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The Exploits of the Emden (1928)

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clip Debt collecting on deck

This clip chosen to be G

Clip description

HMAS Sydney rushes to engage the Emden off the Cocos Islands, after picking up the alarm signal sent from the wireless station at Deception Island. The Sydney crew man their stations, but one crewman decides it’s time to collect all monies owed, before his pals ‘get blowed up’.

Curator’s notes

Some splendid shots of HMAS Sydney at full tilt, shot during exercises at Jervis Bay, on the NSW south coast in 1928. Ken G Hall joined the ship with two newsreel cameramen for a week, in order to shoot new material to refashion the original German film, Unsere Emden (1926, see main notes).

These comedy scenes, featuring real sailors selected by Ken Hall, are among the first scenes directed by Hall, and they give us a taste of things to come in his work. Hall’s taste for broad comedy is apparent even in this film – which is hardly natural material for comedy. The title card midway through this clip explaining that this incident is based on ‘absolute fact’ is an unusual touch – Hall is anticipating the audience’s scepticism, so he nips it in the bud by direct address to them.

These scenes aboard HMAS Sydney were added to the film to replace German-shot scenes in which German actors played Australian sailors. Hall wrote that the original film was ‘not all that badly put together – but when it came to the sequences involving Sydney – well, they were a pretty poor joke. Square-headed German sailors in funny-looking caps racing round as Australian tars would have had audiences either in stiches or wild with rage…’

One of the sequences that Hall filmed was a simulated burial-at-sea, to mark the men killed, but that sequence has been lost.

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australianscreen is produced by the National Film and Sound Archive. By using the website you agree to comply with the terms and conditions described elsewhere on this site. The NFSA may amend the 'Conditions of Use’ from time to time without notice.

All materials on the site, including but not limited to text, video clips, audio clips, designs, logos, illustrations and still images, are protected by the Copyright Laws of Australia and international conventions.

When you access australianscreen you agree that:

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  • You may embed the clip for non-commercial educational purposes including for use on a school intranet site or a school resource catalogue.
  • The National Film and Sound Archive’s permission must be sought to amend any information in the materials, unless otherwise stated in notices throughout the Site.

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