Enjoying Ladies in Black

Last Friday, 21 September, a friend and I went to see the new Bruce Beresford film Ladies in Black. I had really wanted to see it.

The film is based on the 1993 book Women in Black written by Australian writer Madeleine St John (pronounced Sinjun). Madeleine was born at Castlecrag on Sydney's North Shore on 12 November 1941, the daughter of Edward St John and French mother, Sylvette (Cargher). Her maternal grandparents were Romanian Jews.

Edward was a prominent Sydney barrister, a civil activist and a sometimes renegade Liberal Party parliamentarian in the 1960s. Madeleine's mother committed suicide in 1954 when Madeleaine was 12. The following year her father married Valerie Winslow.

Madeleine grew up in the urbane upper middle class world on Sydney's North Shore. She went to Queenwood School for Girls, Mosman before going the Sydney University where she was a contemporary of Beresford, John Bell, Clive James, Germaine Greer, Arthur Dignam, Robert Hughes and Richard Walsh. Her father defended Walsh in the first Oz obscenity trial in 1964.

Madeleine turned to novel writing quite late following a failed eight year attempt to write a biography of Helena Blavatsky. She then gave up, destroyed the manuscript and tuned to fiction.

Women in Black was published in 1993 followed by three more books including The Essence of the Thing, a book shortlisted for the Booker prize. Her career was cut short because of her death from emphysema. She was just 64.

I am very out of touch with some things. I had not heard of the book, nor that it had been turned into a successful musical under the title Ladies in Black. I was attracted to the film by the posters and by snippets of news that suggested that it was a film that I might enjoy. As I did.

The film is set in Sydney in the summer of 1959. This was a time of change in Australia. The austerity of the immediate post war period had been replaced by relative affluence with full employment and growing wealth. The mass migration program launched at the end of the Second World war was well underway bringing changes within Australian society,

The story begins when a shy schoolgirl, Lisa Miles (Angourie Rice)) takes a summer job at the grand city department store, Goode’s, while awaiting the results of her final exams. Goode's is clearly based on David Jones, then Sydney's poshest store, where Madeleine worked as a casual.

At Goode's Lisa is befriended by fellow assistants in the cocktail frock section Fay (Rachel Taylor) and Patty (Alison McGirr) and is drawn into the ambit of Magda Szombatheli (Julia Ormond), the charming and sophisticated Slovenian émigré who in charge of Goode's high fashion end. Between them, they are the ladies in black named because of the uniform they wear.

We watch Lisa grow from a bookish girl to a glamorous and positive young woman as she herself becomes a catalyst for a cultural change in everyone’s lives.

I really enjoyed the movie as did our fellow blogger AC. You will find her review here. It does have weaknesses, but it's good fun.

Following the movie I read some of the reviews as well as investigating the film's background. I am glad that I did this after rather than before, because I got seriously annoyed at spots. Sometimes, it is better not to read reviews because of the way it affects, conditions, thinking. I may come back to this point later once the film is out of the cinemas.  

Lovers and Luggers - in search of a pearl for a girl

Back in the seventies, the ABC had a series replaying Australian films from the industry's heyday prior to the Second World War. This was, I think, the only period in which the Australian film industry occupied a key local box office position. I would love to see the series repeated, although it maybe that our images of ourselves have shifted so much that the films would no longer resonate. If so, that's a pity.

One of the films I most enjoyed was Lovers and Luggers. Made for Cinesound  in 1937 by Ken Hall, the film tag read "Epic pearling adventure romance in glorious sun-splashed tropical settings of Thursday Island!", while the plot is described in these terms "A concert pianist, as concert pianists are wont to do, goes pearl diving in the South Seas to find a giant pearl for his girlfriend. He does, and that's when all the trouble begins."

The film is a romp sitting squarely in the middle of a number of past streams

As I remember it, the opening scenes show what used to be called a lounge lizard from the effete London focused side of the Empire clearly in need of redemption, thus playing to both Australian's images of themselves and of themselves in comparison to the English.

Then we have the tropic Pacific location, appealing to resonances of the Pacific as an exotic location and source of wealth. Then, too, we have pearls. By the time the film was made the pearl industry with its romance but also its horrors and dangers was in sharp decline. Still, it retained its fascination.

Pearls have gripped human imagination for thousands of years. They were worn in civilised Middle East and Asian societies as early as 3500 BCE and continued to grow in popularity during Roman times when pearl fever reached its peak. A pearl earring reportedly paid for one Roman general's political campaigns. Cleopatra dissolved a pearl in wine and drank it to prove her love to Marc Antonius.

When my daughter turned eighteen several thousand years later, her chosen present was a string of pearls. Her grandmother loved pearls too. For my part, as a gauche youth, I found those sophisticated country girls with their twin sets and pearls quite terrifying. It would be years before I realised that I was as nervous as them.

The book on which Lovers and Luggers was based was written by Gurney Slade, pen name of the English writer Stephen Bartlett, and was set in Broome where Bartlett had actually dived for pearls. Hall changed the location to Thursday Island because it made filming easier. As an aside, I found that some scenes were actually filmed at Port Stephens, so I have to add it to my growing list of films with New England connections.

Needless to say, pianist Daubeney Carshott (Lloyd Hughes) falls in love with and is redeemed by Lorna Quidley ( Shirley Ann Richards), the daughter of the boisterous Captain Quidley. It’s all very melodramatic, but rather fun. 

Reflections on David Stratton's Stories of Australian cinema

ABC is presently running a series featuring David Stratton looking at aspects of the history of Australian film. I am not giving links partly because of geoblocking, partly because the link will only survive for a little while anyway.

David is deservedly one of Australia's best known and most loved film commentators.  He is also writing on something I am interested in, attracted too. Despite all this, I ended up turning off the second episode, Outsiders, in the middle. I did come back to it and finally enjoyed it, but it was a battle.

I have been trying to work out why I felt this way. Certainly part of the reason was that I felt the selection of film and indeed the commentary reflected current angsts, popular causes. I also felt that the commentary reflected a current trope, that somehow Australians are not comfortable in their own country, that they are here as occupiers and are therefore disconnected in some way from the land. Finally, there were comments about small town Australia that really annoyed me.

I would be the first to accept that there is a growing disconnect between many urban Australians and the country outside their immediate neighbourhoods and circles of contact. Increasingly, our big metro centres are made up of large villages that have little contact elsewhere in the metro area, let alone with the country beyond the metros outside popular holiday resorts. They occupy land but are not connected with the land in any real sense.  This affects portrayal in film. You get film that is message rather than story focused. I think that this is one reason why Australian films so often fail at the box office.

I accept that this is a biased view, but I do think that it is not without some substance.To illustrate, take a second current trope in discussion, the need for film to adequately reflect Australian "diversity". I have put diversity into inverted commas, for it tends to be a very particular type of diversity that is required to be recognised. In the end, the success of a movie, and Australia has too few successful movies relative to the size of output, depends upon a story that people want to watch. If we want diversity, then we need good stories that reflect that diversity, or at least the form you want. To argue for diversity for the sake of diversity is to miss the point.

Australia does have "message" movies that have achieved at least some box office success. Rachel Perkin's Bran Nue Dai is a case in point. This is very much a message film, but it's also a rollicking and thoroughly enjoyable musical. Others seemed to me to have failed because they fall in the should see rather than want to see class.

I wondered if I was wrong in all this and started digging into past box office records to answer the question what had been successful or failed compared to my own preconceptions. This proved to be at least a short term error. The Screen Australia web site provides some information on more recent films, but the box office data is in current dollars, knocking out older films. I found some other material, but not enough for my purposes without hours of work. And, in any case, I had become sidetracked onto another issue that I will mention in a moment.

 I did find enough material, however, to suggest that the position was more complex than I had realised and indeed worthy of further work.

I said that I had become sidetracked onto another issue. David started talking about Muriel's Wedding in the context of outsiders and small town life. I have yet to see Muriel's Wedding. I was put off when it first came out in 1994 because of the way it was described as a parody of small town life, another trope and one that I had become very sick of. I reacted by sticking my finger up in the air on behalf of all my fellow townies and going in the opposite direction.

Now researching it, I found to my surprise that it was in fact a New England film. David Stratton would not think of it in that way, nor indeed would most other people including probably writer and director P J Hogan. However, as part of my work on life, history and culture in Northern New South Wales, the broader New England,  I have been recording all the films that I can find with New England connections, looking at them in their Northern context.

Both Muriel's Wedding and Hogan's 2012 film Mental are part autobiographical. While Hogan was born in Queensland, he grew up in Tweed Heads just south of the Queensland border where his father Tom was a Shire Councilor, a community activist, an ALP candidate at the 1978 NSW State elections and the subject of an ICAC (NSW Independent Commission against Corruption) into local government corruption on the North Coast associated with real estate development.

The family was somewhat dysfunctional and colourful, something that Hogan has mined for material for both films. He has also mined his school and town experiences as something of a misfit.

You can see why I got sidetracked! I ended spending hours trawling though the fragmentary on-line material, something that I will write up as a full post on the New England blog. Meantime, I note that there are now three modern movies linked in some way to the Tweed Valley, writer/director Belinda Chayko's 2010 production Lou staring  John Hurt, Lily Bell Tindley and Emily Barclay being the third.

Lou is a very different movie, a domestic movie, one that I feel was sadly neglected when it came out. Like Hogan, Chayko grew up in the Tweed Valley and the visuals reflect her love of the area.

Growing up in Northern NSW, I was very conscious of the differences across the North, as well as the linkages and similarities. Each place, each region, has its own style and stories, stories which have changed with time. There are enormous differences between Stockton, Armidale, Bellingen, Scone, Moree, Gwabegar and .Lismore. Films have to tell a story that will appeal to a broader audience.

In the end, I think that New England and Australia more broadly are lucky to have as many films as we do. They do make our life richer.

Postscript

I also struggled a little with the third episode in David's series. I may come back to that. In the meantime, I re-watched and then listed all the films mentioned because I found them an interesting combination.

• The Devil's Playground 1976
  
• The Chant of Jimmy Blacksmith 1978
• Kostas 1979
• Man of Flowers 1983
• Romper Stomper 1992Floating Life 1996
• The Castle 1997
• Head On 1998
• The Boys 1998
• Two Hands 1999
• Innocence 2000
• Chopper 2000
• Lantana 2001
• Rabbit Proof Fence 2002
• Lucky Miles 2007Romulus My Father 2007
• Home Song Stories 2007
• Cactus 2008
• The Combination 2009
• Animal Kingdom 2010
• Snowtown 2011
• Force of Destiny 2015
• Ali's Wedding 2017

In addition to these films, there were references to the multiple renditions of Ned Kelly!

Postscript 2 24 June 2017

In a comment, kvd pointed to two movies that he wondered why had not been included, Somersault (2004) and Jindabyne (2006). He also suggested that Kidman's role in Dead Calm (1989) was one of the most disturbing he had seen on film.

I did see Jindabyne, but had never heard of Somersault. I decided not to see Dead Calm. It put me off. That leads me to my another point.

There was a period when I tried to watch every new Australian film. Then as there were more, I found myself treating Australian films the same way as other films and largely stopped going, only going to those films I really wanted to see based on how I felt. And they didn't grab me.

Now I find that i need to revisit films that I missed. Mind you, I still don't want to watch Dead Calm! 

kvd's comment reminded me of another early Canberra linked film that I did see and quite enjoyed although I thought that it wasn't very good, the 1971 production Demonstrator.    ..
    .

Saturday Morning Musings - in praise of Squatters' daughters

I'm rather fond of squatters and indeed of their daughters. This still comes from the 1933 film The Squatter's Daughter starring  Jocelyn Howarth and Grant Lyndsay.

I thoroughly enjoyed that movie. Not, mind you, when it was first released! Hang on, I'm not that old! But it was a fun movie with a superb bushfire scene.

Much of the film was shot at  Goonoo Goonoo station on the Liverpool Plains near Tamworth. Goonoo Goonoo, pronounced Gunna Ganoo, was the centre piece of the Australian Agricultural Company empire. The station homestead complex includes an historical mini-village, comprising the original 1830s chapel, post office and store.

The bushfire finale was filmed near Wallacia, west of Sydney. To accelerate the fire, the crew placed old nitrate film among the trees. Wooof! Wooof? Well, wooof in two senses. Wooof describes my first reaction
on learning the story of the fire - how bloody dangerous. Wooof also describes the fire. It exploded.

The singed cast and crew, and I do mean singed, kept filming. A bushfire is not something you can stage every day. The result was a superb piece of cinematography. If you go to the Wikipedia page and follow the various links through you can go on a quick cook's tour of aspects of Australian cultural life during the period, including the remarkable story of photographer and cinematographer Frank Hurley. He was quite some man.

I said that I was fond of squatters' daughters. I was/am, but they used to scare the living daylights out of me in my teenage years. They seemed so with it, even sophisticated, elegant. It was several years before I realised that they were as much of a hormonal mess as I was, even that I was a bit scary in my own right coming from a different if somewhat overlapping world.  

I have wandered a little, something that I am prone too do.

I mentioned in an earlier post that I have some contract work, once again back in Parramatta. The first two weeks have been very busy. I am also re-adjusting too long travel times. Posting has been a little difficult. It's good that my commenters can carry on a dialogue without me! This is, after all, their site as well as mine.

In the midst of this, I have made some progress on other projects. Last year, I consolidated all my Belshaw World Armidale Express columns into a single working draft as a base for a new book. I have been using the train and bus time to do some editing. I have also been in contact with Janene Cary, a friend and colleague from the New England Writers' Centre who specialises in editing and publishing within an e-environment, about the steps involved in the publication process. July is the target date for release of the book. 

So progress on some fronts, not on others.   

  

Saturday Morning Musings - reviewing Looking for Grace: interesting but flawed

Running over January and February, the St George Open Air Cinema has become something of a Sydney institution. The reasons aren't hard to find.

The Cinema's location in the Domain overlooking the city is a beautiful venue. Gates open at 6.30, but the film cannot be shown until dark, so people eat and drink in the meantime, taking advantage of the view to turn it into a real night out.

Construction of the Cinema is a major undertaking in its own right. The huge screen is mounted on pylons in the harbour along with all the mechanicals required to raise it as darkness sets. The tiered open air auditorium seating 2,000 has to be built, as do all the food and bar areas. Then, at the end of the season, it all has to be dismantled and the site returned to its original condition. The whole process is large scale and expensive. You can see why ticket prices have to be high!

I hadn't been to the Cinema in some time, but last night a ticket became available. By chance, it turned out to be the opening night of the 2016 season and also the Sydney premiere of the new Australian film Looking for Grace. I had noticed the cordoned area with its red carpet at the waterside, but hadn't thought about it until there was a rush of people to take photographs. Needless to say, I joined the throng.

 
 Looking for Grace takes the form of a series of interconnected stories.

The starting story, Grace’s story, introduces Grace (Odessa Young)  and her friend (Kenya Pearson) who have, it appears, run away from home to go to a rock concert. However, there is more to it than that.

In her introduction to the film just before screening, Director Sue Brooks told the audience that we should work through this scene. I can see why she did this and will explain why later.  However, it was an error. She would have been far better off briefly explaining the structure of the film, helping us to understand.

The film then switches to the respective stories of Grace's parents,  Denise (Rahda Mitchell) and Dan (Richard Roxburgh). The next shot shows them both at the premiere.See what I mean by the beauty of the location?

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Both Mitchell and Roxburgh are considerable talents with substantial cinema records. Mitchell is also very sexy (am I allowed to say that today?), more so than you would think from her portrayal in this role where the setting required her to focus on the domestic.

I think that Mtchell's performance was better than Roxburgh's. This is not a criticism of his acting ability, rather that Sue Brooks as both writer and director miscalculated and especially in the potential adultery scene where Roxburgh's portrayal did not quite ring true. Indeed, there were several places in the movie where the detail in the plot lines just didn't come off. A director has to be very focused and disciplined. That's hard where the director is also the writer. How do you as director say to you as writer this isn't quite working? Or vice verca?

There were two more sub stories, one involving Terry Norris as the private detective, a second and short one involving Bruce (Myles Pollard), a truck driver. The second was necessary for the plot, but I'm not sure about the first. Before giving a summing up, here is another cast photo.

Writing in Variety, Guy Lodge was critical of aspects of the film while also recognising some of the strengths. He focused on the ennui of down-under life.There are elements here that I need to think about before responding properly, elements best summarised (and this is a very Australian comment) by the distant sounds of a crow's caw on a quiet morning with its remoteness and loneliness. There are also elements that I just thought were too stretched, that brought me out of that suspension of disbelief necessary for full enjoyment. This wasn't helped by the fact that the narrow gaps between the rows were making my legs and especially my knees hurt.

Given this, should you see the film if you get a choices? Yes, you should. I think that it might become a minor Australian classic as much for its weaknesses as its strengths.  It's an interesting film. .  

The importance of a Town like Alice

Nevil Shute Norway was a fascinating man whose writing reflected his deep involvement in engineering and aviation. His vivid depictions of the early days of aviation were vivid in part because he was there.

In writing, Schute chose to drop the Norway to avoid conflict with his engineering career. He was Norway as an engineer, Schute as a writer.

I loved nearly all of Schute’s books as a child, I still do, but of them all A Town Like Alice was my favourite. It is also a book that has had a significant influence on my life.

A Town like Alice breaks into two parts. The first part is set in Malaya and tells the story of a group of women and children captured by the Japanese. The second part centres on Willstown, a small town in the Queensland outback. Linking the two is the love story of Jean Paget, a young English women who is part of the group of captured women, and Sergeant Joe Harman, an Australian POW.   

The book was immensely popular. In 1956, it provided the source for a very popular feature film, A Town like Alice, with Virginia McKenna and Peter Finch in the leading roles. Now, through the miracles of YouTube, you can watch it at your leisure.

I first watched the film in the school assembly hall during the Saturday screenings put on for the boarders. I was a dayboy, but it was a good night out, so I would walk across from home to join the other boys.

The film focuses on the first part of the story, the Malayan experience. It ends with Joe and Jean meeting at the Alice Springs Airport. However, it was the second part of the story that really influenced me.

In 1981, Bryan Brown and Helen Morse starred in an Australian mini-series based on the book. This time, it included the second part of the story. Here is the first part of the miniseries. You can see the next two parts by following the YouTube links shown with the first part.

What can a girl to do? You follow a man halfway round the world to find that he lives in a fly-struck hole.  Well, you change the town, As Jean says to the local bank manager, get of your bum and stop scratching.

To turn Willstown into a Town like Alice, she starts with a basic fact. There are 50 young blokes in the district, but only two eligible women. The women leave because there are no jobs. No women, and the young blokes leave. So Jean uses some of her inheritance to start a shoe factory based on crocodile skin. Then she starts adding other businesses especially addressing women’s needs. The girls in the factory pick up men, babies are born, and so it goes on. By the end of the book, the shoe factory is no longer economic, but it doesn’t matter. It has done its job.

Yes, I know that there are al sorts of ideologically unsound things in the books and films. In Malaya, Jean is Mrs Boong. In the mini-series, there are references to Abos, although it shows working Aborigines in a positive light, with Aborigines invited to the wedding. And the idea of effectively creating a baby factory? Heaven forbid!

Still, in the middle of all these ideologically unsound things, it was the idea of community development that grabbed me. How might one grow a  Town like Alice? That is what has stayed with me all these years. And yes, I still cry at aspects of the book, film and TV series. Sooky, aren’t I?    

Saturday Morning Musings – the complexities of recent European history with more than a dash of Poland including Once My Mother

Australian PM and Foreign Affairs Minister Bishop have a highly developed sense of moral outrage. It comes, I think, from the desire to play to a domestic audience in circumstances where the external impact of their remarks beyond the nation’s borders has been relatively low. This attitude is not unique to them. It infected previous PM’s and the Australian media as well.

I make this point now because of MH17. Here I did  as I often do, spending some time to check press reporting in other countries. Noticeably, the official responses in other countries outside the US has been far more tempered. This includes the Dutch who, after all, have suffered the greatest loss of life and also the Malaysians whose PM lost a relative on the plane. .

I don’t know that I am very comfortable with a situation where Australia appears to be leading the global sense of international outrage. It’s not a universal sense of outrage, other stories such as Gaza are more important in some areas, but is certainly so among many countries who have been affected or where people travel. We can be as outraged as we like, but in the end it takes cool heads not domestic posturing to get results.

Mind you, my use of the words “domestic posturing” may be unfair. If my own emotional reactions are any guide, I am sure that that the PM feels very strongly. And yet, neither he nor Ms Bishop can actually afford to let emotions within a 24 hours news cycle set the Australian response.

Frankly, I find the Russian response to the whole thing unbelievable. But cold, forensic analysis is required now if we are to have any chance of getting to the truth. 

Last year I watched Remembrance, a film partly set in Poland. The film is based on the true story of      Jerzy Bielecki  and Cyla Cybulska. Jerzy was a Polish political prisoner sent to Auschwitz, Cyla a Polish Jew at the same camp. They met, fell in love, escaped, but were later separated.  Told that the other had died, they went their separate ways only to meet many years later.

The film changes key elements of the story, but provides a gripping picture of a part of Polish history. I mention this now in part because events in Ukraine reflect the historic past of that part of Europe, more because of the imminent release  of  Sophia Turkiewicz’s new documentary film, Once My Mother, another film with Polish connections.

The term New Australians has been largely forgotten now, almost discredited. It was, in fact, a public relations coup. How do you persuade an insular society still reeling from the Second World War, worried about its future and cautious of change, that  it must admit millions of new residents including refugees from countries that had recently been enemies? You make them one of us.

Assimilation is another now discredited term. However, it was also part of the necessary dialectic. These New Australians will assimilate and become one with us.

Many modern Australians have, I think, lost sight of the tragedy and complexity of European history over the first half of the twentieth century. I make this as a general comment, for at the same time many of the children and grandchildren of that first post war immigration wave are now (like Andrew Denton) seeking details of that past connection to illuminate their own life. In Andrew’s case, the story took him in part to Poland and the holocaust.  

The story of Sophia and her mother Helen is a little different, but also part of the chaos of the time.

Sophia Turkiewicz is best known in Australia for her 1984 film Silver City focused on the story a shipload of Polish refugees coming to Australia. I haven’t seen the film. I must do so now.

Sophia’s relationship with her mother was complicated, in part because Helen placed her in an orphanage for two years. Sophia never properly understood why. She decided to do her mother’s story as a student film project, collected some material and undertook some filming, but the put the matter aside. Now, with her mother sliding into dementia,she took the project up again before it was too late. In doing so, she found a little of her mother’s remarkable story, including the reasons why Helen had put her aside for a period.

The story is complex, but its start can be summarised in this way.

Following the German-Russian pact and the subsequent invasion and partition of Poland, up to 1.5 million Poles were deported from Soviet occupied Poland to Siberia. Conditions were very poor; tens of thousands died. Following the German invasion of the Soviet Union, the exiled Polish Government and Stalin reached a peace agreement. As part of this, an “amnesty” was granted to many Polish detainees who were to be allowed to join a new Polish army to be formed under the command of General Władysław Anders. The new army was to be under the control of the exiled Polish Government.

Tens of thousands of Poles including many civilians were released from the Gulags but without food or transport to find their way to the new force. Again, thousands died trekking to the new headquarters. Sophia’s mother was one of those who had been exiled and then found their way to the Polish Army headquarters.

There were inevitable tensions between the Soviet authorities and what was, in effect, a foreign army on Soviet soil. Anders therefore decided to move his his newly formed force and the civilians who had joined them to Persia where they would come under British control. Again, there was limited transport so that people had to trek to to the Persian border. Again, thousands died.

  Helen accompanied the movement to Persia. Then when the troops went on, she was relocated to a refugee camp in Northern Rhodesia, now Zambia where she was to sty for the next six years.

For the first time in her life, Helen had now found now found security and peace.  She also found love in the person of an Italian POW held in an adjoining POW  camp. Sophia was born.

With the end of the war, the Italian POWs are repatriated, leaving Helen alone again. Finally, as a single mother, she arrives by boat in Australia with her baby daughter. She speaks no English, has had no formal education and knows nobody. She puts Sophia in an orphanage. This is where the story begins. I gave the link to the film above, but just repeating it. It includes the trailer and background material.

Australian life - transforming Raymond Terrace to Wirrawee

On a recent trip, we stopped at Raymond Terrace for lunch to allow me to take photos. Founded in 1837, Raymond Terrace lies at the junction of the Hunter and Williams Rivers. It is an interesting place, now a little off the beaten track.

This is King Street, the old main street. The river lies just to the left of the photo, the current main street is out of sight on the right.

This is another shot of the street taken a little further along. You can get a feel for the buildings.

In 2009, King Street was transformed into the main street of Wirrawee for the filming of Tomorrow, When the War Began. The girls loved the books, we enjoyed the film, hence my visit.

King Street was chosen for the film because of its original buildings that could be modified to present the appearance of an older country town in the current era. This next shot shows the Bendigo Bank building. It's the same building that appears in the top shot on the far right hand side. Only cosmetic changes were required. The building on the left is, I think, the Lee family's Thai restaurant. 

I enjoyed my excursion. I hope you do too.

Australian life - Dad Rudd MP

My thanks to Neil Whitfield for this one. 

Ken Hall was one of Australia's most popular film makers. This article by Juleanne Lamond, “Unfounded attack on Dad and Dave comedies!”, focuses not just on Hall but the Dad and Dave series. When I saw Dad Rudd MP years after its release, I really enjoyed it.

There is also a reference in the article to a more parochial interest of mine. The film was part funded by an overdraft from the NSW Government. This, I think, links to the efforts of NSW Deputy Premier and Country Party leader Mick Bruxner (Bruxner was film maker Charles Chauvel's cousin) to get financial support for the Australian film industry.

This little known episode is interesting because it was, I think, the first attempt by an Australian government to support the local industry. And so far, I have been unable to find any real details.  

Sunday Essay - the Turning

I didn't Know what to expect when I went to see The Turning. In that I wasn't disappointed!

Tim Winton is one of Australia's best known writers. The Turning is a book of seventeen short stories. Many of the stories interweave, creating a twisting central plot-line.

I hadn't read the book, although I will certainly do so now. My failure to read the book in advance proved to be a major error, for it would have added to my enjoyment of what is a quite complex movie. Complex? Each of the short stories has been turned into a short film under a different director who chose their own cast. Producer-director Robert Connolly provided overall coordination, directed one segment, but otherwise left it to each director to do their own thing within a broad framework. So we have what are in fact common characters at different stages played by different actors interpreted in different ways.

Seventeen short stories makes for a very long film, three hours. Even with an intermission, I was struggling a little at the end, wriggling uncomfortably in my seat, enjoying the film but wishing that it would end! With the normal movie, even a long one, the central plot provides coherence. Here you have to focus, responding to each segment, working out how the bits fit together. Despite that, this is likely to become a cult movie whose individual segments will be repeated again and again.

In visual terms, The Turning is quite stunning. While the budget is not public, it is reported to have been less than $A5 million; I found that hard to believe, given the production qualities. It has some of the most beautiful visuals I have ever seen. It also stars some of Australia's best acting talent, familiar faces whose qualities we know, as well as less known's. In drama terms, some of the individual segments are quite gripping. They hold you, but leave you dissatisfied because you want to know more.      

This is a very Australian movie. I went with a friend who grew up in another country. I found myself nodding at particular scenes, then trying to explain to her why so. I don't know Tim Winton, but he clearly has a country background. Guns, Aboriginal fishing parties on the beach, sand caves, sexual angst in smaller communities, country cops, shows, they were all there.

In commercial terms, this is an Australian first, movie as an event. Some of my favourite Australian movies made for equivalent money and targeting main stream release have vanished without trace. This movie (wisely) eschewed commercial release. It went the film festival, art deco cinema event, approach. It limited its release to a small number of cinemas, charged a premium price (tickets are $25), relied both on word of mouth and the cultural mafia. The film will get its basic cost back from limited release, and then make its money from after sales.

I doubt that It will be ever done again. This is a one-off. I don't know the commercial terms that were negotiated, but some of the actors who were involved in combination would have blown a limited budget in fees.

It actually made me very proud. Despite my sore bum, my restlessness, I would like to see it again. I would like to rewatch individual segments. I would like to soak myself in the film. We couldn't have done this even twenty years ago.

From a purely professional viewpoint, I kept thinking how do I turn  my writing into this? I would so love to showcase my own area, to simply tell the story.       

What did you think of The Shire?

I watched The Shire tonight. I kind of felt that I should. Then perhaps I shouldn't haveI

Eldest has a predilection for certain popular US TV shows, so I have actually watched more of this type of show than you might expect. Many more, in fact.

The official web site describes the program in this way:

Set against the backdrop of the Southern Sydney region that commands the loyalty of its residents like no other, TEN’s brand new ‘dramality show’ The Shire is the latest daring addition to its schedule.

Screening Mondays at 8.00, The Shire isn’t another contrived piece of TV faux-fact; it’s true unscripted Shire life-through-a-lens. The entertaining cast of characters may seem larger than life, but they’re every bit as real as the relationships they share.

From Mitch, the ‘Peter Pan’ surfer boy who never wants to grow up, to Nikee, the glamour model who wants nothing more than to settle down, seeing what makes The Shire’s personalities tick and what ticks them off is certain to make compulsive viewing.

Some you’ll love, some you may loathe, but you’ll all be talking about them when The Shire hits your screens. Are you ready to meet them? Find out who's who on The Shire!

Mmm! The show begins like a tourist promo, then switches into the "story". I can only manage so much shopping in Dubai with Daddy's credit card, and I probably learned more about botox that I cared to. Now on the US shows I have learned about the Housewives, even the real housewives, of Orange County. I have seen the most amazing manipulation of parents by seventeen year old girls spending enough on their birthday party to retire half the Greek debt. But I wasn't bored. And here I was, except for rare flashes. 

Now accepting that I am not in Ten's target demographic(!), accepting too that Twitter is not a good guide given those I tend to follow, I did what any sensible person would do, I went to the official Facebook page. Wow, some of the negative comments there would make Tony Abbott look like the Gillard Government's greatest promoter.  Angie wrote: "Thank you 'The Shire' for reigniting my will to hang myself."

So I went to the official Shire Twitter hash tag. Oops!  According to Chris: "BREAKING: RTA says Tom Ugly's Bridge bumper-to-bumper northbound. Residents fleeing. More detail in Late News". Peter thought that the show was making Being Lara Bingle look like Q&A.

Mind you, even as I wrote the last two paragraphs eighty new tweets came in. They included this one: "If you missed ‪#TheShireTV‬ tonight, this image basically sums it up. pic.twitter.com/69CEnQ9x " Ouch!

Mind you, and as one twitterer noted, its seems just so bad that everybody is likely to switch in next time just to see what the fuss is all about. Now Ten may want that, be seeking it, for if the next episode is better then people may stay. Better? I don't mean high drama, just something that fleshes everybody out in a more interesting way.

Still, what do I know? I will put this post up on Facebook to see what reaction I get. But then I'm not sure that most Easties actually talk to anyone from The Shire. In the meantime, Channel Ten can send me a cheque for promotion!

Refashioning Dad revisited

Back in Early April in Refashioning Dad, I reported on a campaign to reshape my wardrobe. This was followed by End of the fashion big brands? and then That crumpled look. This somewhat unusual Belshaw excursion into fashion came to a halt over a simple issue, money. Not a permanent halt, mind you, just a deferral.

Then yesterday my fellow blogger Ramana pointed to this story from the New York Times, For Men, a New Look for the Summer Suit. Now this photo heading the story caught my eye, for the bloke on the left is  wearing one of the outfits I  actually wear to work minus the tie. This was one result of stage one of the refashioning Dad campaign. Mind you, not the brands, but the colours and cut.

 

The story said in part:

It’s no secret that men’s tailored clothing has been on a roll. According to NPD Group, which tracks the clothing market, for the 12 months ending March 30, 2012, sales of tailored clothing (suits, jackets and trousers) were up 11 percent over the same period in 2011. In an economy in which double-digit growth in any category is remarkable, the fact that 2011’s nearly $4.5 billion market in tailored clothing rose to almost $5 billion this year is extraordinary.

Now I happen to like tailored clothing, while greatly disliking the crumpled fashion now in somewhat in vogue, at least in Sydney. So I liked the thought that some of my clothes style might be coming back into fashion. Then I read another paragraph:

Not only does a less expensive suit cost less, it is also a far less precious thing. You might not bicycle to work in a $1,700 suit, but one that cost $450? When the cost of a suit is on par with a fancy dress shirt and a pair of premium jeans, the possibilities for wearing it open up considerably. Brunching! Gallery-going! Walking the dog! Even Mike Rowe, the hunky, muddy star of “Dirty Jobs,” might wear one to work.

This pulled me up a little. $US450 for a cheap suit suitable for biking?! Mmm. Then I looked at the detail of the costs attached to the outfits in all the photos. Mmm indeed! I am not going to spend half my annual clothes budget on one combination. But then, I don't need too.  It's not necessary.

So long as the cut is good, so long as the clothes are well made, I don't need a brand. I just need my main fashion adviser. And she's free!

A gentle Monday meander

As will be self-evident to anyone who reads my blogs, I have been struggling to maintain my writing. I really have. I suppose that it's unrealistic to think that I could in in the midst of multiple moves and changes in family directions. I should be packing and cleaning, but I don't feel like it. I also left the house a bit after six this morning, and tomorrow want to be earlier still. I didn't sleep especially well last night, so that I find myself getting very tired.   

Given all this, tonight just a gentle personal wander without politics or anything else serious. Call it an indulgence!

This photo of Clare on Facebook  drew a comment from a friend:

Note to self: Don't get Clare angry, she knows how to use a gun!

I laughed.

Because Facebook is limited in its public access, I use it for short diary entries. Not too revealing, but a way of keeping people in touch.

There tonight I wrote:

Monday, 14 May 2012. Bloody cold this morning.

We have a new Belshaw to add to the very small number in the family, and that group spread across three countries - Olivia Alexandria Belshaw-Weir. So that makes Ryan and Kristy parents, brother David a grand father, me a grand Uncle (?!) and gives my girls a new cousin somewhat removed.

said that we were a small family. Including partners, there are just twenty of us on the Belshaw side in three generations in Australia, New Zealand and Canada. I know from family trees and photos that there are still some relatives in Northern England, but we lost all contact a number of years ago. In all the world, I have just two first cousins on the Belshaw side.

Another busy week. I am trying to work out how to energise my writing. It's been sadly neglected!

I have written a little on the Belshaw family. It's actually a remarkable story even though I am hardly impartial. I do so in part because of my interest in history, in part because I have my daughters in mind. In the hurly burly of their life there is little room for the past, the present is all. Yet I don't think that they are all that different from me, the interest will come because of the need to establish a link between past and present.

In Saturday Morning Musings - the quality of life I referred to gardening. This led Armidale writer, Express journalist and fellow blogger Janene Carey to write:

May I suggest you check out the Gardenate website if you're about to embark on a herb/vegie garden? Lots of info, a lively community swapping tips on gardening and cooking, and a free reminder service monthly.

It's a website (and also an app) that my software developer husband built because he wanted something like that himself - http://www.gardenate.com

I am always very happy to shamelessly promote one of my colleagues. But seriously, Gardenate is a very good web site. 

I have actually written a number of gardening posts. Perhaps time to pull them together.

Staying with the texture of life as well as the personal indulgence theme, this is a picnic photo of my part of the Belshaws. From left to right mum, me lurking behind Mum, Prof and brother David. It's very formal, I know, but I grew up in a more formal world. 

I have written on picnics many times before. They are one element of the texture of life. I have a picnic basket, one of those posh ones, in the cupboard. Perhaps time to pull it out.

Janene also referred to a story she had written for the paper on local MP Richard Torbay. It's a pretty good piece that links to an earlier story of mine, Why I support Tony Windsor. It may seem very local, but remember that the current Australian Government is in power because of New England politics, as have a number of other State and Federal Governments before them. Perhaps not so local after all!

In a comment on Saturday Morning Musings - the quality of life, Ramana wrote:

In a small town, an entrepreneur decided to open up a brothel, which was right opposite to a church. The church and its congregation started a campaign to block the brothel from opening with petitions and prayed daily against his business.

Work progressed. However, when it was almost complete and was about to open a few days later, a strong lightning struck the brothel and it was burnt to the ground.

The church folks were rather smug in their outlook after that, till the brothel owner sued the church authorities on the grounds that the church through its congregation and prayers was ultimately responsible for the destruction of his brothel, either through direct or indirect actions or means.

In its reply to the court, the church vehemently denied all responsibility or any connection that their prayers were reasons for the act of God. As the case made its way into court, the judge looked over the paperwork at the hearing and commented:

"I don't know how I'm going to decide this case, but it appears from the paperwork, we have a brothel owner who believes in the power of prayer and we have an entire church that doesn't."

I laughed, but as I also said to Ramana there is a very funny Australian movie along the same lines - the man who sued god.

Tonight I didn't feel like cooking, so I decided to have one of those weight watchers style meals that I had in the freezer for my wife. Then Clare unexpectedly came home for dinner, so now there are two in the oven. I need to go and stir them and put them back in. I actually find them unsatisfying, but I have promised Clare berries, cream and ice cream for desert! Then I am going to whip the rest of the cream and have it with coffee!

I think that it's time to finish. Maybe more tomorrow. 

Three different Australian movies

Last night we watched Bran Nue Dae (and here) on ABC TV. Its a sort of a road movie set in Western Australia and especially the Kimberley. I must say that I enjoyed it. Still, I was frustrated when I went to the website to get more details. One day I will write a short piece on the stupidities committed by Australian films in their website designs.

Its a bit kitsch, but worth watching because it's quite fun. The official trailer follows. 

Another Australian film we watched over Christmas, one given to me by Santa, was Red Dog. This one is also set in Western Australia, but in the Pilbara region to the south of the first movie. This is a very different movie, even though both movies are in roughly the same time period.

I really enjoyed it. The official trailer follows.  Further brief comments follow the trailer.   

By the standards of local films, both movies were financial successes in local box office terms, with Bran Nue Dae taking $7.6 million, Red Dog over $21 million. Both are very Australian, with Red Dog striking a huge chord just based on the comments I heard from people.

The third Australian movie I saw at Christmas, again a present, was very different. This was the New England film, Lou the Movie (and here), set in the Northern Rivers. This is a very different film set in present times that was far less successful commercially. Again the trailer follows. 

I really enjoyed Lou. I also liked it because it shows part of the area that I know. There is an enormous difference between the colours and culture of New England and that in Western Australia.

Three very different movies, all Australian.

In writing this piece I tried to get some decent box office stats, buts struggled. I also found more visual material that means that I can better use film to illustrate New England life. But that's a matter for a post elsewhere.  

Australian cowboy & indian outfit 1951

I was going to write something serious today on left versus right. My heart wasn't in it. Instead, a very short nostalgia piece.

This photo is from Christmas 1951. Brother David and I had been at Mum because we wanted a cowboy and Indian outfit. So she made us one for Christmas.

Cowboys and Indians were big things then, although this influence was not always welcomed.

During the 1930s the New England politician Sir Michael Bruxner, then NSW Deputy Premier and leader of the NSW Country Party, had complained about the American influence, about the way cowboy was replacing stockman in urban parlance, about the introduction of the term rodeo.

Perhaps under the influence of his cousin, noted Australian film maker Charles Chauvel, Bruxner attempted to introduce quotas for Australian films in cinemas, probably the first ever Government attempt to encourage Australian film production. The move failed.

Our outfit was very much an Australian variant made from local materials easily available to Mum including hessian bags. Still, it had holsters and feathers!

Growing up, westerns were a popular genre at the local cinema and one of the staples at the local news agency. Then they vanished.   

Saturday morning musings - rain, Terra Nova & The Slap

This morning I browsed the Australian papers as I usually do looking for story ideas. Not inspiring.

There are perhaps things that I should comment on: I have said before that I would write something on the renewed interest in industry policy, but my heart isn't in it! Then if the constant beat up in The Australian about Mr Rudd's interest in regaining his position as PM has any validity, perhaps we should revisit the reasons why he lost the position. Not the ostensible political reasons, but the underlying problems in approach that laid the basis for subsequent problems. Has the leopard in fact changed his spots, or will it be more of the same? Again, my heart isn't in it.

It's a gloomy morning here in Sydney. It's been quite wet across much of South Eastern Australia. Many of the irrigation and water supply dams are close to full. Just as the long dry spell was cited as evidence of climate change, now the wet is being cited as evidence for the opposite. Oh well.      

  Actually, the rainfall one is interesting. This is the latest Australian Bureau of  Meteorology rainfall projections suggesting that the northern half of the country is likely to experience above average rainfall, below average in the far south east. Australia is a big country, so there are always considerable variations within the bigger patterns.

Staying roughly with climate, last night eldest and I watched the first long episode of Terra Nova. Described as Lost meets Jurassic Park, the series begins in 2149; life on planet Earth is threatened with extinction due to dwindling worldwide air quality and overpopulation. Scientists discover a rift in space-time that allows people to travel 85 million years back in time to the late Cretaceous period of a prehistoric Earth, but in an alternate timeline thus avoiding paradoxes caused by reverse-flow time travel, offering a chance to save humanity.

I didn't know that the series was filmed in South East Queensland, nor that production was much delayed by heavy rain. This can be a very wet area. Charles Chauvel's 1949 epic Sons Of Mathew suffered similar problems to Terra Nova.

I quite enjoyed Terra Nova, eldest loved it. However, I hope that it's not too much like Lost. I got lost in Lost!

Staying with TV, on Thursday night I started watching The Slap on SBC TV. Both the original book and the TV series received rave reviews. The Australian's Peter Craven is an example. I hadn't read the book, but was attracted to the TV series by the reviews. I switched off after 15 minutes.

I accept that I am clearly not representative. Neil Whitfield takes a different view, while the first episode on Thursday night came in at number 5 in the mainland capital city ratings with 946,000 viewers. Interestingly, it did better in Sydney than Melbourne. For the benefit of international readers, there can be very significant differences in viewer patterns across Australia reflecting parochial as well as cultural differences.

Out of curiosity, I did some browsing round looking for comments. Most, not all, were positive. However, I'm not sure how many agreed with this comment from Peter Craven. 

The Slap happens to be one of the most elaborate and richly orchestrated representations of the ethnic mix of contemporary Australia put together and it carries, as if it were incidental, that part of Tsiolkas’s mission with a subtlety and assuredness that the book can scarcely match.

It's not necessarily that people disagreed, rather that this wasn't the issue they focused on as compared to corporal punishment, breast feeding, issues of discipline with children, even who had the best bum. The comments on this ABC sponsored post will give you a feel. One of the twitter streams is here.

I accept that it's all a matter of taste. I just felt that's life too short to bother. 

ANZAC Day, national identity & the power of images

Today is ANZAC Day in Australia and New Zealand and in many places around the world where Australians and New Zealanders gather. The day marks the day in 1915 when members of the Australian and New Zealand Army Corps went ashore at Gallipoli in what is now Turkey, but was then part of the Ottoman Empire.

ANZAC Day is a slightly unusual military celebration.

To begin with, it actually celebrates a defeat. The aim  of the Allied invasion was to capture Istanbul, the capital of the Ottoman Empire. The Ottoman Empire  was allied to to the German and Austro-Hungarian Empires. If Istanbul could be captured, then the Ottoman Empire might be forced out of the war.

The Ottoman troops were led by Mustafa Kemal (later known as Atatürk), who would become the founder of modern Turkey. The Allied Forces lacked the numbers to defeat an entrenched well led army and finally were evacuated in secrecy at the end of 1915.  Allied casualties included 21,255 from the UK, an estimated 10,000 from France, 8,709 from Australia, 2,721 from New Zealand, and 1,358 from the Indian Empire.

Australians and New Zealanders celebrate ANZAC Day as a heroic defeat. To Turkey, it is a heroic victory. This makes for cooperation and shared celebrations that both sides can participate in. It also makes for closer links than you might expect between the three countries. The photo shows Turkish troops carrying the Turkish, New Zealand and Australian flags at an ANZAC Day celebration in Turkey.

As the Wikipedia article draws out, ANZAC Day has undergone many changes since the day was first named in 1916. By the 1960s many, including me, were either opposed to or at least ambivalent about it because we perceived it  as a celebration of militarism, even jingoism. Those opposed to it then really expected it to die as the diggers died. Instead, over the last twenty years it has become institutionalised and gone from strength to strength.

This is partially a reflection of nationalism, something that still makes me uncomfortable, but more a reminder of the sacrifice and horrors of war, a memory of Australians and New Zealanders who have died in so many conflicts beginning in the colonial period. The War Memorials that dot the towns in both countries are still being updated.

Despite the nationalism and the use of ANZAC Day as unifying national symbols, there is no triumphalism in ANZAC Day, no celebration of national military triumphs. This can be difficult for others from different traditions to understand.

In general, the first half of ANZAC Day is remembrance, commemoration. The mood at the dawn services that mark the start of ANZAC Day round the world is somber, restrained. Then after the marches the more larrikin spirit of both countries sets in as the mood changes.

The Australian gambling game two-up symbolises the second phase. Banned until the late 1930s when it was legalised just for and on ANZAC Day, two-up has given Australia such phrases as cockatoo (the person who watched for the police and then squawked a warning) and come in spinner (the spinner was the person who threw the coins). Played by the diggers, it has become a national tradition, although I suspect that more modern Australians know about the game than have actually played it!

ANZAC Day is also unusual because it is a day shared especially between two countries. New Zealanders become concerned that the more self-centred Australians sometimes ignore their role. However, that of itself is part of the complexity of a relationship that really has no direct comparison to national relationships any where else in the world.    

It's a bit like Christmas in some families where the kids fluctuate between harmony and dispute. The back-yard cricket (or rugby or netball or any game you care to name) can get quite vicious. Yet the links continue because neither side can deny the relationship.

Finally, from time I have referred to the blog World War Two Day-By-Day. This has just reached Day 602 April 24, 1941.

On April 24, 1941, the evacuation of the Commonwealth Expeditionary forces from Greece including Australians and New Zealanders in the face of the advancing Germans is getting underway. I wrote a little about this in Arrival in Iraklion, Greece, history & the on-line world and especially An Australian dies in Crete. There I record the words of Australian poet John Manifold who wrote of his friend John Learmonth:

This is not sorrow, this is work: I build
A cairn of words over a silent man,
My friend John Learmonth whom the Germans killed

As John Learmonth was being evacuated from mainland Greece to Crete where he would die, Australian troops were defending Tobruk in the face of Rommel's attacks. I quote from World War Two Day-By-Day:

 At 7 AM, Italian infantry attack the Tobruk defenses at 2 points after an artillery barrage at dawn. Advancing in suicidally close formation, they are broken up by Australian small arms fire from the forward gun pits and British artillery fire from the rear. The attacks are over within an hour (107 Italian POWs captured).

The Australians defending Tobruk became known as the Rats of Tobruk and were celebrated in Charles Chauvel's 1944 film of the same name. The link includes clips from the film.

To a degree this film is propaganda, myth making. Yet the courage at Tobruk stopped the Germans in their tracks. Rommel could not overcome.

Sixty five years later, any Australian regardless of background would instantly recognise the symbols. I quote from curator Paul Byrnes' notes on one clip of the film:

On an armoured patrol into the desert, men of the Australian 9th Division run into an Italian patrol. Peter Linton (Peter Finch) is wounded in the first skirmish. Bluey Donkin (Grant Taylor) and Milo Trent (Chips Rafferty) break off alone into the sand hills, picking off the enemy until both are wounded. As Milo tries to help Bluey, his own head wound makes him unconscious. Bluey tries to keep him awake until their comrades arrive in an armoured vehicle.

This is the film’s first real encounter in the desert and Chauvel emphasises the immediacy and very personal nature of the fighting, as well as the comradeship of the Australian soldiers. They are characterised as ferocious and individualistic fighters, able to function on their own, like guerrillas, but devoted to each other’s care once the enemy is defeated.

The style of this sequence is almost like a newsreel. The narration, written by Maxwell Dunn, is redundant in terms of information, but it gives the audience a sense of direct communication, as if being addressed by a friend in a letter from the front. Audiences were used to narration on newsreels; they were the only source of moving images about the war in an age before television news. Chauvel made use of real newsreel footage in the film, but also newsreel techniques. After the war, this kind of simulated naturalism would be given a name and a great deal of recognition in Europe, as neorealism.

Images are important. To a degree, we are what we believe we are. ANZAC Day reinforces the perceptions of Australians and New Zealanders about themselves. It is, like it or not, a central unifying element in two societies undergoing fundamental change.

The power of ANZAC lies not in its official promotion, its institutionalisation, but in the fact that people in both countries still identify with the underlying messages.   

Postscript:

Australia's ABC went from the Sydney ANZAC March to the Dawn Service at Gallopoli. From there, after a break, the cameras will move to the Dawn Service at  Villers-Bretonneux in France.

According to Wikipedia (link above), on 24 April 1918, Villers-Bretonneux was the site of the world's first battle between two tank forces: three British Mark IVs against three German A7Vs. The Germans took the town, but that night and the next day it was recaptured by 4th and 5th Division of the AIF (Australian Imperial Force) at a cost of over twelve hundred Australian lives.

In 1919 at the unveiling of a plaque to the Australians, the town's mayor spoke of the Australian role. Here he said in part:

Soldiers of Australia, whose brothers lie here in French soil, be assured that your memory will always be kept alive, and that the burial places of your dead will always be respected and cared for...

The school in Villers-Bretonneux was rebuilt using donations from school children of Victoria, (many of whom had relatives perish in the town's liberation), and above every blackboard is the inscription "N'oublions jamais l'Australie" (Never forget Australia).

As I watched the Sydney march I thought just how thin the ranks were becoming. I also thought that the march showed just how diverse Australia had become. As I watched former soldiers in the ARVN (South Vietnamese Army) march under the old South Vietnamese flag, I thought of the decision by Australian PM Malcolm Fraser to throw open the country's doors to Vietnamese refugees.

At the time some 50,000 per month were fleeing Vietnam with many drowning at sea, other clogging  refugee camps. In the end, Australia took something like 200,000. Yes, 200,000. That's a huge intake.    

   The photo shows Vietnamese refugees arriving for resettlement.

I had to leave the televising of the Gallipoli Dawn service for a period. When I came back, the cameras were focused on the Turkish flag with singing in Turkish. It took me a moment to work out what was going on. It was the Turkish national anthem.

This may not sound significant, but think about it for a moment. Here you have the crescent flag of an admittedly secular country but one with a dominant Muslim population being broadcast on Australian national television as an integral part of one of Australia's most important national celebrations. See what I mean?