The collaborations of Tim Burstall and David Williamson were so crucial to putting the Oz film industry of the 70s on a firm footing that it's odd in a way this reunion slipped under the radar. Or maybe not... it was an original script, not based on a play, and it had sat in a draw for over half a decade, after it was written in the wake of Petersen's success.
That had starred Jack Thompson and this one features the actor they used when you couldn't get Thompson, Mike Preston - another muscly blonde, but far less good an actor. He plays a more macho Williamson type - he's broken up for from his wife (Diane Cilento) and has a new partner (Wendy Hughes) with little kids. He seems to have plenty of money, running a toy factory, supporting Hughes and some kids and also his ex Cilento who has a new lover.
The key roles never seem quite right. Cilento is very glamorous, it's good to see her in an Aussie film, but I never quite believed her, or Preston. Or come to think of it Michael Pate though it's nice to see him.
Gary Day plays another in a long line of his alpha sleezes but he seems more at home. There's some typically poorly drawn Williamson females, like the two girls at a party who stand around sizing up the attractiveness of Rod Mullinar and Preston. Hughes plays a woman complaining about looking after the kids and doing her PhD. There's other Williamson worries - the cost of divorce, concern about environment, the difficulty of remaining faithful, the hassles of dealing with an ex-wife, dealing with struggling teenage kids (he didn't have any then but he would soon and they'd be a constant of his plays from the late 80s onwards).
I wish it had been set in some industry other than toys. I mean, that is an interesting metaphor but it's really standing in for the Australian film industry, with its domination from America... and Williamson, who can and has done a lot of research on different fields, wrote this too quickly to do the research to really know it. If they'd done it on the film industry he simply would've known more. Maybe he was worried about being sued.
There's some 70s style nudity with some throwaway shots of Wendy Hughes topless in bed and Clare Binney topless in the shower. sort of comes out of nowhere and winds up having a big part when pate tries to seduce her... I felt this role could've been combined with Thornton's or Hughes or at least the girl who plays Day's girlfriend, Vanessa Leigh. And maybe Comber and Cilento should have gone off to Queensliffe with the others. There's too many characters.
There's 70s style Williamson "shock value" with Day, Leigh, Binney and Preston sitting around watching a porno and Preston kissing Day's girl while Day is in the room. That is pure Don's Party (Binney was in that movie). So too is talk of middle class people subsiding others (lovers, kids), Warwick Comber being upset Cilento talked to an art critic from The Age,
The script needed another draft. There's no real reason why Preston's daughter Sigrid Thornton couldn't be Cilento's daughter as well (or was she? i'm not sure). There's another character too Arthur Dignam, who is Preston's lawyer, giving advice about the business and the partnership. Oh and there's Sigrid Thornton's boyfriend.
But you know something? I enjoyed it. I mean, it's not very good - too unfocused, too many characters, Preston isn't up to it, doesn't have many or even any really funny lines, the toy industry background feels underused. But there's interesting actors, it tells a story, I like the Aussies teaming up to take on the Yanks at the end. The domestic violence faced by Cilento feels all too real. It was an easy watch.
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