Clip description
This clip begins with a panoramic view from the Morehouse Tower of St Paul’s Cathedral looking south over the Yarra River to the Botanical Gardens and the War Memorial. It is followed by a tracking shot from one of the shoulder lanes on the tree-lined St Kilda Road and then views of the Princes Bridge, Collins Street buildings, the Town Hall, Parliament House and the Royal Exhibition Building in the Carlton Gardens. The clip is accompanied by voice-over from Norman Campbell and an orchestral music score.
Curator’s notes
The 'descriptive talk’, as it is characterised in the opening credits, combines facts about the city and its historic buildings with epithets such as 'splendid’, 'most beautiful’ and 'impressive’. Along with the classical score and Higgins’s accomplished photography, the narration presents Melbourne as an idyllic destination that combines the beauty of nature and the progress of a modern city (see clip two).