GEOFFREY WRIGHT



After Lover Boy, Romper Stomper and Metal Skin, you seem to have a particular niche in Australian cinema. What do you see as your contribution?

I think that what I have contributed - if I have contributed anything - is this: a look at the fringe of our cities. That is in terms of content. This has been coupled rather intimately with the stylistic thing about my films. I don't separate this from the content. The style is a kind of `operatic high relief'. It is a melodramatic, highly manipulated, but not necessarily manipulative (in the conventional sense), approach to my work. It probably draws just as much inspiration from MTV as it has from people like Roman Polanski, Stanley Kubrick or Martin Scorsese - people who have maintained authorship of their work and control of their work. I still have an enormous respect for and am in awe of them, especially Kubrick.

Is it correct to see A Clockwork Orange in some of the sequences of Romper Stomper - in the subway or in the robbery at the wealthy man's house?

In as much as I thought that practically everyone had seen A Clockwork Orange and that I couldn't move in on that genre without referring to it, I didn't think that there would be any harm in referring to it. If we're trying to be honest about those characters, we could say that they would have seen the film too. So there was a certain irony in putting them in situations which the film had depicted. And, of course, we do hear the odd story in this country about those kinds of crimes. There are more of them in America.

The strange thing about A Clockwork Orange is that advocates of censorship are gleeful over the fact that Kubrick won't let it be released on video in England, but what they don't realise is that Kubrick and his family received death threats, `If you allow the film to be released, we're going to bomb your house'. So Kubrick is acting on a fear of terrorism rather than a belief in the causal relationship between his film and crime in the community. I find that quite ironic.

There was quite an amount of criticism of Romper Stomper. In retrospect how do you see the criticism and your reaction?

I find - and I thought this might happen - that the dust has settled a bit. I find that people still talk about it at dinner parties and get into rows about it. But I also find that there are more people now that are prepared to give the film the benefit of the doubt and to listen. This didn't happen when the film first came out. It had its supporters and it had its very vocal opposition. And a lot of people said, `I don't want to know about this. I don't know what the opposition is saying, but I certainly think that this film looks horrible'. Now I find that there are a lot of people catching up with the film on video, people who were perhaps too embarrassed to go to the cinema. I think that there's a reappraisal of the film amongst those sections of the public that weren't our target audience to begin with, and I think that reappraisal will go on.

I think that it's a film which is going to be a recognisable point in the history of Australian films, much more so than some other films that were released at the same time that were much vaunted and applauded. While people will think about the money, the incredible amount of money that certain films grossed, rather than what was in those films, I think people will still be talking about the content of Romper Stomper ten years from now.

The response to Metal Skin? Less dramatic?

Yes, thankfully. But, I mean, I wasn't setting out to make another film as controversial as Romper Stomper. I don't know that that would be possible and I would be a fool even to attempt it. That's not my job. I'm not out there to raise hell for its own sake. I'm not interested in that. Unfortunately, what I am interested in occasionally provokes strong responses anyway, so I suppose I'm never going to make a film which people will walk out of saying, `Oh, yeah, well, that was quite nice'.

Metal Skin, even though it's obviously less controversial, still leaves people with the same kind of hung, drawn and quartered feeling, psychologically, as Romper Stomper did. And if you look at the faces of people coming out of Metal Skin, they're very similar to the looks on faces of people when they came out of Romper Stomper. There are a lot of white faces, a lot of ashen faces and people have said to me, `Don't ask me what I think of that. I have to process it. I have to think about it', because it is a very dense film. It stands up well to a second viewing or even a third.

A lot of people say that they like it better the second time. I hope I'm not sounding like I'm blowing my own trumpet here, but it's actually a very dense film. There's a lot loaded in there, and if you care to work your way through the hieroglyphics, there is a lot going on.

I wanted to show the characters' psyches from the inside out. If they `see red' then the audience can see red in the images. Some of the experience is psychotic so it is shown in a way that communicates this.

Why the western suburbs of Melbourne? Because they are familiar or a special symbolic place?

They are symbolic because, for me, they have a certain atmophere. Basically the western suburbs remind me of what Melbourne used to be as the manufacturing centre of Australia. It's that no more. Consequently there's a lot of empty buildings. Things are on the upturn now, getting better and those buildings are being filled up with all sorts of things. But you must realise that these films were all conceived and written in a three to four-year period. They all happened in quick succession on paper. Metal Skin was written before Romper Stomper was shot. It was written while I was waiting for the money to come through for Romper Stomper. I was living in Laverton at the time. I spent five years in Laverton. It's just off the Geelong Highway and it wins Tidy Town awards. But while I was there, it was a place for that cliche, quiet desperation. Nothing rang truer than that.

I remember riding on a bicycle at night through the place and I used to imagine that those petro-chemical plants, which have never ceased operating, were actually spewing out more toxic fumes during the night than they were during the day. I thought that, maybe, they can get away with it more during the night. I realised that in Laverton we were a long way away from any kind of organised entertainment, or anything really. If you wanted entertainment, if you wanted to go to the movies, you had to get into a car and get on the highway and drive, perhaps, to Werribee, which has its own problems, or into Footscray. But whatever you do, you have to have a car.

I also remember one night travelling on the Altona line to get to Laverton and I thought, `I don't want to catch the train'. It was late at night. I didn't have my car, so I got the train . Sure enough there were some pretty shifty, dodgy-looking characters on the train. Then all of a sudden the lights went out. The train went faster and faster and faster, and lo and behold, we passed through a station - I forget which one it was, one of the stations in Altona - so help me God, it was on fire. The station was on fire. So the train driver had taken it upon himself, rather than to slow down and go into the flames, to decide to accelerate through. So never let anyone tell you that the western suburbs are dull. The lights were out. We were sitting there in the darkness. He was accelerating, and we barrelled through a station which was on fire, with towering columns of flame. Finally we got to the end of the line. It was like something out of Indiana Jones.

The locations of your films are not only the fringe, but the edge. These young people are living on the edge.

Well, what do you do when you live on the edge? We underestimate boredom in our society. We think boredom is a petty emotion. It's not. It's a form of anger. When you're bored, you don't know you're alive, so you turn to things which make you feel you're alive. This is very much what Romper Stomper was about, and Lover Boy and, of course, Metal Skin. I'm singing the same song, I really am - different choruses.

Boredom, then rage, then anger and the vicious outbursts.

Yes, and misunderstanding and confusion and introversion. You meet these kids who move in on their own worlds, whether they're tribal as in Romper Stomper or totally personal as in Joe's Metal Skin world, with his ambitious million-dollar invention.

Young people who are being forced to make choices from a position of weakness rather than strength usually make the wrong choices. There are so many choices but no rock-solid social certainties. There is no one thing to believe in especially in the social dislocation resulting from eighteen years of recession.

The other thing the film is about is the responsibility of young men. A lot of young men came up to me at previews and say, `we really got into Romper Stomper. I'm not sure about this one'. And I've said, `Listen, buddy, that's because this film is about the lack of responsibility of your group, of you guys, of you too, and how you treat girls and your parents and yourselves and your mates'. It's about young male irresponsibility, and Dazey is the penultimate irresponsible male.

Joe says Dazey didn't deserve to be loved.

He didn't deserve to be loved. Unfortunately, it's an unjust world and love is not necessarily given to the worthy. It's often given for reasons which people can't control. That's the shame of it. But we have to learn to live with it. We can't say that the guilty will be punished by an act of God. Justice often takes a long time.

The migrant experience is central and crucial to your films. You have the migrant trauma of the Asian people in Romper Stomper and the reaction of the mainly Anglo-Celtic? people who are neo-Nazis. Then in Metal Skin there are the eastern and southern European migrants who contrast with characters like Roslyn Harrison and Robert Day. They survive, but the migrants don't. The most pessimistic aspect of Metal Skin is that Savina and Joe die.

It's funny, isn't it - if you look at docors and lawyers in our society, there still mainly Anglo-Celtic? groups. The migrant groups tend to go to other professions and jobs - there's a lot of real estate agents and people like that - but in the corridors of power it's still an Anglo-Celtic? game. The same with politics, with the odd exception, your Al Grassbys and people like that. But, they're visible because they are out of the ordinary. By and large, considering the proportion of the population which they make up, migrants are still under-represented in the professional classes; and I don't know why. Doctors and lawyers, politicians and money-movers, people who know how to move wealth in our community (which is fundamentally a capitalist one), people who understand how wealth is generated and moved and acquired, are to this day by and large Anglo-Celtic?.

Further, they are educated in the private school system and they have children who are let in on their secrets. And on and on it goes. I'm not a Left-winger, really, about anything - except education. I'm infuriated by the discrepancy in the quality of education that people receive in our community and I don't understand why we tolerate it. I find it awful.

The other aspect of the migrant experience is that Savina's mother is mad, obsessive with her continual brushing.

Yes, obsessive-compulsive.

... and Joe's father is quite mad. What has driven them mad? What do you think has driven them mad in Australia?

I think that people like that are subject to the same sort of pressures that a lot of Anglo-Celtic? people are subject to; but whatever else happens, there's always one more straw that may break the camel's back, and that is the fact that you're among migrants and a minority. And the bottom line is our multiculturalism. We think of ourselves as a multicultural society, and in terms of recreation we are. But in terms of how the country is run and the organisation and the channeling of wealth and power, we are monocultural. And that is the dominant Anglo-Celtic? culture. If you want to learn how to move money, you have to understand how the Anglo- Celts work. I hope that doesn't sound like some kind of mad racist statement, but what I'm saying is that that network, the professional network, has nothing to do with a Greek influence or a Rumanian influence or an Italian influence. Capitalism is an Anglo invention, a western European thing.

On a certain level there's something for Anglo- Celts to take pride in, in the fact that they gave birth to the parliamentary system, but along with that there was capitalism that always worked in tandem; and, unless you play their game and are part of their network and understand how they think, you aren't going to get to the bottom of how our society works.

The background and treatment of religion are of particular interest in Metal Skin. You have the Rumanian Orthodox tradition: Joe has the icon of the Madonna next to his broken mirror; his father, who fled the communists in the early 50s also has his icons. Why choose the Orthodox Christian tradition, images and its music? What was the specific religious focus?

I think that people are desperate for a transcendent or transcending spiritual grasp of the world, and we often resort to institutionalised religions for that. It is the logical thing to do. That is an example of people clinging to something that they feel may empower them. Even in the backblocks of Altona, next to the petro-chemical plant, there is God. And that's what they think. So they need to be reminded of it. That's why we have religious icons, to be reminded, and to focus our meditative attentions on religious images like that.

As regards the Rumanian background, in the back of my mind was the thought that I wanted something Gothic (with echoes of the Dracula myths).

Were the icons there simply as background? Did they have some influence on Joe or his father?

I see Joe basically (I think he sees himself) as a kind of age-of-reason-type figure, a Newtonian figure, who may be putting religion on the back burner and is more concerned with Newtonian physics and the new mechanical inventions. Joe sees the answer to his problems in a kind of revolutionary idea, as he describes it, in `separating the oxygen from the hydrogen'. He's going to be a scientist. He thinks he can transcend his problems with a scientific breakthrough. So, for him, the religious iconography that we see in the house and beside his mirror is basically the past and a reminder of the limitations of the past: the fact that God may be present but my immediate surroundings are still materially depressed, I can't tolerate this any more, and I'm alone; I'm going to get in touch with the bigger community by this scientific breakthrough because I can't do it with the Orthodox religion; so I'm going to do it scientifically because that is the common language, the lingua franca, of the modern world, science. So that's his answer.

Savina's answer is through an old, old nature-based kind of religion which began as pagan, and which was painted, I suppose, by the early Christians as being anti-Christian or an Antichrist thing. And that is the memory, the piece of history, the notion that she has adopted, that is genuinely anti-Christian. Her religion is a religion with one member - Savina. So she's going to empower her life through her religion. She's the minister and she's the member and she's the congregation. She's all these things in one. So she's going to plant this seed in the bigger seed of the established church. But, of course, things go wrong for her too.

I don't believe in the supernatural myself and I don't see any cause or effect in her rituals. But she believes that there is. The train of events turns out, but not through black magic. But, of course, there are elements and forces and we are not aware of their influence.

After all her rituals, the parodies of traditional religion and the iconography in the church and in her room and home, especially those associated with her mother, she hides from the priest on the roof of the church - he seems to be sympathetic...

Yes, he's not a hostile figure.

... but she could not literally hold on to the church any more.

Yes, she's a fallen angel. I don't know, there may be something in the story of Satan for her. But it is like the Miltonian Satan rather than the New Testament Satan, Satan as Milton understood him. Maybe that's what happening, a sin of pride and the fall. When you think about what happens to her, it's a melodramatic, nightmarish surreal experience. I find the whole sequence very old-fashioned in a way because Savina defiles the church and she's swiftly punished. Basically, she's punished in the same way that Richard III is punished. She takes on too much. You find that the natural order of the world has to take up arms against such a bold vaunting interloper - as it does, whether you're Idi Amin or Adolf Hitler or Savina.

What about Joe's nightmare with Savina's mother hammering the nails into Joe?

What I'm saying there, in a basic kind of symbolism, is that Joe is being split. There's something penetrating his head. He doesn't understand it. He sees himself being martyred. That visitation of Savina in the nightmare is not supernatural. That was always intended to be a psychological experience, the result of the drugs and the alcohol. It's a kind of irony that, although she's dead, she continues to influence the living. Our memories of the dead influence us. The dead, if we remember them, are never really dead. My father is dead, but I don't think of him as dead because I can still hear him say things in my head. I can still hear him giving me advice.The electrical patterns in my mind make up the memory of him. It's odd. The memory is an extension of him now.

That notion is actually explored in the last chapter of `Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance', where Persik is remembering his dead son who was killed on the streets of San Francisco, after attending a religious meeting - he was murdered - and he says, `In a way my son lives inside me, because of my memories. He has left me something'. I think that's the notion here, only it's a very negative thing. It's Savina's frustration and her bitterness and her kind of melodramatic, bold, sweeping decisive action is being passed on to him.

Joe kills his father. That sort of thing happens - we read about it in the newspapers all the time - that kind of domestic tragedy. This time it is caused by a gang of kids, and he takes it out on Dazey. When the father dies, he says `Dazey, Dazey'. I think he also says, `Where are you?' or something like that. It's a kind of love-hate relationship. He really loves Dazey. And if he can't have him, he's going to kill him. Joe is an idealist. Idealism is doing what he thinks is right. But terrible things are done in the name of idealism.

That reminds me of the Queen Street massacre killer. He was after one person in particular. He killed all those other people. The person that he was after hid behind a bench and survived. All those other people died and he died too, but the one he was after survived. Jim Schembri said to me, `I don't understand why Joe is after Dazey if the people that trashed his house and attacked his father were the other gang'. I said to Jim, `Well, to begin with, worse than that is the fact that Savina is dead. He's coming to terms with it; and he knows that Dazey is behind all that', (plus the fact he's in love with Dazey). He hates Dazey and he's in love with him. People who wipe out their family love their kids when they put the bullet in their kids' heads. They love them, but they want to control their lives, they want to possess their lives.

And the complexity of his attraction to Ros, his relationship with her and his seeing Dazey betray her?

Yes. That's one thing about the film I'm very proud of, that it is, I think, appropriately complex.

Lover Boy in relation to the explorations of the later two films?

I think that Lover Boy probably contains my most reasonable characters and the ones that people can most easily relate to. I don't give them that kind of outlet in the other two films. Lover Boy, although it's equally pessimistic, is probably a bit more lyrical and the characters are more, shall I say user-friendly or less intimidating, less aggressive, less operatic? But certainly the progression is clear - I have noticed the films are becoming steadily more abstract. Lover Boy is quite linear. Romper Stomper is somewhat strident and shrill. Metal Skin is like fractured glass. It goes in four ways with the four characters. It's a much more challenging film.

In Metal Skin, you've used such a variety of styles, even within minutes: stridence, with jangling noise, screams, music and then silences. It moves into the imagination and into reality both past and present. And there is the circular structure of the film.

Well, with the new physics, they say that our idea of time as being linear results from the way our brains process the experience of time. If you think about time, what is time? It's movement. It's movement separating itself from other movement. So what do we think of time? Time is a very weird thing, and the way we think about time is a convenience born of the way our brains process information. I think that the past is the past: a past of ten days ago is no different from the past of ten seconds ago. It's all the past, and if you want to mix up these different pasts - which we do in our memories, and emotionally, - that's quite justified. So I do like to challenge our ideas about a linear kind of progression of time because most of what we regard as common sense is a convenience.

The US visceral approach to film-making is more authentic and compelling. It is images that make impact.

There were some changes after the festival screening in Venice?

Yes, probably half a dozen changes. On the soundtrack, special visual effects (we swapped a few shots around), a few reaction shots and things like that, half a dozen things which I thought made it a few degrees better. It's amazing. I always thought that there was a problem with the rhythm at a certain point in the film, but after we made those half a dozen changes, I was satisfied with the rhythm. I feel that the pace is quite good, considering the fact that we're telling the stories of four people - a very difficult thing to do.

Your using Shakespeare and operatic references?

Yes, I love Shakespeare with a passion, a great passion.

They're both pessimistic and tragic. Which word would you prefer?

Tragic. Tragic stories are the ones we're telling. What are they saying? I think Orson Welles said the great stories of the West are `Paradise Lost' with a death in it! getting booted out of the garden and confronting death. Our society has a great fear of death. And our society has a great resentment of youth as well, because youth have what we will never have again. But I think what I'm trying to say with all three films is that youth has its own horrors and its own difficulties. Don't envy youth. It's rough. Don't envy it. Youth have to get on and make the best of what is to come, because youth is a very difficult time. I think the only thing they've got going for them is skin cells that rejuvenate quicker than ours - but that's about it. Everybody's adolescence and early 20s are difficult times, and some of them are fatal.

How many male friends do I have that are now dead through drugs or hard living or who just they felt that they didn't want to go on any more. I've lost too many. So if people say to me, `Geoff, you're making another pessimistic film', I think `well, there are plenty of people out there making films that are going to make audiences feel good after a hard day's work, plenty. There must be space under the sun for me and what I want to do. I'm sorry but why are all these people dying? I just think that we should be less afraid to face death and be less resentful and less condemnatory'.

There was a Pearl Jam concert at the gardens near the Myer Music Bowl. I think a wire fence fell down and a lot of people surged in and didn't pay. The next thing you hear on the media, `we've got to stop this sort of thing; one of these kids could have been killed', - and this, that and the other. But they're kids. They want to have experiences. They want to have a good time. They need experience. How are they going to become adults unless they have experiences? You've got to let them do their thing, and if a bloody wire fence comes down from time to time, that's too bad. And if some of them get hurt - I know that we worry about them and we don't want any of them to get hurt, and I've just been saying about how too many of them die - but you can't put them in cotton wool. You've just got to make sure that they know that they're loved and everything will come out right after that. If they don't know that they're loved, they'll spend years looking for it in the wrong places or finding something else to replace it.

I don't see anything wrong with pessimism in the context of film. Life goes on, but film is not life. Tragedy shows the way things go wrong. If you can conduct your life better than that, well and good. A two hour film can't offer a `way out' but it can cast light on relationships and problems.

So you're a hopeful director, really, although you're involved in the tragic?

Look, why else would you do tragedy unless you think that someone is going to listen to you - but, don't do as my characters do. That's what I'm saying.



Interview: April 27th 1995, incorporating material from Press Conference at Venice Film Festival, 1994.

CAPTAIN RON

US, 1992, 100 minutes, Colour.
Kurt Russell, Martin Short, Mary Kay Place.
Directed by Thom Eberhardt.

Captain Ron is a very mild comedy from Touchstone Studios. It was written and directed by Tom Eberhardt, director of the amusing Sherlock Holmes spoof, Without a Clue, and the drama, Gross Anatomy. Martin Short (less frantic than usual) and Mary Kay Place are a couple who inherit an old boat. They also find that the captain of the boat is Captain Ron, played by a more than usually scruffy Kurt Russell. The expected things happen, the adventures on the boat, the slapstick comedy, the encounter with pirates and Cubans - and, of course, the change of heart of the parents and their two children.

1.Comedy, piece of Americana?

2.The Chicago settings, the contrast with the Caribbean, the sea, the islands, Florida? Musical score?

3.The title, the focus, the irony of Captain Ron and his abilities?

4.Martin at work, his hopes, with people? The office? Katherine and her work? Benjamin and his precocious attitudes? Caroline and her age, leather clothes, engagement? The bequest, the decision to take the boat?

5.The Caribbean, the dead uncle, the boat, wanting to sell it? The buyers and the imposition of Captain Ron to bring it back to Florida?

6.Ron, appearance, manner? His stories about the war? Calling Martin the boss, Katherine Kitty, Benjamin as Swab? One eye, asleep with the glass eye showing? His steering, burning the map by accident? Teaching the family how to manage the boat? Gambling, women? His losing the car and its going into the water? Escape from creditors? The pirates, pursuits? The family, learning from him, exasperations? Cuba, the car and the escape? Contacting the Coast Guard? His achievement with the family, the farewell? Seen with the new couple and the same spiel? Catalyst for change?

7.The family, the types, at home, taken on the boat, being transformed? Their reaction to Ron? Martin and the steering, the social life? Ron's behaviour? Caroline and men at the ports? Benjamin precocious? The slapstick comedy, the danger of the pirates, the achievement?

8.The pirates, their background, Cuba, the pursuit? Set adrift, the dangers? The reaction, the car, eluding the pirates at the end and their achievement?

9.The children, the change, their attitude towards their father, pride in him, the support of their mother?

10.The decision to stay with the boat, change their lifestyle? A comedy to respond to the needs of recession of the 1990s?

CAPTAIN KIDD

US, 1945, 90 minutes, Black and white.
Charles Laughton, Randolph Scott, Barbara Britton, Reginald Owen, John Carradine, Gilbert Roland, Sheldon Leonard.
Directed by Rowland V. Lee.

Captain Kidd is an enjoyable pirate yarn. Some of the production looks a bit cheap - perhaps the necessities of 1945. However, the black and white photography is effective, the studio sets are sometimes good, as for the palace and for the cabins on the ship, sometimes weak, as for the models of the pirate ships. There is a rousing score. However, the film stands out because of the performance by Charles Laughton as Captain Kidd. It is a lower-key version of his Captain Bligh from The Mutiny on the Bounty. This is a callous man, quietly spoken yet vicious, greedy and ruthless - with an ironic tone. Laughton obviously enjoys this role. Randolph Scott is a rather stolid period hero. However, there is good support from Reginald Owen as the servant, Gilbert Roland as Lorenzo and John Carradine as Povey. The film was directed by Rowland V. Lee, veteran of a number of period dramas from the '30s and '40s.

1.Enjoyable pirate adventure? The 17th century and the tradition of the pirates? The English and Spanish navies? The plunder? The buried treasure? The cut-throat attitudes of the pirates? The reactions of governments?
2.Black and white photography, studio sets, effects? Making the film credible? The musical score?

3.Charles Laughton's portrayal of Captain Kidd: his career, pirate, the buried treasure, killing his opposition and burying them? The journey to England, his pretence, his humility in the court of William III? Persuasive manner of speech, simplicity? His ambition for the Blaine household and properties? His getting his crew? His reliance on Lorenzo and Boyle? Povey and his arrival, the battle of wits? Taking on Mercy? Shadwell's servant? The voyage, the confrontation with his previous partners? The mission, the taking of the ship, the taking of the treasure, the killing of the ambassador? Kidd and the confrontation with Mercy? Mercy and his fight with Lorenzo, Lorenzo's death? Kidd engineering Boyle's death? The clash, the digging up of the treasure? The punishment of Mercy, his escape on the boat, his disappearance? The lady? Kidd's return to England, the visit to William III, the report about his piracy, Povey's death? The appearance of Blaine and the lady? His last words on the gallows?

4.The sketch of the pirates: Lorenzo and his help to Kidd, his attachment to the lady, the fight with Mercy? Boyle and his indiscretions? Povey and his shrewdness, the bargaining, self-protection? The pirate crew?

5.Mercy, in Newgate Prison, his pirate background, on the boat, the clash with Kidd? His really being Blaine, his sense of mission? the burning of the ship? The lady? The revelation of the truth to her? Shadwell and his assistance? His own servant? The attempts on his life? His escape? The vindication at the end?

6.The lady, the death of her father, in love with Blaine, happy ending? Shadwell and his service, service to Kidd, help to Blaine, his death?

7.The court of England, territories, ships, ambassadors, treasure, justice?

8.The popular ingredients of pirate stories? The legends of the pirates? How enjoyable an example?

CAPPUCCINO

Australia, 1989, 84 minutes, Colour.
John Clayton, Rowena Wallace, Jeannie Drynan.
Directed by Anthony Bowman.

Cappuccino was written and directed by Anthony Bowman, who wrote and directed the comedy Relatives.

This is a film about the world of theatre and television in Australia. The characters echo many of the personalities of the media. The screenplay is full of witticisms as well as barbs towards the industry. There is much to amuse, especially in the performances of John Clayton as the taxi-driver stand-up comic, of Rowena Wallace as the successful, if slightly cynical, stage star who becomes a director and Jeannie Drynan as the rather flighty actress who can't get a role.

There are also odd characters from stage, from soap operas, from stand-up comedy as well as corrupt police.

In some ways, there is too much material in the film for its short running time and its portrait of stage and television stars. However, it is a light-hearted look at the media and it entertains.

1.Entertaining film about the media, the world of stage, films and television? Wit? Spoof? Satire?

2.The Sydney world of the media, theatres, studios, stand-up comedy restaurants, police stations? Homes? The musical score?

3.The title of the film, Max's play - how much was real, how much invented? Play within a play? The cafe as the meeting place for the central characters - and their cappuccinos?

4.How authentic the characters and situations? How contrived? How much stylised? How much posing and posturing?

5.The Australian media, film and television industries? The satire on the types, the satire on situations? How much valid criticism?

6.The device of having Max do the narration in closed-up? As stand-up comic style? Explaining the characters and the plot? Moving the plot along? How much corresponded to the characters as we saw them? How much Max's interpretation for the purposes of a play? The intensity of John Clayton's performance, his humour, accent, his ability to create characters? The finale and his presenting the play to the characters - and the camera drawing back to show the movie within a movie?

7.Max, training, confiding to the audience in an acting style, taxi-driving and his telling jokes to the passengers, his stand-up comic routines? His first attempt and its failure? Celia and her laughing, the others in sympathy? The party afterwards? His persevering? His giving up the jokes and Celia's being hurt? His telling the yarns and his success? Regular employment? His still taxi-driving? His relationship with Celia, the tensions, her leaving? His friendship with Anna and the past relationship, Maggie and the past relationship? Comparisons with Larry as the glamorous star of soap opera? The videos and the policeman having been injured in the accident, hospital, the videos and the blackmail of the official? Celia taking the video? Max and his disappointment in Celia's departure, having to cope? The questions of the police, his being imprisoned for parking fines, his experience in prison and writing the play? Getting out? Handing the parts to the various characters? Dealing with his life and relationships?

8.Maggie, the audition, her flighty style, disappointments? Her reputation, advertisements? Friendship with Anna? With Max? With Larry? Relationships, comments? Her Brazilian boyfriend and the relationship? Her continued attempts to get jobs, always missing out? Her support of Max? Her observing of the situations and characters? The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie, her ultimate success? Anna directing her? Her reaction to the screenplay?

9.Anna, cynical style, going for auditions (and fulfilling what Max said about people who get parts)? Friendship with Maggie? Support of Max? Relationship with Larry? Her frank style? Her reaction to Celia and her humour? The jobs, the auditions? Having to tell the bad news to Maggie? Her failure as a director? The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie and the rave reviews? Her wanting to console Max? Her criticisms of Maggie's Brazilian boyfriend - and her relationship with him? Personality and style?

10.Larry, the soap opera star, concerned about himself, his looks? With the group, response to Max? Relationship with Celia, living with her, offering her jobs? Yet self-centred? His nightmare, being dismissed from the soap opera, watching the episodes with Celia? Driving the taxi? The comic touches with his suicide attempts, Celia's reaction?

11.Celia, laughing at Max's jokes? Not enjoying the stories? Her age, experience? Ambitions? The flashback to Max at work, the filming of the condoms and her tantrum? With max, the relationship, attracted to Larry, hoping to get television jobs? Looking at the video, taking it, concealing it? The police and their questions, the attack on Max, the attack on Larry? Attack on herself? The filming of the film - and her shooting Bollinger?

12.Bollinger, the videos, taping the officials? Corruption and bribery? The taxi, the accident? Strong-arm tactics on Max? The realisation that he was a policeman? Partnership with Nigel? Comic and inept touches? Threats? His not getting his way? Nigel, hoping to be in films? Partnership? Loyalty to Bollinger?

13.The world of the cafe, of cappuccinos, of the staff, Bollinger's strong-arm tactics, the owner and his providing a place of refuge for the actors?

14.The wit of the screenplay? How incisive? Critical? Humorous? A portrait or a perspective on the Australian media of the late '80s?

CANDY

US, 1968, 124 minutes, Colour.
Ewa Aulin, Richard Burton, Marlon Brando, James Coburn, Walter Matthau, Charles Aznavour, John Huston, Elsa Martinelli, Ringo Starr, John Astin.
Directed by Christian Marquand.

Candy was an oddball comedy in the late '60s. In later decades, it is still a curiosity, something of a relic of the attitudes of the late '60s.

The screenplay was written by Buck Henry, actor, writer and director, from the sex novel by Terry Southern. (Southern was the author of Red Alert, the novel on which Dr Strangelove was based - and Walter Matthau reprises the mad general role dramatised by George C. Scott and Sterling Hayden in Dr Strangelove.)

The film is meant to be some kind of allegory of America in the '60s - showing the innocent nymphet (innocent Lolita type) at the prey of various men, especially celebrities in their field: Richard Burton hamming as a celebrated Welsh poet a la Dylan Thomas, Walter Matthau successful as a gung-ho American general, James Coburn as a surgeon who performs like a bullfighter, Marlon Brando as an odd guru. Charles Aznavour, Ringo Starr and John Huston also appear. John Astin has the dual role of Candy's father and uncle. A strong supporting cast led by the director of the movie, Christian Marquand, and Italian stars is in evidence. Celebrated photographer Giuseppe Rotunno was the photographer and Dave Grusin composed the music. The film has quite extraordinary credits - but does not quite live up to them. A certain curiosity.

1.The novel in the '60s? Changes of attitudes? Moral standards? Permissiveness? Psychedelic atmosphere? The film as a record of '60s attitudes - in parody? The perspective of later decades?

2.Italian production, American locations, Italian studio work? The international cast? The stars and their spoof performances? The musical score, songs, title song?

3.The pre-credits fantasy for Candy coming from outer space? The return to space at the end? The credits coming at the end? Spaced out?

4.The portrait of Candy, her fantasies, centre of the universe, alien in the US? At school, with her father in school? Her mother? Uncle? Her admiration of the poet? The gardener and the interaction with Manuel? Sexual innocence, ignorance? Knowingness? Being taken away, pursued by the gang of motor cyclist women, their defence of Manuel? In the plane, her innocence with the general? The injuries to her father, in the surgery, looking for the doctor, her relationship with him? The manager of the hospital? Her meeting with the wanderer? His disappearance? Into the truck, learning mystic ways with the guru, travelling America, sexual encounter? The leadership of her father, underground? The carnival atmosphere and her remeeting all the characters? Candy as a character, a symbol?

5.Candy's father, the ordinary square American of the late '60s? His injuries, operation, reappearance as her guide? The contrast with his brother, permissive style, permissiveness with Candy? Her mother - and her disappearance?

6.The spoof of the Welsh poet, Richard Burton hamming, Mephisto? His performance, stories, poetry? Sex?

7.Ringo Starr and his performance as the Mexican gardener? With Candy? The three motor cyclists?

8.Walter Matthau and his spoof of the gung-ho American general? The men in the plane, their drill? Six years in the air? Ready to attack? Their parachuting out, his following them? The satire on puritanical sex?

9.James Coburn as the surgeon, the audience, his staff, adulation? The music, the parallel with the bullfight? His clash with the manager of the hospital? John Huston as the lascivious manager?

10.Charles Aznavour, wandering the streets, the encounter with Candy, his disappearance?

11.Marlon Brando as the guru, spoof? Travelling the countryside? The collage of the various lotus positions? Sex? Freezing to death?

12.The recapitulation of the characters at the end? To what purpose? A perspective on the '60s?

CANDLESHOE

UK, 1977, 101 minutes, Colour.
David Niven, Helen Hayes, Jodie Foster, Leo Mc Kern.
Directed by Norman Tokar.

Candleshoe is an entertaining Disney film of the late '70s - reminiscent of the plot of Little Lord Fauntleroy. Directed by veteran Disney director Norman Tokar, with music by Ron Goodwin, the film boasts a strong cast led by David Niven, Helen Hayes and Jodie Foster.

The settings are the England of so many Hollywood fantasies, rich absentminded ladies, eccentric butlers who take on disguises, villains (like Leo McKern) and very English orphans. However, it all comes together to form an enjoyable family film.

1.Disney style family entertainment? British setting? Stars?

2.American and British locations, the estate, the railway line and trains? The Ron Goodwin score?

3.The title, British tone? For American audiences, worldwide audiences?

4.Leo McKern? as Harry, the type, his working with Clara, choosing Casey, interviews with her, the argument? Training her? His strong will, the trip, the insinuations and his control over her? The plan?

5.Jodie Foster as Casey, American tomboy style, the encounter with Harry, her foster parents, Clara, going to Britain, the training? The other orphans?

6.Helen Hayes as Lady St Edmond? Her type, background, wealth, poverty? Her reliance on Priory? The orphans and her help? Life at the estate, the style - the fairytale touch? Her interview with Casey, acceptance of her? The charity work?

7.David Niven as Priory, at work as a butler, his prim English style, the humour of his variety of disguises? Motivation for Lady St Edmond? His relationship with Casey, the orphans? The plan, clashing with Harry, help? The final battle?

8.The orphans - the group, individuals, their antagonism, with Casey, helping, working, the battle?

9.Casey and her pretence, her relating with Lady St Edmond, with Harry, the map, the clues? The search, her change? Standing up to Harry? Her helping Priory? The train, the battle? The happy ending?

10.Fairytale style and values?

CAMPUS MAN

US, 1987, 94 minutes, Colour.
John Dye, Steve Lyons, Kim Delaney, Morgan Fairchild, Miles O'Keefe, Kathleen Wilhoite.
Directed by Ron Casden.

Campus Man is a pleasant, though slight, comedy drama about students at university. It focuses on Todd, an intelligent go-getter, who has a bright idea of producing a male beefcake calendar. The main man photographed is diving champion Brett, who becomes tangled in Todd's mechanisms and in the power of Catherine van Buren (Morgan Fairchild) from Image Magazine, a slick executive who contracts him to the magazine. This endangers his amateur status. Todd has to go through many manoeuvres in order to free Brett from his contract - which, with shrewdness, he does. The supporting cast includes Miles O'Keefe (who was Tarzan the Ape Man with Bo Derek!). The film has comments on the American Dream, American go-getting, the rights of the individual to fulfil personal dream with integrity.

1.Enjoyable comedy drama? Piece of Americana? University youth? The American Dream and its consequences? The world of big business and contracts?

2.The Arizona locations, the state university of Arizona? The surrounding countryside? Musical score and songs?

3.The title, the focus on Todd, the focus on Brett, the calendar men?

4.Todd and his sleep in class, encouragement of the professor, schemes, his friendship with Molly? Working together, the idea of the calendar, persuading Brett, persuading the others, the photos, the printing of the calendar, his salesmanship? Catherine and her contract? The conflict between the two? Getting the money from C.J? Brett and the success, the contract, the amateur status? His clash with Brett, with Molly and the other girls? His scheme with C.J., the big ceremony, producing C.J. as the image of the 80s instead of Brett? Saving Brett?

5.Brett, athletic, beefcake, the calendar, friendship with Dayna, roommate with Todd, signing the contract, his regrets, wanting to dive, the scheme and his being arrested - and his reaction, being saved?

6.Catherine, the executive from New York, business, unscrupulous, her being tricked by the cheating scheme started by Todd, the hoax in order to get her to release Brett, her meeting C.J?

7.C.J., outer Arizona, his money, tough rebellious look, the toughs around him? Todd approaching him, persuading him, coming back, the fight? His becoming the model?

8.Dayna and Molly, their friendship, working on the calendar, on the schemes, Dayna infatuated with Brett? Molly and her clashes with Todd? Friendship with him? The final scheme, the final ceremony?

9.Comic moments? Beefcake moments? The film's comment on the American dream, unscrupulous business? The person of integrity and ambitions?

CAMILLE CLAUDEL

France, 1988, 174 minutes, Colour.
Gerard Depardieu, Isabelle Adjani, Alain Cuny.
Directed by Bruno Nuytten.

Camille Claudel is the story of the 19th century sculptor, the contemporary and sometime lover of August Rodin. While Rodin's reputation is strong, Camille Claudel's reputation was obscure. However, book, exhibitions and this multi-French award-winning biography have changed this. The star is Isabelle Adjani, who had the rights to the biography. She brings to life a woman with a strong sense of artistic location, iron will but an emotional fragility that ultimately destroys her collaboration with and love for Rodin and leads her to madness and 30 years in an asylum until her death in 1943. Gerard Depardieu gives yet another credible performance as Rodin.

The film is striking in its re-creation of 19th century France as well as showing the dynamic of Camille's life, her inspiration and her art. It begins almost breathlessly (as did Camille) but then slows and reflects the confusion of her searching and her collapse.

Long, sometimes exhilarating, sometimes grim, it is a stylish film by cameraman, co-writer and first-time director Bruno Nuytten. It is a forceful portrait of an artist.

1.The impact of the award-winning film? Portrait of France? French culture and people?

2.The use of Panavision photography, the re-creation of the 19th and 20th century? Paris, the countryside? The use of colour, the emphasis of greys and blues and darker tones? Colour and moods? The strong orchestrated score?

3.Editing, the initial fast pace, the slowing down, the portrait and film of Camille as reflecting the motion of her life?

4.The focus on sculpture and art, Rodin and Camille? Seeing the artists at work, their materials, the studios, models, commissions, inspiration, the physical detail of work? The art pieces by the two artists? The exhibitions?

5.Helping the audience into the world of artists, their drives, vocation, reality and unreality, creativity, relationships, the effect of the artistic gifts, madness?

6.A true story, the perspective of the film? The Claudel family? The portrait of Rodin? The background of French history at the turn of the century? Camille's decline and the postscript to the film about her confinement?

7.Isabelle Adjani's performance as Camille, the breathless opening, the girl of 20, digging the clay in the night, the intensity of her work, her friendship with Chicant, the clashes at home, the criticisms of her mother, the devotion of her father and his financial support? The friendship with Jessie and their work together? Waiting for Rodin, his visit, the reaction, his seeming rudeness? Camille going for the marble, the sculpting of the foot (and his later signing it)? Her finally throwing it into the river? The background of the academy, her teachers? Rodin and his advice? Camille and her intuition, the comments about her inner sculptors?

8.Her working, being an apprentice to Rodin, with Jessie, learning, relating to him? The Adam statues and her defiance? The visit, the posing? The affair? Their house together, the collaboration, the Calais burghers? The jealousies? The presence of Rose and the provocation? Her father, love for him, his free thinking, financial support? Defence against her mother and her moods? Her love for her brother, dominating him, their closeness, his intensity? Louise and her ordinariness, engagement and marriage?

9.Her success, her work, achievement? The love and the pregnancy? Her decision about the child, the abortion and her telling Paul? Her asking Rodin to marry her, his hesitation and refusal? Her not going to Calais? The enmity with Rodin, the fights, the meeting and the discussions about the Balzac statue? Her going into seclusion, finance from her family, working, drinking? The neighbours, the little boy? Her wanting a commission for the Fair of 1900? Her exhibition, the support of Eugene Blot(?)? Seeing Rodin in the street? The madness of her dressing for the exhibition? No works being sold? Paul and his praise of her work, the critic of Rodin?

10.Her father's death, the passing of the years. the funeral, her madness, her mother's desperation, the documents to confine her, her smashing all her artwork - and hesitation with Chicante? Taken away? 30 years, the nature of her mania? Blaming Rodin?

11.The portrait of Rodin, his reputation, a master of sculpture, brusque manner, the models and his getting them to pose, ideas and creativity? His response to Camille, the sculpture of the foot, his not saying anything? His work, her being an apprentice, the Gate of Hell? Her defiance? Her using his models, shaping the model and her own ideas? The women in his life and reputation, Rose and her hold over him? The beginning of the affair, the visit to her home? The collaboration, the burghers of Calais? His not marrying her, his own success, his drying up of inspiration, the clash and the separation? His relationship with Rose and staying with her?

12.Paul Claudel and his place in the family, Camille's dominating of him, his father and ambitions, the closeness of the children, his education, melancholy, discovering religion, God, changing, writing poetry, Rodin and the discovery of the busts of Camille, his getting a diplomatic job, travels round the world, his career, visits, his verse? His comments at the art exhibition? His father reading his son's work and disappointed with Camille? His memoirs of his sister?

13.Monsieur Claudel and his background, work, the mother and her tantrums, the money for Camille, his pride, the scrapbook? Paul's poems? His death, his wife's reaction, bewilderment at Camille? The contrast with Louise and the ordinariness of her life?

14.Rose, the long relationship with Rodin,, her age, love, possessive, the visit to the Claudel household posing as Rodin's wife, her wanting to go to Victor Hugo's funeral? Spying on Camille, the physical attack?

15.Chicante and his friendship, his love for Camille? Love for Victor Hugo? The poses, Rodin giving her a lesson with Chicante posing? His bust? The significance of Victor Hugo, his ideas and ideals, his funeral and the effect on Chicante, on Rodin?

16.The world of art, the workers in the studios, the managers, the entrepreneurs, commissions, Eugene Blot and his support of Camille, the exhibition? The people at the exhibition - curiosity and gossip?

17.Jessie, the friendship, the sharing in Camille's early life?

18.Portrait of a woman, in her times, creativity, portrait of an artist?

CALL ME MISTER

US, 1951, 95 minutes, Colour.
Betty Grable, Dan Dailey, Danny Thomas, Dale Robertson, Richard Boone.
Directed by Lloyd Bacon.

Call Me Mister has the popular team of Betty Grable and Dan Dailey (Mother Wore Tights, My Blue Heaven). They get to sing and dance. Danny Thomas also appears and has the opportunity to crack jokes and sing. The supporting cast includes Dale Robertson and a quick early appearance of Jeffrey Hunter.

The setting is the end of the war, American GIs in Japan, the entertainment units. The film is based on a popular military revue for morale purposes. The film was directed by Lloyd Bacon, veteran director of many musicals and thrillers. The dances are staged, characteristically but mildly, by Busby Berkley.

1.Popular post-war musical comedy?

2.The teaming of Betty Grable and Dan Dailey, Danny Thomas early in his career? Songs, choreography by Busby Berkley?

3.The Japanese settings, the atmosphere of the end of the war? American occupation?

4.The old theme of putting on a show, Kay and her working in entertainment, interviewing officers, auditioning the soldiers, casting, rehearsals, the show? For morale purposes?

5.Japan, the occupying forces, American homesickness?

6.Kay and Shep, their marriage, separation, Shep's reputation, trying to sell his dancing shoes, attitudes of authorities? AWOL, going to the rehearsals, the song and dance routines, the happy ending and their being reunited?

7.Stanley as cook, his song and dance routines, his cracking jokes? Billie and her friendship with Kay, the attraction towards Stanley?

8.The commanding officer, his attraction towards Kay, attentions towards her?

9.A pleasant but conventional piece of Americana?

DAVID PARKER



You were a photographer before being a writer and director?

Yes, I was a stills photographer working in theatre, opera and ballet and in television, and then in film. I would manage with the magazines I was working for. And I'd go on set and just cover that particular day or days for that particular magazine. I really started developing a love for the process of film-making and that grew to a point where I was employed as a still photographer on movies. I consciously went after that style of work. And I guess I worked in a lot of movies in the '70s and into the '80s, The Man From Snowy River and Mad Max, Burke and Wills, a lot of those quite big movies with quite long shoots. So I was really very much a part of the process, although as a stills photographer, you never are part of the process.

Just observing it?

Yes. But what was interesting about it was that my job was to record the process as well as shoot for posters and publicity. What was actually happening was I was getting one of the best apprenticeships you could ever have as a film-maker. It was on The Coolangatta Gold, the film that Edgleys were doing in Queensland, that I started talking to Colin Friels about it. By that stage I really thought that I had more to offer than just being a stills photographer on films, that I had some stories that I wanted to tell. My dilemma was who to get to write them, because I felt my stories were unique and I had a unique way that I wanted to tell them. It was he who suggested to me I should write them myself.

I thought that was fairly audacious because I had an immense respect for the craft, skills, creativity of scriptwriting but, having said that, I launched into writing what was to become Malcolm.

You landed on your feet instantly?

Yes.

In those unique stories, there's a lot of emotion but there's also a lot of very strong ironic humour which somehow or other taps into to a lot of that ordinariness that Australians have. showing the funny side of it without being patronising.

Yes, I think so. Only, I suppose, that term, ordinariness, is generally regarded as a negative term, but to me it's not. Most of it's going about life, working away and trying to make our lives as good as we possibly can - and I think that applies to everyone. So I love commenting on, I suppose, the non-celebrities in our lives, the people who are the workers and the people associated with the workers. I find it such a colourful part of our culture and that's why I like drawing on it.

All those features are in Malcolm. Whose dreamed up the mechanical side of things - the cars, the cameras? Did they come from you?

Yes, it did. I've always had quite a bent towards things mechanical. I actually started doing mechanical engineering - I feel it's the only thing I have in common with David Williamson, that both of us did engineering. He got a bit further with it than I did and, certainly, as a writer he got a little further than me as well. I went into engineering because I was always building gadgets and things as a kid. I remember designing self-opening doors on my mother's garage, which all came to grief when the doors slammed shut on her car rather than doing what they were supposed to do. I took the motor off the motor mower and put it on a 60s bike, things like that. I was always up to mechanically-oriented things.

So I was quite interested in weaving that side of me into the character of Malcolm, because it was an area I knew really well and I think that in your first script it's pretty important to draw on things that you know well because there's a great degree of honesty.

And you wrote Rikki and Pete and The Big Steal?

Yes, I did.

And again that quirkiness that commentators refer to these days...?

For me it's normal. When I think about what I write, I obviously choose a very small part of any particular community and make the story out of that, something that comes out of my imagination or has been triggered by some thought. The story itself might be unique, but the pallette that I use is not. It's life.

It's the inner city Melbourne streets and the ironic and offbeat facets of human nature stand out in both those films. What attracted you to Hercules?

Well, I'd seen Double Take always been very amused and in awe of what they did. I think Des Mangan is a very clever fellow just to come up with the concept. I know it's been done in different forms in different parts of the world, but I don't think anyone did what Des did, which was basically take over a theatre and use the concept of revoicing a film live, which is what they did. So I got involved in this idea of doing a film based on that concept. Des came up with the idea of having a guy who was unhappy with his lot, working for a big distribution company so he takes over his own theatre. On opening night he finds his film's in Italian and not in English. So then you can swing into the idea that he has to rework it on the run.

For me, the difficulty with that film was that there was something very tactile, I suppose, about a live performance, and that's not what you have with the film. So we had to ascertain how much of the success of Double Take was to to do with the tactility of the live performance, or could that idea be transferred into film. We believed it could be.

It was your chance also for some live-action direction.

It was. I think my respect for Nadia went up about 2000 per cent. You know it's tough. You're there, you see a scene, it's not the way you imagined it. And the skill is being able to communicate to the actors how to fix it within their terms, and their terms differ. If you've got three people standing there, you have to speak to the three of them in a different manner because they may use different approaches to their parts. So it was quite an awakening for me.

Hercules was screened at the Venice film festival. Do the Italians enjoy that kind of send-up of their films?

They do, actually. I think given that the Hercules movies from that era - and the original Hercules we worked on - were a bit of a spoof anyway, I don't think there was any problem with it. There was nothing sacrilegious, that's for sure, in we were doing film from the Italian point of view. The original director actually contacted me and wished me luck. He hadn't seen it but he thought it was a wonderful thing to have happened to his movie. Which was a relief - I'm glad he wasn't attached to the Mafia or anything or had a different reaction.

Diana and Me has had a strange history because history intervened.

I remember saying to Nadia at the time I must have had a very pleasant previous life for things like this to happen. I was very happy with the film we made. I thought that, even though it was probably a more standard type of formula, it was a really interesting idea and I felt that we had to shoot it pretty darn well.

You touched into the whole excitement of magazine competitions, royalty, Australians, abroad and British photographers.

Yes, the British papparazzi. I mean, having been part of that scene for a while, very much on the edge of it - but I was in there. I had done royal tours. I had staked out Charles and Diana in Alice Springs, so I knew what I was talking about. But here we were doing paparazzi on motorbikes, joyfully chasing George Michael who'd had a car accident.

There was nowhere to go with that film. We did shoot a new little top and tail for it primarily to place the movie within the past so that it would at least work chronologically. But it appeared it wasn't enough. We either came out too early with it or such was the response to Princess Diana in life and death that we were completely on the wrong page, a film that could be released only after her death.

I think that a very clever marketer in the United States could do very well with this film, because it holds Diana up in such a good light, and I think there is a fear that that won't be the case and people don't want to be exposed to that.

Did it get a release in England?

No. I think we're disadvantaged in that area, in that territory because there are two members of the Village Roadshow board who are in the House of Lordsn or are heading for it. There's no way that they're going to do anything to rile royalty at this point.

You mentioned your admiration for Nadia. It's been a very fruitful collaboration over these years.

It has been great, yes. And it will continue to be. My partner and I, we're pretty much ensconced in Melbourne, we'll always be back there.



Interview: 10th September 1998