A time in Australian TV that seems so long ago - the historical mini series period, when budgets were healthy and everyone well paid. This was a follow up to A Town Like Alice and wasn't as successful and it isn't hard to ascertain why. Adaptations of the Eureka Stockade fall into the same trap - trying to recreate history rather than dramatise characters.
So there's a lot of actors in fake beards and fake accents. The cast is incredibly strong but it's like there's this cover painting of in authenticity.
Too much of the drama is repetitive - there's two Irish women who give inspirational no nonsense talks to their men (one, Carol Burns is very good), there's two Irish man who makes speeches. The third lead woman (Amy Madigan!) sings songs and goes "why are you never home" to boyfriend Brett Cullen (who is the hearthrob of the show, and quite good - he was on The Thorn Birds and I presume got the gig that way).
There are no real characters here, just beards, hats, accents, and speeches. Bryan Brown has dynamic charisma and his accent is fine, but the character he has to play is... feisty Irishman I guess. Bill Hunter is also a feisty Irishman, only more horny. Rod Mullinary hams it up in a beard and German accent. The English governors act through their beards and moustaches and say things like "we can't let the miners get away with it".
As with the 1949 I think the dramatists were seduced by the colour and movement and apparent drama of the characters (Lalor had a romance and lost an arm... that sounds cool in theory) but couldn't bring them alive as people. Rather shamelessly they throw in a down syndrome character; it's got to be said, those scenes felt actually moving.
The second half is better as events kick in and the miners start fortifying and characters become less important. There is decent action (though for some reason the Kanopy copy I watched cut out the battle). And the story is interesting. I just wish it had been better.
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