Review: Newsfront

The tale of several Aussie newsreel makers from the late 40s through to the 60s, especially focusing on hardworking and fiercely loyal, veteran cameraman Bill Hunter. Gerard Kennedy is his brother, who works for a rival company, after ‘selling out’ and heading for the United States, owners of the rival company. Angela Punch-McGregor is awful as the caricatured, conservative Catholic girl Hunter unhappily weds. Wendy Hughes is the co-worker he becomes involved with. Chris Haywood plays the relatively green, likeable camera assistant (who becomes Hunter’s sidekick/protégé of sorts), and Bryan Brown is also memorable as a left-leaning editor. Look out for former pop idol, one-hit wonder and former reality TV irritant Mark Holden late in the film, as a much less enthusiastic protégé/assistant.

Lauded 1978 Aussie drama from Phillip Noyce (“Rabbit-Proof Fence”, “Dead Calm”, “Blind Fury”) offers a pretty interesting, authentic tale of our newsreel filmmakers around the time television came to turn their world upside down (a lot of actual newsreel footage is used, and is the highlight of the film). Unfortunately, it forgets to populate this interesting material with suitably interesting characters, the film’s somewhat choppy, episodic approach makes it hard to latch on to any of the sketchily drawn figures (Hunter’s central character, meanwhile, is entirely uninteresting, despite the late actor’s best efforts). Hughes in particular, fares poorly, with an ill-defined part. And yet there are fine performances by Brown, and especially Haywood, who constantly steals scenes.

Worth a look (the Maitland flood segment towards the end is terrific), but strangely aloof, and a bit overrated over here in my opinion. The screenplay is by Noyce and the infamous Bob Ellis (Paul Cox’s “Cactus”, “A Man of Flowers”, “My First Wife”), from an idea by David Elfick and Philippe Mora (the eclectic director of “The Howling II & III”, “A Breed Apart”, “Communion”, and “Mad Dog Morgan”).

Rating: C+