TYPICALLY AUSTRALIAN

Evening Star, Issue 25701, 26 January 1946, Page 10

TYPICALLY AUSTRALIAN

I OVERLANDERS ' AN EPIC " I came to Australia to make a film that would be definitely Australian and also portray the Australian war effort," said Mr Harry Watt, director of Ealing (London) Studios Australian production, ■' Overlanders.' " But 1 had a hunch that by the time this film would be on the • riiarket maybe the war would be over—and that many people would be weary of the ordinary battle and combat films; A film isn't medicine; primarily it's entertainment. So-1 looked around for something exciting; something really Australian, and something that in a year or two years' time' audiences would be eager to. look at. Something with the future as well as the past in it. '" I read as many Australian books as I could —history, anthropology, travel, novels, a few plays, some

poetry, short well as the Australian classics. I talked to generals, journalists, politicians, and the average Australian wherever 1 found him. 1 employed a well-known Australian writer to do some literary and historical research for me. At one time I thought of an historical film that would culminate in the heroic holding of the Kokoda Trail. I explored the possibility of other direct war themes and what might be called buccaneering stories of Australian life. In the meantime 1 travelled. ■'■■■-■ " In. three months I'd travelled 30,000 miles and 1 knew : that '. there was a whole lot more of Australia still to be seen, but I'd now got the, idea of what my film about Australia would have to have in it. It. would have'to have a background of space and open air, of immense distances and of the tremendous courage and toughness o'f its people ' . "The actual idea .of the story came quite bv chance, in the office of Mr Murphy, Food,Controller. Mr Murphy had been explaining to me Australia's problems in connection with food supply for military purposes. T He'knew that'great numbers of Allied soldiers were due to arrive here and his 'department had had to plan- ahead the of vegetables and .crops"and the moving of stock. 'ln 1942 ,we. moved 85,000 head of cattle,' he said simply, 'right across ,the continent. Are you interested at all? ' . ;■ " Was I. interested? .The more. I thought about it the/more I likediit. Mr Murphy saw it as a documentary film for his department, but I found in it all T had been looking, for as a subject. It was heroic in quality. It.had distance and open air.and endurance in it. It was a true record of one of Australia's .greatest war efforts, The;Cpmmonwealth of Australia has also recognised this, and has, given us invaluable help and the co-operation of various departments—the Army,-the R.A.A.F , the Departments of. Agriculture and Information, and the. Department of the Interior. Undoubtedly the film! is going to give people overseas ah intimate and first-hand picture of what the back country of Australia- is like. 1 think it is going to give Australians themselves a real thrill. ' " I'm not telling the story except in outline. It deals with the.overlanding of one mob of cattle by one droving outfit. The characters of the drovers were as important to me as the job they were doing, and the job they were doing was terrific! I wanted to make it a human, as well as a war, epic. If you like vou can call it a little epic, something intensely human and same time immense. One of the characters in the film draws the European comparison: 'Do you know what you're trying to do, Dan ? You're trying to drive a mob of cattle from London to Moscow in the.wrong time of the year in a bad season . . .' " It's not, of course', all bullocks and bad language and heroism. There's love . . that irrefutable attraction that grows up under the moon and the stars that reach down out of the high skies of the Northern Territory and swing in great arcs over the sleeping plains; an attraction that . blossoms in the ' firelight round the romantic night camps with the cattle. There's danger and the perpetual gamble of the cattleman—how much water and what feed ahead? There's comedy. What Australian camp, is without its comedian? " All told it's a simple, strong story with-a group of actors, some of whom will go far in .films."