-
ities inherent in this tale of a young adven-
turer, Harry Walford, who decides to
‘borrow’ 1,500 head of cattle and, accom-
panied by his mate Bluey, driv[...]esigner Gordon Liddle
overseeing the construction of the town at
the local showground. On the Monday
a[...]street in Adelaide.

Permission to close off part of George
Street had obviously not been all that eas[...]me 30 extras were costumed
under the watchful eye of Liddle (who is
also the costume designer); shop fronts had
been[...]conist as a P & 0 ticket office. The Rocks
branch of the Bank of NSW needed no
modification: it could pass muster in its
present form.

The first scene to be shot was one of the
film's heroine, Lily, finding a magnificent
dress in the mi||iner’s shop. Lily is played by
a newcomer, eighteen-year-old Kathryn
W[...]d with her easy-going unaffec-
tedness. The scene is shot from both
outside and inside the shop, and within an
astonishingly short space of time both
Schultz and director of photography Dean
Semler are satisfied with the results.

The next shot, of Harry and Bluey
walking into the P & 0 office, re[...]the setting-up period,
Semler talks about the use of Super Techni-
scope on this film (Brian Trenohar[...]ws the film
to be shot widesoreen without the use of an
anamorphic lens, which is a requisite of the
Panavision system. Semler seems very
satisfied with the depth of field he has seen
in the rushes so far.

According to Schultz, the rather naive
young couple at the centre of the film are
the only ones taking the adventure
s[...]aracters are a bit larger than life.

in the role of Harry, Schultz has cast
another newcomer — thou[...]nd .

Kerry Walker. the latter playing the
madame of an Adelaide brothel.

The cameras are quickly set up and a
stream of buses passes by. Then, it's
“Action!” and, in[...]Ftosen, who has
dropped by for a progress report, is
smiling.

A few days later, at the Mort Bay studios
in Balmaln, Schultz is shooting a scene from
late in the film in which H[...].

Again, Liddle’s meticulous production
design is apparent — a magnificent brothel
set with red velvet wallpaper and a multi-
tude of candles — as is the relaxed way that
Schultz goes about extractin[...]a rather corny situation.

“|‘m taking a bit of a chance with this,"
he admits during a break in[...]ng over the top with the fu|l—blooded
melodrama of Careful, He Might Hear
You, and, apart from Mad M[...]y.

Kerry Walker, as the outraged brothel
madame, is almost unrecognizable in a
tightly-fitted dress a[...]ultz
and his principal actors dream up funny bits
of business, while a honky-tonk piano
tinkles away in the background.

One thing is certain: it cinema audiences
derive as much fun f[...]rding
experience. fi

Looking for the funny side of Birdsville:
below, DOP Dear? Semler (strok[...]

telemovies

Filming stopped temporarily in t[...]torey terrace house in Sydney's inner-city
suburb of Newtown. The budgie — affec-
tionately known as Jonathan but currently
being addressed by a variety of other
names — stood obstinately still. Ignoring
the coaxing of two of his leading ladies
(Emma Coles and Kris McQuade), the
pleas of director Jane Campion and the im-
patience of the crew, Jonathan steadfastly
refused to perform[...]ing in their
lounge room amid the amiable clutter of
presents, wrapping paper and a precarious
tree. L[...]his spot
in the background, had executed an array
of acrobatics from his perch, using a stray
piece of curling ribbon as a prop. Seizing
on the apparent[...]ze the festive spirit, Campion had asked
director of photography Julian Penney to
zoom in on the bird[...]nds.

The second off the rank for the 1986
season of telemovies — the first being The
Book of Athuan, produced and directed
by Alan Burke — 2 Friends is a project that
unites a disproportionately high number of
talented women.

Produced by Jan Chapman, who was[...]levision.

As Chapman notes, the past two seasons
of telemovies have provided "a chance for
writers an[...]ss themselves in
the medium”. A quick roll-call of the initiates
does reveal an impressive line-up of talent:
Alex Buzo, Louis Nowra, Ken Cameron,
Kath[...]nd designer Janet
Patterson.

Garner's screenplay is essentially a story
of friendship between two teenage girls.
who experie[...]elieves that the per-
ceptive eye for the details of domestic life
that distinguish Garner's books wil[...]lish casualness, but the thing that i really
like is that Helen has a very fresh feel for
detail: she[...]ear us
saying ‘Now, where are we again, October
or July?'. It took me a while to get my head
around the idea that going backwards is
going forwards at the same time."

The second decision was one of tone.
“We felt that it should have a style of its

46 — January CINEMA PAPERS

own," she explains, "much more like a
tableau than is traditional for television: a
static camera sitting back and observing; a
lot of wide shots and playing with keeping
the frame, and letting people move in and
out of it." Visually, Chapman likens it to the
style ado[...]and in this
case, may have constituted something of a
risk, as neither of the leads has had much
previous television or film experience.

Kris Bidenko, playing the more flam-
boyant of the two girls, met the director
while working on[...]m
Unit, and was chosen to play Kelly on the
basis of that work. After Chapman and
Campion had conducted days of auditions
for the part of Louise, they found Coles,
whose only previous TV[...]ial for Lancome.

Far from jeopardizing the style of camera-
work, Campion believes that their relativ[...]asset. “They
make it work,” she explains. “If they were
too experienced, they'd be hitting marks
too much, they’d lose the sense of idle
casualness that they lend to it. And anyway,[...]ing. They always have their lines
down, and there is no difference in their
behaviour on set, except t[...]little more emotional than
adults.”

As Campion is describing Coles and
Bidenko, they are occupying[...]ternately giggling at and
berating a recent issue of Cleo liberated
from another crew member.

Coles,[...]Quade as Louise’s mum, Janet.

adds that Louise is "probably more dis-
ciplined than I am. She's got the vege
garden, she probably does most of the
washing up and a lot of the cooking."
McQuade is relishing her role, though
many of her friends, remembering
Fighting Back and the award-winning per-
formance in Palace of Dreams, reacted to
it with, “Oh, you're playing[...]ther mothers that We played have been
the victims of the western suburbs. This
time, I'm an independent spirit. It's great;
Louise is more sensible and, through her
sensibility, l get to be more flighty. i get to
play more of a child and Louise gets to
reprimand me more as the mother.”

Backing up the female leads is a strong
team of actors in supporting roles, including
Peter Hehir[...]special crew," Chapman
notes. “They shot Scales of Justice and,
since then, they've done most of the tele-
movies. it's a small, ten-person crew a[...]ve them-
selves in the concept. I think it has to do
with making the telemovies with such
different di[...]that the telemovies will become
an annual feature of ABC production.
Varying dramatically in style, to[...]st two seasons
have indeed provided a transfusion of new
blood for the ABC, and the third batch
promises to do the same. “it's very
exciting," Chapman asserts[...]e doing things that
the commercial stations don't do. And,
frankly, it's what keeps one working[...]

Production round-up

The approach of the festive season signals
a wind-down for the fi[...]th the company gearing up
for 1986 with a variety of new projects. The
first of these, the miniseries The Last
Frontier, is set to roll on 2 February, with
the pilot episode[...]ture, Revolt in

Paradise, due for July.

A batch ofHa|mi’s international
production of Spearfield’s Daughter, a
three-parter shot in A[...],

slot.
Through their

Activity in the corridors of the ABC drama
departments will also slow down over the
the telemovies 2 Friends
and The Book of Athuan and the mini-
series Tusitala and The Haun[...]Rag. a miniseries focusing on
life in the offices of a suburban newspaper,
finished shooting on 12 De[...]tive
miniseries, Dancing Daze, featuring a
number of the creative minds responsible
for Sweet and Sour, is being considered
for release in March in a Sunday[...]or's Bunyip to
complete shooting on 21 December.

Of the few productions to continue over
Christmas, m[...]rity from Crawford Productions.
While Whose Baby? is due to finish pro-
duction on 20 December,
Nowhere is in production until February. Of
the two new series, Coopers Crossing will
continue shooting until September and
Prime Time is shooting indefinitely.

Two economical Melbourne-based pro
recently went

Dofine’s Cactus finished
ahead of schedule, with cast and crew
working only four to[...]ne from The Big Hurt.

into post-

last weeks of the shoot. Producer Jane
Ballantyne estimates tha[...]ochists’
financed by the government (which one is
not clear at this stage). The inflation disco
was[...]shoot their next feature, The
Cricketer, in March or April.

Also on the drawing board for early in th[...]Coote & Carroll's The
Challenge in the third week of January,
—PBL's Petrov on 3 February and Jack
T[...]Cinema Papers
Production Survey

A full listing

of the features, telemovies,

documentaries and shorts now in pre-
production, production or post-production

in Australia.

FEATURES

PRE-PRODUCTION

AVENGERS OF THE CHINA SEAS[...]&'trhe)vor), Gia Carides

glikki), Lydia Mil r
yn is a story about a

opsls: Buckles
policeman and a p[...]a stranger in town whose
skill with a cricket bat is almost unnatural . . .
he's gotta have a secret.[...]A huge rogue crocodile terrorises
the inhabitants of Darwin.

DOT AND THE TREE

Prod. company . . . .[...]S

. , VI in-
m¥a'l'<er, find the spread of a big city threatens
their lifestyles.

DOT IN CO[...]n bath at Sydney University, on view
to thousands of people, until the murder was
solved in 1944.

FAN[...]FL
.$350.000
..90 minutes
...... ..16 mm
....Koda.k ECN

age . ng girl, Jenny,
lives er lite as a series of sexual fantasies.
She meets the man of her fantasies,
Quentin, a brilliant research psyc[...]mplete as poss-
ible. l you have something

which is about to go into pre-

production, let us know and we
will make sure it is included.

Call Debi Enker on (03)
3295983, or write to her at
Cinema Papers, 644 Victoria
Stree[...]: Gus Mercurio (Ugo Mariottn.
Synopsis: The story of a man's rise to
leadership in an emergency, when a
Dunkirk-etyie evacuation is used to rescue
thousands of holida -makers from a bushfire
on the Mornington[...]ed a murder down on the farm; the
others were not so sure. But when they
opened that Pandora's box, th[...]t

opsls: The a entures of Magwitch, the
convict hero of Charles Dickens's immortal
classic, in Australia.[...]Carey.

PANDEMONIUM

Prod. company...........K.F.M. Pandemonium

Pty Ltd
Producer... ....Robert Francis
Director Ha n Keenan

Scriptwrfters . . . . . . . . . .. eterGailey,

Ha dn Keenan
Photography Sanderson
Sound & music dir[...]A pagan passion play set under
and on the shores of Bondi beach. with bulk
ratbaggery and meaning.

P[...]ler (Sugar).

Synopsis: The film tells the story of awoman
who breaks with convention and defies the
taboos of an era in the pursuit of self-know
ledge and sexual fulfilment.

P[...]

e: e true
triumphs of Australia's
who fell from

..NeweIl Lock
$5.5 million
...120 mins
trials and
of boxing
orld War

golden bo
' . ' grace as a result of
I s conscription hysteria a_nd was resurrected
as[...]emphis, lonely,
bewildered and reviled at the age of 21.

TERRA AUSTRALIS

Prod. comp[...]hy ..................... ..Graham Sharpe
Director of
model design .Nonnan Yeend
Consultant zootog .Dr[...]nopsis. Based on scientific findings, the
fi m is set in prehistoric Australia.[...]ng .. ...OutTo Lunch

Cast: Vanessa e grave( is Carlyle), Alex
Nonon (silhouettist, Mccallum, Wit[...]rn (Mr Pitt).

Synopsis: Comrades tells the story of the
Tolpuddle Martyrs, a group of six Dorset
fami workers who, in the early 1830s, formed
one of the world’s first trade unions and in
doing so were convicted of sedition and
transported to the penal colony of New South
Wales. Their plight became a cause cele[...]y led to them being pardoned,
largely as a result of the work of Mr Pitt.

DOT AND THE BUNYIP[...]... Yoram Gross
Scriptwriter. Greg Flynn
Director of p .. . raham Sharp
Director of animation .. Jacques Muller
Asoc. producer .... .[...]oil his plans.
Dot soon discovers that the circus is merely
a front for an international wildlife smug[...]ram Gross
Photography .. ..Graham Sharpe
Director of animation .. .Fiay Nowland
Assoc. producer ..San[...]rray Griffen,

Joanna Fryer,

Greg Farrugla,

Han ka Bilyk

Layout artists ........................ ..[...]d. company .............. ..Australian Institute

of Aboriginal Studies
Directors ....... ..David and Judith MacDougall
Director of photography....David MacDougall

Graphics.
Asst e[...]Synopsis: Sunny Bancroft, the Aboriginal
manager of a cattle station in Northern NSW
decides to race one of the station's stock-
horses at the local picnic r[...]g,
sometimes losing.

THE STEAM DRIVEN ADVENTURES
OF RIVERBOAT BILL[...]ted adventure set on the

urray River at the turn of the century.
Riverboat Bill and his crew attempt to protect
[an illegal bunyip from the long arm of the
aw.

3 F.U.K. FM (106.3 ON YOUR DIAL)

Prod. company .M[...]FM disc jockeys who find themselves
suddenly out of work, and in need of money
quickly. They implement a series of get-rich-
quick schemes as well as elaborate cons[...]i , John Howard ( r Proctor).
Synopds: avis Davis is off around the
world on a fast motion package tri[...]se her around the wand — one problem,
no money. So his sons Eddie and Wally
assisted by the beautifu[...]ntemporary comedy. A witty,
uncompromising expose of the sexual and
social mores of life in a typical middle-class
Brisbane suburb, where all is not what it[...]gner Anria’Jake.b
’Make-iép ...... .. arlaJO Kfiefe

rops uyer an ing
Standby props .. Brian L[...]ry Gregory).
ynopslez It would have just been the da he
got out of prison if it weren't also the day isa
entered his life. Unt[...]urdy). David Slingsby
Spence).
ynopslsz The story of Harry Walford, an un~

Neville Cohen Synopsis: Going Sane is a comedy about a
Allan Peterson man's obsession with the passing of time.
Fiona McLeod

. dam Kropinski Ph°l°9l'3Pl[...]S no sis: Crocodile Mick Dundee is a Boom swinger.. ...Perry Dwyer B09?“ Upefalolr[...]eatlve Broadcasters Prod. company Naked c r
wilds of Australia. He becomes national John Bowling ASSN![...].. .Deryk De Niese M3,l<9'llD 3S5l5lal'll-~ Anna K<'=lPln5kl Focus puI|er..... Michael Finuca[...]

Feb 21-Mar 23

Presents the best of Ihe independents in the 2nd
Fringe Festival of Independent Film

FRINGE FILM WEEK

Feb 22-Mar 1,[...]EJIJVENATION CENEEE

SCRATCH REMOVAL and CLEANING of 35mm and 16mm
NEGATIVE, POSITIVE AND REVEFISAL FI[...]ssy coating remains on the film after treatment

~k Film can be subsequently wet printed, ultrasonically
cleaned, spliced, projected or handled in the usual manner

iv Ideal for negative or positive film that will be transferred to
videota[...]NIE DONOVAN for further information
(02) 427 2585 or a.h. 653 2494

UNIT SE1, 1 LINCOLN STREET, LANE C[...]522

WE ARE
CURRENTLY
CELEBRATING
/ OUR 38TH
YEAR OF
SERVICE TO
THE
DISCERNING
USER OF OUR
SKILLS

ompact video

699 6999

FOR AL[...]

....Barbara Ring
Ron Stigw[...]Design assistants.

night and day. A celebration of wind, waves
and love. A movie of music and action,
all the colour and excitement of
windsu ng’s most spectacular activity —
wave-[...]come involved with Kangaroo. the awe-
some leader of a political group called the
ggers. The consequen[...]e explores his_.po|itical past
and ‘the sources of power in individuals,
marriage and society as a w[...]De Roche,
Bonnie Harris

Stunt safety officer ..
Still photography.
Horse master
Wrangler[...]herine McC|ements (Sarah).
Synopsis: Ned Rowlands is the driver of
Cobb at Co's seventy seat passenger coach,
The Leviathan. His skills attract the attention
of Lord Ironminster's son, Harry
an accident was considered the best drags-
man in the country. Harry is determined to
to set a new record and needs
ees, and finds himself
involved in a relationship which is more than
a more race against time.

WHAT'S THE D[...]ll (Barmaid), Judith Stratford

Wayne Allen 51°¢k~

....Denise Haratzis
.....Pip_Karme|

....Frank[...]to
his mechanical ability being used in a series
of eccentric crimes.

MY COUNTRY

..Warhead Films
..[...]us Caftrey
.....Angus Caffrey,
Ali Kayn

bU"dI"9 Prod. company.

Producers ......... ..

Directo[...]age Abigail
transported through time to the Sydne of
one hundred years ago where she must ulfil
the B[...]hecy before she can
return home. Through a series of extra-
ordinary adventures Abigail succeeds in
th[...]Still photography ..
Runner ........ ..
Safety officer..
Catering..
Mixed at ..
Le.boratory..
Lab.[...]nzil Howsen (Governor-General), David
Grey (Clerk of Courts), John Howard (David
Andrew Bone
Columbus), Lee Harding (The Surgeon).
ynopsls: The true story of the discovery of
Australia. Sort of.

PLAYING BEATIE BOW

SAFC Productions Ltd
......[...]Jill
erryman (Miss Dodge).
synopsis: Making waves is a fast-moving
contemporary comedylromance about t[...]Einstein).

5 opus: The incredible, untold story of a

year-old apple farmer and genius from
Tasmania[...]tes

Gauge.. ..... ..16 mm

Synopsis: The history of the Australian
stock horse.

CASS’S STORY

Prod[...]ew), Libby Wherrett (Renate
Paul).
Synopsis: This is the story of a 1&year~old
girl, one of the thousands of children in Aus-
tralia each year who are victims of incest. it
is also the story of a family in crisis when dis-
closure of the secret causes disintegration,
shatters the system of relationships and
poses frightening questions for the future. it
is hard-edged drama based firmly in fact, but
its thrust is positive and it allows a safe
conduct zone on the far side of the minefield.
its aim is to raise awareness of incest in the
community, and to show that the result of
breaking the silence surrounding it can be
positive rather than a continuing
victimization of the child.

COAL DOWN UNDER[...]ength. ..
Gauge. ...... ..16mm
Synopsis: A survey of Shell Australia's
coastal interests.

DESI[...]

Synopsis: How the west was Lost is the
story of the Aboriginal pastoral workers‘
strike 1946-49 told through a combination of
documentary and dramatic reconstruction.
Aborigin[...]il
they began to question their lot with the help
of white prospector, Don McLeod. In 1942,
McLeod met with hundreds of Aboriginals
from the Pilbara region and after six weeks
of meetings it was decided the only way to
achieve justice was to strike, after WWII.
This is the story of their struggle as told by
those who lived it.

MESSENGERS OF THE GODS

Prod. compan[...]stock . ...7291, 7294

Sync s: The role and uses of the crane
family of birds in human societies throughout
the world, fr[...].
It vividly illustrates the beauty and the value
of wildlife in the affairs of man.

MOVIE HORSES DOWN UNDER

Prod. company ....[...]West coast. Produced for
the Tasmanian Department of Tourism.

RETURN OF THE LEVIATHAN

Prod. company .[...].... ..7291, 7294
Synops s: A documenta about one of the
most mysterious, grace ul and intelligent
creatures on this planet. It will show the
impact of whaling in Australia and how the
death of this industry may have saved this
natural wonder of the sea.

SOMETHING OF THE TIMES

Prod. company .............. ..Australian Institute
of Aboriginal Studies

Dist. company ............... ..Australian Institute
_ of Aboriginal Studies
Director ..... .. ....Kim McK[...]...... ..16 mm

Synopsis: This film examines some of the
remaining traces and memories of the
buffalo shooting camps of the Northern Terri-
tory before WWII. White shooters relied upon
local Aboriginal labor and the lives of certain
Aboriginals came to revolve around the
bu[...]tages
0 Tasmania as a centre for the construction
of Australia's new generation of submarines.

WAR BRIDES

Prod. company .[...]ullivan
Length.. 50 minutes
Gauge ....16mm
Synops of some of

the 15,000 Australian women who married
American[...]ip' to join their sweet-
hearts on the other side of the world. Forty
years later, they talk about the[...]ECN

Cast: George Donikian.

Synopsis: Witch Hunt is a story of trial and
error, innocence and guilt. It was an attempt
to find a crime — the so~ca||ed “Greek
Conspiracy“, but it turned into[...]or in judgement that was revealed as a
conspiracy of a far larger order — a con-
spiracy against members of the Greek
community.

ZANONI

.Pro-Image Studios[...]Synopsis. The ship “Zanoni”, a classic
vessel of its time, was sailing on its maiden
voyage from A[...]outh Australia, in
1867. This sealed time capsule of the late
1800s led to a frustrating but rewarding[...]basher), Robert Jones (‘Ticket seller).

Syria is: A film sonnet about Julie, Stella
and ay, who ne[...]y satirizes the
commercial and ridiculous aspects of the
record industry.

THE MAGIC OF CRICKET

(Working Title)

Prod.[...]tute for
head-hunting and war. They play the Game
of Cricket to settle their disputes . . .

MY LIFE W[...]).

Synopsis: Liz has split up with her lover and
is now living alone in a bedsitter overlooking
the waterways of inner city Sydney. Her
attempts to get herself out of her depression
and to understand it, form a disco[...]nightmare

comprehension. A special kind of fantasy
SEA

drama.

Prod. company[...]mins
..16 mm
anhlight’
the expressive potential of
the theories of

idea

Sound recordist
Editor .......... ..
Prod.[...]kinetic art the film attempts to
reveal the unity of nature.

SELLING IS COMMUNICATION

Prod. company.
Dist. company ..
Pr[...]000
..30 minutes
...... ..16 mm
ky s social style is lacking,
where men are
more.

Prod. company.[...]h assistance from the Creative
Development Branch of the
Australian Film Commission)
....AIexander Pr[...]ly
religious sister live in a shack in the middle of
a vast desert. The man dreams of leaving in
a flying machine of his own invention. A
comedy of the ironic.

THE WEDDING

Matrimonial Productions[...]Synopsis: A positive look at the achieve-
ments of Australian innovation, presenting
an analysis of how it works, how it has
worked and where it and[...]inal-run rehabilitation
centre on the north coast of NSW to take part
in a three-month programme that[...].....16mm

Synopsis: A film about the top stratum of
commercial and social life in Hong Kong. It
centr[...]hase
Gauge.. ............... ..16 mm
Synopds. One of the Real Life series. the
film follows a political candidate in a
marginal seat through the seven weeks of
the campaign to the numbers coming in and
the gathering of the faithful for the election

night party.

DOCT[...]m follows Dr Bruce Shepherd through the
aftermath of the Medicare dispute. Shepherd
is committed to the rivatization of health
care and the film exp ores the personalities
and the lifestyle of the surgeons and their
relationships with the com[...]. . . . . . . . . . . . . . ..16 mm
Synopsis: One of the Real Life series, the
film follows a group of patients from a drug
and alcohol treatment clinic[...]r last
days in the clinic and the first few weeks of
their return to the community as they
stru[...]

Synopsis. This is the sixth in the Australian
Heritage Commission's series Artisans of
Australia. It shows the work of Christine
Cooke and Elizabeth Stevens who work in[...]ncilling and some investigation
work on the walls of Villa Alba, an unrestored
and unoccupied building[...]ength.... 90 mins
Gauge. .....16mm

Synopsis: One of the Real Life series, the
film is about the criminal justice system and
its treatment ofis very
common among older people. This film
shows[...]age
their diabetes by proper diet, exercise, care
of the feet, and consultation with their
dieticians[...]......... .. ...Bruce Ezard
Unit manager .. Emma Ta lor
Producer's assi ...lan ost
Narrator er Gwynne[...]. . . . . . . . . . . . . . ..16 mm
Synopsis: One of the Real Life series. the

film is an inside study of life at The Sydney
Morning Herald. The film looks[...]athering, the meetings, to the late
night rolling of the presses.

ON TOP — DOWN UNDER[...]or release in North America. it
features a number of case studies of Austra-
lian original automotive component pan
ma[...]opsis: A film set within the Chinese com-

munity of Hong Kong. Here, people know
little of the romantic social life generated by
British presence. The film is about two
hawkers, a squatter and their families[...]he face a well-organized bureaucracy.
THE SCIENCE OF WINNING

Prod. company . .Film Australia
Dist. co[...]ent
has eclined dramatically since the golden
age of the sixties. The debacle at the
Montreal Olympic[...]too much for an ath|ete?What are
the ethics . . . is it still sport?

SINGLES

Prod.[...]s
Gauge. ..16 mm

Synops . ries, the
film is a foray into the world of the un-
attached. Charles is recently divorced and
struggling to get his life together. He is in
love and trying to establish a relationship. At
the same time, a small group of women vie
for his attention.

SOLID PLASTERING[...]Australian

Heritage Commission's series Artisans of
Australia. It shows the work of Larry
Harrigan a third generation solid plasterer.
He has been working on the exterior of the
Collingwood Town Hall in Melbourne for the
pa[...]estoration job. He demonstrates
the various kinds of plastering including
running moulds, making an ur[...].
Gauge.... .....16mm
Synopsis. series, the
film is about a Vietnamese refugee family
and the visit to Australia of a son they
haven't seen for four years. A moving[...]tes
Gauge.... _....16mm
Shootin stock. .Eastmanco|or

Synops s: The first in a series of films about
Australian writers and their work, pl[...]FE colleges
and tertiary institutions. The series is con-
cerned with writers as interpreters of society.
David Williamson is seen in various
activities, such as a rehearsal of “The Club",
writing at home, discussing his wor[...]Narrator.
Gauge.

Shootin
Synops s: Tod y
aspects of traditional Aboriginal Australia is
the outstation or clan homeland movement.
After a general introduct[...]. the film goes to Baniyala. homeland
settlement of the Madarrpa clan. The picture
that emerges is of traditional Aboriginal

pie running their own aff[...]hy .Vit Martinek
Gauge... ...16 mm

Synopsis. so Edo|s's
return to the Mowayun Aboriginal community
in north-west Australia after several years of
banishment.

FILM VICTORIA

ALL IN TOGETHER[...].....16 mm

pals. A film made for the Department of
Sport _and Recreation and the Victorian
Camping Association concerning the
integration of disabled people into the
Residential Camping Prog[...]hris Co in
Vince O'Di:‘>>rri)nel

Prod. assistant. .Samantha Toffolet[...]film to delve behind the bland
scientific walls of an herbarium, to reveal the
rich matrix of history, scholarship and
common utility found the[...]e

narration produced for the Tourism Commis
sion of New South Wales. It shows some
different location[...]ndon-

derry industrial Safety Centre, Department
of Industrial Relations. The centre carries out
test[...]rivate sector. The vi eo demon-
strates the range of these tests and shows
the department's commitment[...]ge.. ...... ..35 mm

Synopsis: A woman's eye view of the begin-
ning of civilization.[...]mm
Shooting stock.... ....7294

Synopsis: History of the campaign for equal
pay for women.

HENRY HAND[...].... ..16 mm
5 nops mentary on the

li a and work of the Australian novelist Henry
Handel Richardson.[...]s
Gauge. ............ ..16 mm

Synopsis: A series of Women's Studies Pro-
grammes for junior. secondar[...]junc-
rich with the Curriculum Development
Centre of the Schools Commission and all
State Educational[...]episodes depicting the lifestyle
and experiences of a family-run Queensland
Barrier Reef resort islan[...]. ..Matt Carroll,
Greg Coote

Executive in charge of
production .................. ..Harley Manners
Pr[...]Gauge.... ............ ..16mm
Synopsis. e a a go is the dramatized

story of the 1983 land and sea battle for the
America's Cu[...]t for the cup to the genius,
talent and endeavour of those involved, who
made an impossible dream beco[...]..1" video

Synopsis: In the near future, an out-of-work
theatre troupe inadvertently prevent the
piracy of Australia’s underground power
source by a most[...]series based on Ruth

Park’s best-selling novel of the same name.
HOVER PATROL

Prod. company.[...]are students for
the responsibility and challenge of leader-
ship, the teleleature tells the story of the
testing of a multi-cultural group of adoles-
cents attending the college.

JOE[...]

PROUD TO BE SUPPLYING:
- Sword of Honour.

0 Lancaster Miller

0 The More Things Change
0 Crocodile Dundee

- Archer

FOR THE SUPPLY OF ALL

FILM PRODUCTION TRANSPORT
CONTACT DAVID SUTT[...]erine ADQSIICO ‘F3""‘a).i I-V La°kh°"a Mak (K3"Va)' L”p°°

Laboratory ...........Atlab Pert[...]d, 57”“ Q"""35 ad°'°5°°”t5 "°"‘ T“'k'5hi c.a”‘b°d'a"-
Krejus (Mary wiisori , Mus-[...]°'Y ----- --C'"9V9X 9."°“"d5i Ia°'"9. "'9 .°ha"°” .95 and
THE LAST FRONTIER i_,ngrn_ xaornrnd[...]Michael Lake Lab, liaison", ,3ruce Braun dilemmas of growing up in a mu l-cultural[...]producer ____,nm sanders diverse group of 16 year old Australians. The Asst location manager. _ _ , ,
Director,_ ,,,|»(eyiri Dobsorr world is explored through the eyes of the Prod. secretar)’ - - - ' - - - - - - --Flon[...]ountant-A Hob Threadgold (H ‘mg T5 Cker Jo‘; Fofliesr Ter Gr" _
Roger Dunn adults are seen. The format is "F3’lV" and 1st asst director ...... ..John Wil[...]ell (S Qnio irllf A9R5°- ar Fr in Docror Service is (Broadcast) PW I-id
byr___ ,_W___Mi¢haeiLaiirancer PACK OF WOMEN 3rd asstdirector. Peter Nathan IY re‘; 5 rh flurbaékgr wrr or Coo ers Pl_'oducer.... ....Lex Van Os
Ha‘ "'°E"°’ THE §3,‘i’°”s"r}’i5.§Ii[...]man .. ....Martin McGrath synopsis: The programme is based on the 3951 b0Y~---- Pete’ M3I°"9Y ggonf[...]..Howard Neil
Keygrip.. Graham Litchfield mosaic of new ways of looking at women. Lengmt r-4* 50 l'"'”U1°5 Ass[...]gcgrrng Eigkrz; Post-production co-ordinatorn. ..Ka_ran P_eel
Cosnrrrne designer r_ Mn, Brewer celebrate new women IS hliacked . . ._ r Camera Operaror Jan Marden Prod[...]ij"
Ast d‘ . .. ‘ . - ' . , . ,
sg:n?jle1gir1or_ ,,,,‘?gil1: vzzcfiznr Dm.‘ °°'f'P3"Y~~ "PBL P'°.d”°"°"5 under the awesome influence of the vast §:"‘d(:fgs“:rdr°be ' Sana?/“Z -r[...]- - ' - - ' - - - --C""G'°“'“ emptiness that is the Australian outback. ~ ' 1st asstdirectors ..[...]aslo.
StUdl0S~-~. EIYOY 31 MCE"0Yi 3 9 "1". Tn to or me ggiggiion or Producer .OscarWhitbread Studios. .Tram Broadcast . . K33’ He""°55Y

FIVE DOCK yn~°ps~s' e S r-Y - -[...]Moi heii, synopsis: When the going gets tough the K" 9"“ """" " " '"‘

Synopsis: This four—hour miniseries isor me no men who rm her Producer ........ .. .....Ke[...]/ r _
PT°d- C°mPal"Y---- ------- --CI'l3dW'l‘3k DOUQIBS Synopsw - The smry of ‘mes undercover Rose Evans Producers ..........[...]atthews Editor Zbigniew (Peter) Friedrich 3”“ K‘°‘V'
Prod. accountant. ..Caro|ine Fife Scrip[...]""T°"yW"°°ck
L9"91h 120 ml”Ul95 Ted FI0b9|'IS' Don Llnke’ ‘D “Mane. emeeit Services Ltd[...]stralia's stance in life control synops _ he true Ka Hennessy Prod secretary exandrya Jones Pubhtchy "GTV9
and world achievements over the last 25 story of Cyclone Tracy, which virtually Script editor... D[...]?Jr“.5'.;'3§ii1‘;?n2m‘s?nii.%°§£%?;ii;"so3.§‘;?: TUDAWALI: nstense FROM ?£%%’s°SL'i?[...]q_rag§ Asst art director. Jase Saunders senani’is’iai;s" '°A'dél2 £32 {gh*"°r;; tghgrlef Keanettir N"'a(_,La"f‘=
_ IS I_9 . »~ r . M k _____________ __ __ » - - ' . ate ac rt yr, atr[...]......... .. ruce orsie ~ r . r W r R . . ep an or: art,
exec, producer _ ____ar._i¢e Horsfieid 1st[...]: g:?1tnt:y’g"p e‘r:‘o‘rr:g;yrrE;"r1°;r':K Synopsis: Prime Time is a new concept in
frodg.r:ccountant.. .Manfred and Mrcrgallum 2;cr>_rd)ur;:so}rs risgrirsrtcrarntbased draalghéibglnpgfiy Spe[...]company. 1
Gauge“ _____ _,35 mm life and times ofis ‘he new currem afiairs
accounts, the story ill[...]SOR POOPSNAGLE'S
. . . . . . . . . .. es 1" video ta
NOT SUITABLE Fora ADULTS Prod. company. Cr[...]

Synopsis: The true story of two mothers who
gave birth to daughters in the Kyneton
Hospital in 1945. One of the mothers, subse-
quently believing the babies[...]extensive litigation.
The story follows the lives of the families as
the daughters grow into young wom[...]Standby props. Peter Davies
Art dept runner K m Vaitiekus
Set construction. hris Budrys
Asst ed[...]ynopsis: A film based on the extraordinary
events of the 1971 Qantas bomb hoax.

COPING[...]e), Naren
Morrison, Toby Slade.

Synopsis: Part 4 of the four-part Full of Life
series, a series designed to introduce
children to the concept of a healthy,
balanced life. Adults are often obsess[...]o their lives, but mental well-being and the
idea of ‘‘self'’ are concepts not often pre-
sented[...]splaced Czechoslovakian migrant.
During World war if, as a doctor in the
German army. Cari Zlinter did[...]vis Latter (Milk bar assistant).
Synopsis: Part 2 of the four-part Full of Life
series, a series designed to introduce child-
ren to the concept of a healthy, balanced life.
Fuelling Up introduces children to the world
of good food by explaining that food is not
just taste, it is fuel. The programme doesn't
simply tell children what to eat, it shows
them what happens to food after it is eaten.
The process of digestion, the range of foods
we need and the chemical content of food
are all explained in such a way that children
will learn “they are what they eat”.

GAME OF LIFE
(Formerly Youth In Australia ’85)
Prod. co[...]d
Prod. design .. .....Bob Hill
Prod. research co-or Ina ors.... ..Kris Wyld,
Judy Menczel

Prod. mana[...]tock.. ....... ..Video

cast: Nick Conway (Master of Ceremonies),
Denny Gordon (Miss Heroine), lan Nim[...]ett Thompson, Mark
Wooder.

Synopsis: The project is a series of eight
television programmes designed to reflect
the realities of being a young person in
Australia in 1985.

THE G[...]aniatis family, a fictitious Wollongong
household of Greek origin, and the aspira-
tions of the daughter, Anastasia, who wants
to be a rock music performer. It combines
drama, music and humour and is in English
and Greek with English sub-titles.

TH[...].................. .. ...Philli Cornford
Director of photography .. lie Ryan
Sound recordist. Lloyd a[...]the unimagin-
able shattered the traditional calm of the
venerable Victorian Club in Melbourne.

Pr[...]men burst through the doors to
relieve bookmakers of over $2 million in un-
traceable cash. This mini-[...]f alone and unemployed in Sydney
Town. Her plight is brought to the attention of
the local bishop's wife, who offers her a
small g[...]is: Hector, a handicapped boy,
becomes the centre of international media
attention when he is abducted by a bunyip.
The bunyip, Hector’s friend and an accepted
member of Hector’s foster family, saves
Hector fro[...]

A SENSE OF DIRECTION

Prod[...]1 video
Shooting stock

Synopsis: An examination of the prepara-
tion and staging of the 1 1th World Orienteer-
ing Championships by A[...]tate
Park, Central Victoria.

SHOUT — THE STORY OF
JOHNNY O’KEEFE

Prod. company ................[...]n
..Jenny
...Sal|y Campbell,
Blossom Flint

....l or Lazareff
Sal y Campbell
Alan Fleming
.....Jacqui[...](Bill Haley). Ritchie

s: A dramatised recreation of the life
ndary King of Rock and
'Keefe.

ia‘s I

SPEARFlELD'S DAUGHTER[...]Kim Braden, Ross Petty,

gl

Synopsis: The story of an Australian news-
paperwoman. the daughter of a senator, who
is posted to cover the Vietnam War. From
there, she[...]ts around the world, culminating
in her take-over of a newspaper chain in the
United States.

STUDIO 8[...].Lynn Poynter
Casting... Jennifer Allen
Lighting di .. ruce Liebeau
Camera operators .....Richard Bon[...]s and three
barmaids retreat to the ladies lounge of a
pub after having marched down George
Street in[...]r men and their striving for equality.
The climax of the play is the decision to drink
in the greatest bastion of male supremacy,
the public bar.

STUDIO 86 — RE[...]hor, behind
in his rent, ins to create characters of a
play they gr ually assume independence.
Mr and[...]who are about to be evicted when a
strange twist of fortune places them, for the
first time, in a position where they have a
chance to take control of their lives.

STUDIO 86 — SISTERS IN THE[...]e
as sisters, some people might say un-
healthily so. in a crowded house with a large
family their rel[...]o Sydney's beaches and a residents’
association is meeting in the surf club. The
peaceful beauty of the beach is under threat
from developers but perhaps a meetin[...]aret, his former love, may change the

ay.

SWORD OFSu Wood
Wrangler..... Ger d Egan
Arrnourer..... ..Br[...]mily saga set
a alnst the turbulence and optimism of
h een of the most significant years in Aus-
tralia's hist[...]A series tracing the last four years
in the life of novelist Robert Louis Steven-
son, which were spent in the South Pacific,
Sydne and Western Samoa. The title is
taken om the name that the Samoans gave
to their beloved friend, it means "teller of
tales".

TWO FRIENDS

Prod. company...
Dist. comp[...]aner Girl, Arguing Woman).

Synopsis: Two Friends is about friendships
— about two best friends at school — about
the confusing period of middle teens, when
childhood is discarded for the beginnings of

adulthood, when characters are developedfik

Please help us keep this survey
accurate. Phone Debi Enker on
(O3) 329 5983 with any errors or
omissions.

CINEMA PAPERS January — 57

"K

Fred Harden looks at some of the new electronic equipment and production hardware on show
at the Institute of Radio and Electronics Engineers convention — IR[...]mber to 4 October.

While the emphasis at IREECON is on
broadcast electronics, the Convention also
provides the opportunity to look at some of
the recent developments in film and tele-
vision technology, especially in the support
areas of programme production, audio and
lighting equipment. What follows is a brief
summary of some of the items that caught
my attention as being significant.

But before getting on to that, it is worth
noting some very sophisticated soft-
ware/h[...]ine wire services as well,
and need never put pen or typewriter to
paper. The saving in time and the reduced
handling of information is considerable.

in the film and video areas, the most
dramatic event was the display of the Sony
HDVS (high-definition video system). I h[...]an high-definition programme
material in the form of a video clip with
Wendy Stapleton and Peter Sulli[...]tions around Melbourne, Volk Moi was
the director of photography, and the tech-
nical results were bre[...]screen video projector.
approached the resolution of 35mm film.

The Sony high-definition system is one of
the most developed of all the television
experiments. it achieves high-quality results
by increasing the number of scan-lines in
the broadcast image. Our PAL televi[...]l lines; the Sony
increases this to 1125. As this is not com-
patible with current world broadcast
formats, and the SMPTE is still trying to
finalize a standard for high-defi[...]eo image obtainable to
be down-converted to a PAL or NTSC
standard, or to a 35mm printer via an
electron-beam.

To enhance the comparison with film, the
screen format is wider, in an aspect of 5:3;
and, although the quality from the screen
mo[...]monitors are limited
physically by the mechanics of the tube
design and the mask. The video projector[...]e.

The implications are important for the
future ofof directors, including
George Lucas and Francis Ford Coppola,
have used the system. and it will only be a
year or so before it is used for a complete
feature or a part of one.

58 — January CINEMA PAPERS

The arrival of high-definition as a tele-
vision broadcast forma[...]tion. A standard PAL TV channel
uses a band-width of about 7 MHz, while
the Sony HDVS frequency is 30 MHz. We
could have a high-definition channel on our
VHF band if we got rid of the three existing
stations, though a more likely[...]at would be difficult to
implement, as the amount of power
required for transmission is not possible on
the existing satellites.

The solution is in some form of data com-
pression, so that only the information
relating to the parts of the image that have
changed significantly from th[...]tted frame would be broadcast.
There are a number of these systems being
developed, and the most promising is the
one from NHK, the Japanese broadcasting
corpo[...]ers with
film and audio equipment was the subject
of an earlier article on computers in film-
making ([...]AEC
Mark 3 controller, and had almost every
type of broadcast and non~broadcast VCR
connected to it.[...]accurately, a time-code edit list
on a disk that is compatible with the de
facto industry-standard CMX format.

The usual method to date is to match a
cut workprint in a synchronizer that has the
neg interlocked with a strip of film with con-
tinuous SMPTE time-code numbers pr[...]as a leader put at its head, and the start
number of the film with the time-codes is

Bottom left, Sor1y’s high-definition video[...]er.

locked to a start frame. The take on the neg
is found that matches the workprint, using
the edge numbers, and this is locked
beside the negative. The start and end tim[...]cene are read off
and written down, and this list is used by the
tape operator to edit from, after the nega-
tive or a print is transferred on the telecine
to 1" tape.

Chris Ftowell started developing her
system with the use of a large LED display
that was connected to the syn[...]simple matter for the computer
to compile a list ofif required.
There are full-list management facilities (you
can change or insert new scenes or num-
bers from other sources), and the result is
supplied as a hard-copy print-out and on a[...]

Miller tripods w[...]but suitable for the lighter
16mm cameras up to 8 kg (18 lbs), the

Below, left, Christie Electroni[...]stem to correct nose/tail heavy
cameras, and this is in addition to the quick-
release plate that slides for fine tuning. The
head weighs 2 kg. Price: $450.

The aluminium-alloy compact tripod has
a camera capacity of 15 kg, and each of
the legs consists of three tubular sections
that collapse to 655 mm and extend to
1400 mm. it is available with a 75 mm or
100 mm bowl, and looks very good, with a
semi-matte black finish. There is a built-in
spreader with positive locking screws. It
weighs 4.5 kg, Price: $350.

At the Rank Electronics display was the
new 12K HMI, the SlRl0 1200. its price was
quoted at ‘j[...]$25,000. The lamp-
house size gives no indication of the extra
punch this lamp has, but you could believe
it from the weight of the ballast unit. Bank
will have the SlFllO 1200s for hire, and it will
be interesting to see the acceptance of the
big HMls where arcs have been the only
real a[...]vice,
designed by Craig Anderton, American
author of many useful build-it-yourself audio
articles and books. Its keyboard is a modi-
fied Commodore Vic 20 computer. For
about[...]chines to be interlocked with \/CRs. The
emphasis is on use for music composition.

Vinten showed a number of heads and
camera support systems, including their[...]for a
pedestal mount). TCN9 have a Merlin, and
it is interesting to see that Vinten have
always been a[...]e a perfect crane for film-
work on the table-top or special-effect com-
mercials.

Another UK company[...]small video equipment-dis
tributor with a number of products of their
own design. Aimed at the small video pro-
duction house, or film editing houses with
off-line video installat[...]the Liftroy time-code
lnserter TC-1 ($1490). This is a low-cost
way to read longitudinal time-code and[...]d act as a time-
code reader for edit suites, but is also being
promoted as an off-line unit.

Among t[...]igned equip-
ment was a clever non-digital method of
horizontally moving and locking a video
frame so that titles, etc, can be reposi-
tioned. The pict[...]rator that displays a superimposed
outline border of title, safe area, title with
adjustable horizonta[...]cross—hair. Powered from the
ENG video cameras or from mains, the
device draws 130mA and weighs 375 g.

Mediavision were demonstrating their
range of lighting and grid systems, and had
the news that[...]lamp. It can be supplied with a hand-
grip stand or 1/2" spiggot clamp. The Mini-
Pro range has been around for sometime,
but has undergone a change of colour —
it's now a fashionable grey —— and will
accept a 30-volt 250w lamp for hand—he|d
battery or camera-mounted use.

On the 3 Arts stand was another range of
lights by the Italian manufacturer, Desisti.
With[...]for hand-held
use, the 200w Tiziano. The 200w CID is a
single-ended lamp, focusable by a thumb-
wheel near the handle, and it will run from
AC, or a 24v or 30v DC supply. Unlike the
standard HMls, the Tizi[...]remain flicker-free. With
the ballast, the price is approximately
$4,500 complete.

On the Filmtronic[...]peration (and even
supplying a hard-copy printout if required),
it should be the ultimate charger for[...]pply
(handles 90 to 265 volts AC and 47 to
44OHz, or even 12 or 28 volts DC with an
optional module), the CASP analyzes the
charge state of up to six batteries. dis-
charges them if required, then fast- or slow-
charges the battery at its optimum rate. it[...]350 watts), and has a 1/0 port for the
connection of a bar-code reader or to a
separate computer printer. This would
allow a number of batteries, each with bar-
code identification, to be logged quickly, so
that a history of use is kept.

The unit is apparently very effective with
the Christie reFLE[...]take about 40 minutes. The con-
trolled discharge is one of the most
important aspects of the CASP, and charge
and discharge cycles will maintain the maxi-
mum capacity of the ni-cads, which tend to
‘learn’ a particular bottom level of charge if
not fully discharged. The basic CASP sells
for about $7,200.

if you are looking for a cheap way to do
an off-line edit, or need quality 1/2" VHS pro-
grammes, then the new[...], and $1,970 for the editing
controller, a system of two machines and
controller with a couple of small monitors
would come to about $10,000. And t[...]e break-up. You can insert
edit vision and either of the two audio tracks
independently, There are spe[...]and search functions that give the
units the feel of more expensive 5%"
machines.

A special circuit m[...]ssible, and the VCR
will accept external sync in, or connection
to, atime-base corrector. The lay-out of the
controls and the flexibility of the functions
should make the BR-8600E a winner f[...]rices quoted here
are approximate, and may be out-of-date
by the time of publication. For UK equip-
ment, Australia[...]

screens, all varieties of stage curtains, multipurpose staging L:-D
systems[...]wns. THEATRE AND STAGE EOUWMENT

Brakell Products is a division of Rank Electronics Lighting Group.

So get to know us at Brakell, and you ll appreciate[...]Aumw

A“5"a"a" P'°"‘I°"° 39350" THE CHOICE or PROFESSIONALS THE WORLD oven
L59 Toorak Rd[...]

REBEL

The same logic that it took for Kath[...]about getting it all to look right.

A fine bit of inspiration that might have
been for conceiving a[...]bears all the structural
and stylistic trademarks of a musical into
which melodrama has been added for
good measure. The result is a film that
works best as a musical, with its gre[...]the film gives a realistic treatment to the
story of the relationship between an Ameri-
can deserter,[...]m. As might have been
expected, however, the film is more inter-
ested in the love story than in the caustic
issues of nationalism and patriotism that
were contained in[...]Air-Raid
Club’, with a narrative technique that is
traditional: as in 42nd Street and the
AstairelFi[...]he developing love affair.
At the film’s centre is the appropriately
named club, the subterfuge of a war-
stricken city — a spectacular array of art

deco and modernist technology. From the
outside, it is a drab Nissen hut; inside, a
pink neon plane hang[...]covered in Victory posters and
a predominant glow of red, white and blue.

The harsh realities of the outside world
are reflected here in the narci[...]for the
predatory soldiers. In the best tradition of
backstage musicals, Rebel is not just enter-
tainment: it is about entertainment, and the
emotional force is in the performance. From
the rich texture of melody, rhythm, colour,
camerawork and movement s[...]rne, in her first
film role, displays the talent of a performer
who can spontaneously bring forth
emotions, even if they are deeper than the
song or lyrics allow for.

Designer Brian Thomson's rationale
seems to be that all sorts of unreal worlds
become believable if they are properly
defined in front of the camera. Thus, Thom-
son and costume designer[...]orphic Panavision format by Peter
James, the film is a sumptuous achieve
ment in production values. An[...]Raid Club are the over-
crowded, bustling streets of Sydney. MPs
on motorbikes hot on Fiebel's trail,[...]es and
soldiers characterize the seedy atmosphere
of Kings Cross and ‘the Loo’, Sydney's
dock area[...]eping crane shots give the street
scenes a sense -of playful, yet ever-present
danger. The ubiquitous Bryan Brown neatly
fits the role of Tiger Kelly, the guileful spiv
(his name derives[...]on, then elusively slithering away.