Australian
Screen

Clip description

The narrator, Charlie (Alwyn Kurts), strolls along the beach and recalls what made the ‘green year’ of 1929 a defining moment in his life. Charlie age 14 (Darius Perkins) is woken in the night by his ailing Grandfather (Tom Farley), who believes he is the captain of a ship. Charlie helps his parents, Mr and Mrs Reeve (Alan Hopgood and Monica Maughan), bring Grandfather in from the storm.

Curator’s notes

All the Green Year takes the unusual decision of having an on-screen narrator, Charlie, played by Alwyn Kurts – at the time, a well-known TV face for his roles in Homicide (1964–76) and Cop Shop (1977–83). The device is distracting in this scene: his talking aloud while on the beach doesn’t seem natural, and his failure to look up at the audience makes it hard to connect with his character.

His introduction does effectively set a nostalgic tone for the episode and hints at events to come in the series. The 1929 he describes is just prior to the Great Depression and a turning point between wars, so an important time in history. However, he also touches on how more personal events made this year memorable. Among them are his troubled relationship with his family and his grandfather’s illness, introduced here.

The second half of the clip effectively demonstrates how a convincing storm can be conjured with a few tricks on a relatively small budget in an ABC studio. Flickering lighting in Charlie’s bedroom simulates lightning and thunder and wind sound effects are prominent on the soundtrack. A rain machine generates enough falling ‘rain’ to suggest a storm. The camera stays focused on the front porch without ever showing us the garden or any exteriors, betraying the scene’s studio setting. The actors’ performances complete the illusion. Tom Farley as Grandfather seems thoroughly convinced he is on a ship’s bridge during a storm. Seeing him behaving under his delusion makes his family’s distress seem all the more understandable.