Between Empire and Nation: Grierson in Australia

Uploaded 1 July 1999 | Modified 14 July 1999 In many of the international histories and accounts of documentary film John Grierson is afforded a substantial role. Numerous books on documentary film attribute to Grierson the first use of the term “documentary ” in relation to film[1] while others are compelled to begin with Grierson. Kevin Macdonald and Mark Cousins …

The Back of Beyond (1954): Pre-Production Contexts

In her book on The Back of Beyond (1954), Sylvia Lawson describes John Heyer’s Shell Film Unit production as “a key moment in Australian film history in general, not just in the special register of documentary”. [1] Lawson considers the film across a history of viewing and reviewing, and in a variety of teaching situations pointing to “its emotional charge, …

Taking Place: Location and the Moving Image

John David Rhodes and Elena Gorfinkel (eds.) Taking Place: Location and the Moving Image Minneapolis London: University of Minnesota Press, 2011 ISBN: 978-0-8166-6517-4 (Paperback) 376 pp US$27.50 (pb) (Review copy supplied by University of Minnesota Press) In a couple of ways John David Rhodes and Elena Gorfinkel have assembled what is an ideal collection of writings on location and the …

Introduction to Australian Film Theory and Criticism Project Interviews

The interviews to be published on a regular basis across this and future issues of Screening the Past derive from an ARC-funded project, entitled Australian Film Theory and Criticism, undertaken by Constantine Verevis and Deane Williams of Monash University, and Noel King from Macquarie University. This research project takes as its object of study the development of film studies in Australia, especially in …

Some Things You Never Learn: An Interview with Sam Rohdie

Sam Rohdie interviewed by Deane Williams Sam Rohdie is currently Professor of Cinema Studies in the Department of Film at the University of Central Florida. He has held the Chair in Film Studies at The Queen’s University of Belfast and before that was Professor of Film Studies at Hong Kong Baptist University. He has held academic posts in universities in England, Ghana, …

‘We Might Leave it There’: An Interview with William D. Routt

Bill Routt interviewed by Deane Williams [The opening question and most of the response to it were lost because of a technical hitch. However, we do know that the first question posed by Deane was “How did you get into film studies?” and that part of the answer by Bill was that he got into film studies through being involved with a …

‘I’m going to be met by a phalanx of safari-suited men.’: An Interview with Lesley Stern

Lesley Stern interviewed by Deane Williams PHOTO: BECKY COHEN Professor Lesley Stern is the author of The Scorsese Connection (1995) and The Smoking Book (1999), and co-editor of Falling For You: Essays on Cinema and Performance (1999). Her work moves between a number of disciplinary locations, and spans both theory and production. Although her reputation was established in the fields of film theory and history, she is …

Making Settler Cinemas: Film and Colonial Encounters in the United States, Australia and New Zealand, Peter Limbrick

Peter Limbrick, Making Settler Cinemas: Film and Colonial Encounters in the United States, Australia and New Zealand. New York and London: Palgrave Macmillan. 2010 ISBN: 978-0-230-10264-4 272 pp AUD$147.95 (hb) (Review copy supplied by Palgrave Macmillan) In his latest book Making Settler Cinemas, Peter Limbrick traverses some essential cinemas of the world, Ford in the USA, Ealing Studios in Australia …

Awakening the Eye: Robert Frank’s American Cinema

George Kouvaros Awakening the Eye: Robert Frank’s American Cinema Minneapolis, London; University of Minnesota Press, 2015 ISBN: 978 0 8166-9559 1 $US25.00 (pb) $US15.23 e-book 225 pp I’m always doing the same images looking outside trying to look inside. Trying to tell something that’s true. But maybe nothing is really true except what’s out there. And what’s out there is …

Catherine Duncan: As Others See Us

Catherine Duncan’s “As Others See Us”. Introduction In 1948 Britain’s Sight and Sound published Australian émigré Catherine Duncan’s reflection on her experiences working with the Film Division of the Department of Information. Although her essay “As others see us” is a personal account focused on the films she directed for the Department of Immigration, it also provides an indication of how a certain …

Introduction to Australian Film Theory and Criticism Project Interviews

The interviews to be published on a regular basis across this and future issues of Screening the Past derive from an ARC-funded project, entitled Australian Film Theory and Criticism, undertaken by Constantine Verevis and Deane Williams of Monash University, and Noel King from Macquarie University. This research project takes as its object of study the development of film studies in Australia, especially in …

‘The Circulation of Ideas’: An Interview with Tom O’Regan

This is the latest in a series of interviews we are publishing examining a key period in Australian screen culture. For more information, see the “Introduction to Australian Film Theory and Criticism Project Interviews” in Screening the Past #23. Introduction Tom O’Regan is now Professor of Media and Cultural Studies at the University Queensland, Brisbane. He is the author of The Film Studio (with Ben Goldsmith) …

Shifts and Interventions: Cultural Materialism and Australian Film History

Introduction This paper seeks to understand a curious moment in Australian film history: the publication of Albert Moran and Tom O’Regan’s “Two Discourses of Australian Film” (1983) which was closely followed by O’Regan’s Occasional paper for Local Consumption publications entitled “Writing on Australian Film History: Some Methodological Comments” from 1984.[1] This moment is curious in that these writings contain criticisms …

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