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Clip description
Darley (Frank Harvey) and Charles Blake (Campbell Copelin) plot the sabotage of Stephen Burbridge’s timber-cutting operations. Blake denies he’s engaged to Burbridge’s daughter Joan (Shirley Ann Richards); he’s already involved with Darley’s own sister Claire (Aileen Britton). When Jim Thornton (Frank Leighton) exposes Darley’s treachery, Mr Burbridge sacks Darley on the spot. Thornton, who has a degree in forestry, gets his job.
Curator’s notes
The transition from the silent era required more than the technology to record sound. Tall Timbers is almost ten years after the first talkies in Hollywood, and seven years after the first sound films in Australia, but its dramatic roots are still in the rural melodrama that characterised a lot of silent production here. The style suited Australian audiences, who were fond of stories of people conquering the land. During the Depression, depictions of prosperity and financial success, either on the land or in the cities, offered a sense of reassurance in profoundly difficult times.
