THE MELANCHOLY SPECTACLES a STUDY of THC AUSTRALIAN FILM INDUSTRY Jujian Craft
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THE MELANCHOLY SPECTACLES A STUDY OF THC AUSTRALIAN FILM INDUSTRY Jujian Craft One of the problems in talking about the Australian film industry is that it is an industry. One has to forget about the lofty ideals of art and recognise that like any other industry it must be efficient and progressive. If it is not and it can't compete with overseas products then it must be protected. For the government to reach this decision it must feel that the film industry is of vital national importance, or that imports of foreign films place too great a strain on our overseas reserves. It is possible that once a viable Australian feature film industry exists the Australian experience might produce an article which is unique and, as such, valuable in international markets. Thus an import loss might become an export gain. These prosaic considerations are unfortunately the only facts which will influence a reticent government to take direct action to support the film industry. At the moment the government is not particularly concerned about the cultural aspects of a national film industry, and possibly this is a good thing as the encouragement of feature films which would be distinctly Australian would 'lead to the gross perversiOnS of excessive nationalism which have bedevilled so much of Australia's artistic expression. The main concern at the moment should be to put the film industry on a firm economic foundation. 4.5 At -the present time the film industry is in a very precarious position. Since 1960 when legislation was passed to prohibit the importation of foreign television commercials the industry has been dependent on advertising contracts. Other sections of the industry make a very insecure living out of prestige documentaries commissioned by large organizations like C.S.R., Qantas, and B.H.P. Thus in times of minor economic recession the film industry is the hardest hit. The very real element of insecurity in their profession has caused many highly skilled technicians to leave the industry for lower salaries but greater continuity of employ- ment. This is particularly true of young people who enter the industry with high ambitions but leave it for more mundane but secure professions. In highly specialised branches of the feature film industry like lighting cameramen and sound recordists, a technician can only expect highly paid employ- ment when foreign companies come to Australia to make feature films. Recently when Michael Powell was here to make "They're a Wierd Mob" these technicians enjoyed very good salaries for six to ten weeks, then they were forced to seek employment in freelance capacities in the television and documentary film industries. The frustration and insecurity that these people experience is indicative of the hardship suffered by members of the industry since the first World War. When the Senate Select Committee, set up under the chairmanship of Senator Vincent in November 1962 to investigate the state of the television and film industries in Australia, made its report in October 19631 the committee glumly concluded that 'The rise and fall of the Australian film industry is a melancholy spectacle for contemplation by Australians.' 2 Unhappily the Vincent Report was only echoing what had been very evident to the Commissioners of the Royl Commission into the Moving Picture Industry 35 years before. 3 The depressing fact was that at one stage, up to about 1920, Australia had one of the most energetic film industries in the world. Between 1908 and 1928, 152 feature films had been made in Australia. The 46 majority of these were made between 1910 and 1920. From 1929 and the introduction of sound to 1963 the industry was instrumental in producing 95 features. Very few of the films that were produced on local capital were successes, but those that were ("40,000 Horsemen", "Sons of Matthew", and "On Our Selection") grossed more in Australia than "Gone With the Wind". It is generally held that the first film to be shot and exhibited in Australia was produced by Maurice Sestier and Walter Barnett in September 1896, only twelve months after the first projected film show in Paris in 1895. Sestier was a cameraman with the Lumieres who had been responsible for this first showing of motion pictures in the world. Sestier and Barnett took short 60 feet gazettes of movement at the Manly wharf area and other sights of Sydney. In November of the same year they filmed the arrival of dignitaries at the Melbourne Cup. The Melbourne Cup has been filmed each year since then. It is rather unfortunate that the dedication with which this task has been approached has not been evident in other aspects of film making. The most justifiably famous man in early Australian film making is Joseph Henry Perry. Perry acquired a motion picture camera in 1897 and with considerable insight decided to use it for propaganda purposes. The War Cry, 21 August 1897, reported that Perry, a member of the Melbourne Salvation Army, has a first-class Cinematograph camera... that he is now hard at work.., and soon War Cry readers everywhere will shortly have the opportunity of seeing for themselves all the marvels of this scientific fashion of spreading salvation. 4 The results of his labours were two films "The Early Christian Martyrs" and "The Soldiers of the Cross." The dates at which these films were first screened seems to be difficult to determine, but the important fact is that they were commenced in 1899 and that they were story films. it is generally thought that the first 4? story film was not made until 1902 when George Melies made "A Trip to the Moon" or 1903 when an American company made "The Great Train Robbery." It seems most likely that Perry's films predated both the French and the American attempts to evolve a narrative structure from discrete pieces of film. His innovation is made even more remarkable by the magnitude of his undertaking: there were scenes in which 600 actors took part and a multitude of trick effects. In his history of the camera in Australia Jack Cato makes no distinction between the two films. 5 He refers only to one film, "The Soldiers of the Cross", which was shown in Melbourne in September 1900. Perry's son, however, makes a distinction between the two films and states that they were filmed at two different locations: "The Early Christian Martyrs" at the Salvation Army Home for girls in Murrumbeena and "The Soldiers of the Cross" at Wildwood outside Melbourne. 6 Whatever form the films took Cato has demonstrated beyond doubt that one of Perry's films was shown in 1900, and because of this he must be credited with.being the first person ever to assemble a narrative film. In the ten years that followed Perry's attempts at salvation through film, a large number of less charitable gentlemen used the narrative motion picture to make some quick money. Their choice of subject was obviously based on puhiic demand, for the titles of this period indicate a rather depressing conformity "Captain Midnight, the Bush King", 1909/10, Spencer's; "Captain Starlight". 1909/10, Spencer's; "John Vane, Bushranger", 1909/10, Spencer's: "The Life of Frank ardiner", 1909, Australian Artists' Pictures; "Robbery Under Arms", 1907, Jim McMahon and E.J. Carroll; "The Story of the Kelly Gang", 1906, Johnson and Gibson and J. and N. Tait; and "Thunderbolt", 1907, John F. Gavin Productions. As well there was the obverse of the problem of the bushranger: "Besieged in Port Arthur", 1906, Bland Holt; "For the Term of his Natural Life", 1907, Osborne and Jordan; and "RUfUS Dawes", 1909/10, Spencer's. At this 48 stage of the film's development feature films conid be made very cheaply. It was pointed out in the 1928 Royal Commission that films of this period could be made for a few hundred pounds, by 1928 the amount of capital needed to produce a feature film was between $60,000 and $100,000. 7 Before World War I all films were shot in natural light and although this was a tedious business it did mean that capital Costs in the form of studios-with Sophisticated artifical lighting were negligible. That is why the Australian climate was a distinct advantage in the Cost structures of early films. After the introduction of artificial lighting this advantage was minimal but even now well meaning supporters of the film industry seem to believe that our climate will give us an advantage over the industries of Europe and the United States. This might be true of some types of films, but with the increasing amount of studio work that synchronised Sound shooting demands the emphasis is more on the amount of modern studio space a country can provide, not the amount of sunlight per week. The pre-Worid War I Australian film industry was technically well equipped. It had modern cameras, inventive and imaginative technicians, flexible actors and plenty of sunshine. What it did lack was an ability to capitalise on the advances made by Perry. In the United States film makers were quick to see and utjlise the innovations that D.W. Griffith had made in film making and the writers were equally quick to realise the potential of Griffith's way of making a film. With enthusiastic and experimental directors and eager writers the Anerican film industry developed rapidly. This development was also evident in Europe after the War, but in Australia where the lead had been given by Perry 14 years before Griffith started shooting "The Birth of a Nation" there were neither directors nor writers capable of exploiting this lead.