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Compass – Fly on the Wall Messiah (2004)
Every year, 700 amateur singers come together to perform Handel’s Messiah at the Sydney Town Hall. It’s a Christmas tradition. They have nine rehearsals only and getting ready for the big night is a nail-biting experience. [read more]
Jewel of the Pacific (1932)
Lord Howe Island is the subject of this short travelogue made by Frank Hurley during a camera tour of the island in 1932. It shows the island’s geographical features, its local population, a group of men gathering kentia palm seeds ... [read more]
Dancing Orpheus (1962)
A black-and-white nature program from the earliest years of ABC television featuring the unique lyrebird. [read more]
The Chain Reaction (1980)
Deadly radiation is released following an accident at the WALDO nuclear waste facility in central Australia. Heinrich (Ross Thompson), a scientist at the facility who has been exposed to a fatal dose of contaminated water, escapes into the countryside ... [read more]
Opal Fever (2004)
Opal Fever is a four-part documentary series that explores the obsession with mining the precious stone opal. The series looks at the miners, retailers and consumers of opals. It also examines the dangers of working underground. The series is set ... [read more]
Birth of the Red Kangaroo (1965)
This CSIRO documentary details the reproductive cycle of the red kangaroo, its mating habits and the early stages of a kangaroo’s development as it grows in the pouch. It includes animated diagrams to illustrate ... [read more]
Mary and Max (2009)
A tale of friendship between two unlikely penpals: plump, myopic little Mary Daisy Dinkle (voiced by Bethany Whitmore and then Toni Collette) growing up in suburban Melbourne and Max Jerry Horovitz (Philip Seymour Hoffman), an obese, friendless New York man ... [read more]
The Spirit of Gallipoli (1928)
Billy Austin (Keith Gategood) has grown up carefree and undisciplined on the outskirts of Sydney. His mother and father despair until he is called up to compulsory training in the Army. At Liverpool camp, Billy and his best mate Jack ... [read more]
Ask the Leyland Brothers – Episode 23 (1976)
In Ask the Leyland Brothers, adventurers Mike and Mal Leyland travel to different parts of Australia to make short documentary segments. Every story is a response to letters from viewers asking the Leyland Brothers to cover a person, place or ... [read more]
Yindi: The Last Koala? (1996)
This docu-drama follows Yindi, a koala on Australia’s east coast. Yindi is still a tiny baby in the pouch when his mother is injured in a car accident and he must be hand-reared. After mother and baby are returned to ... [read more]
Siege of the South (1931)
Between 1929 and 1931, Sir Douglas Mawson led two summer expeditions to Antarctica in the ship Discovery as part of a British, Australian and New Zealand Antarctic Research Expedition (BANZARE). The main purpose of the expedition was to conduct ... [read more]
Around the World in 80 Ways (1986)
Senile and almost blind, Roly Davis (Allan Penney) is aghast when he discovers wife Mavis Davis (Diana Davidson) has embarked on a round-the-world holiday with his next-door neighbour and business rival Alec Moffatt (Rob Steele). Roly’s sons, Wally (Philip Quast), ... [read more]
The Stranger – Series 1 Episode 1 (1964)
One rainy night a stranger (Ron Haddrick), suffering from amnesia and with no discernible heartbeat, is found unconscious on the doorstep of the Walsh family home. He is welcomed inside by high school principal Mr Walsh (John Faassen), his wife ... [read more]
The Australians at Messines (1917)
In the lead-up to the Battle of Messines in June 1917, Australian troops study a topographical model of the battle area, constructed on the ground. Small towers allow the men to peruse the ground from above. On 5 June, the ... [read more]
The Bones of Building (1956)
This is an instructional documentary made by the Waterside Workers’ Federation Film Unit on safety in the construction industry. It dramatises the case of Bill Smith (Dick Hackett) to illustrate how dangerous accidents can occur on building sites if workers ... [read more]
The Goddess of 1967 (2000)
A Japanese man (Rikiya Kurokawa) comes to Australia to buy his dream car, a 1967 Citroën DS, known by collectors as a ‘goddess’ (because the letters in French sound like ‘déesse’). A blind woman (Rose Byrne) answers the door at ... [read more]
The Boys are Back (2009)
After successful Adelaide sports journalist Joe Warr (Clive Owen) loses his second wife Katy (Laura Fraser) to cancer, his relationship with his two sons from two different marriages is put to the test. Joe had moved from the UK to ... [read more]
The Last of the Knucklemen (1979)
A group of opal miners live in a tin shed near the outback town of Andamooka in South Australia. The foreman, Tarzan (Gerard Kennedy), is known as ‘the last of the knucklemen’ for his ability as a bare-knuckle fighter. Tarzan’s ... [read more]
The Book of Revelation (2006)
Daniel (Tom Long) and Bridget (Anna Torv) are the stars of a modern dance company, run by Isabel (Greta Scacchi). During rehearsals for a new show, Daniel goes out to buy cigarettes for Bridget and disappears. He returns 12 days ... [read more]
A Big Country – On the Hook (1976)
In the mid-1970s, when this program was made, the waterside workers were in well paid, full-time jobs. Few viewers would have known of their traumatic history and the growth of the union that protects the rights of workers on the ... [read more]
