Cirrus@Austlit

'Karen Parsons, a dedicated and courageous American nurse, sets out with five young orphans on an epic journey from a Thai refugee camp to freedom in Australia. She is rescued by an Australian charter boat captain, Steve Hannah, and love blossoms against impossible odds.'

Source: Screen Australia.

'Three people have only seven days to capture an extortionist who is holding the Surfers Paradise Council to ransom for $2 million by threatening to use a shark-attracting formula at a surf carnival' (Source: Screen Australia).

(Sighted: 31/5/2012).

In this mini-series, which consciously takes its name from a 1955 western by Anthony Mann, Kate Adamson, a struggling single mother living in Los Angeles, meets, falls in love with, and marries Tom Hannon, a single father who runs an outback cattle station in Australia. Not realising that her new husband has been killed in a plane crash on his way home, Kate arrives at Larapinta to face not only two shocked stepdaughters (who were unaware of their father's remarriage) but also a severe drought and the machinations of her neighbours on the enormous cattle station that borders Larapinta. Resisting her children's desire to return to the United States, Kate resolves to remain and see Larapinta through the drought.

Moran notes in his Guide to Australian TV Series that

The series was aimed directly at a network sale and to that end producer Hal McElroy not only used his writer on the great potboiler Return to Eden, but also cast both Linda Evans and Jason Robards in central roles. The series was shot in Los Angeles and Alice Springs, and even though the budget blew out from an anticipated $4.5 million to $12 million, the series achieved an American network sale to CBS, the first Australian series to do so.

The mini-series also rated well when it was screened in Australia.

The 1986 television series is set seven years after the events of the 1983 mini-series. Stephanie Harper, Australia's richest woman, is happily married to her plastic-surgeon husband. Her two children are now young adults, involved in the Harper 'empire' but with their own problems. The release of Jilly Stewart from prison starts a dramatic chain of events.

'Nine years after committing her first husband, Howard, to a mental asylum, Jenny renews their friendship. After he seduces her, Jenny suffers from guilt and retreats to a country property with Geoff. Her fears are realised when Howard follows them there.'

Source: Screen Australia. (Sighted: 19/9/2012)

A vicious razorback boar terrorises the Australian outback, beginning with the death of a small child, whose grandfather is tried for his murder but acquitted. An American journalist (who holds strong conservationist views) follows the story and is attacked by two locals, who leave her for the boar to kill. Her husband then comes to Australia, determined to seek the boar who killed his wife (and, incidentally, revenge himself on the two locals).

Written by prolific screen-writer Everett De Roche, the film is based on a novel of the same name by American novelist Peter Brennan (a novel that, apparently, bears little resemblance to the film). The first full-length film directed by Russell Mulcahy, Razorback is a bridge between Mulcahy's early work on video clips and his later, more recognisable genre films, beginning (only two years after Razorback) with Highlander.

According to David Carroll at Tabula Rasa, 'Razorback is perhaps the most recognisable 'horror' film from Australia. It has a rising young director in the form of Russell Mulcahy, some reasonably well-known faces, both Australian and American, and a giant pig. It also has a depiction of the Australian outback as, basically, hell'.

Carroll specifies of the way in which the film approaches Australia (as a concept, rather than simply a country) that 'The brothers, their factory, the nightmare landscape and the pig itself, are all presented as a single, coherent malevolence. I have written previously, in more than one place, that the landscape is the defining feature of Australian horror. Razorback extends the idea into expressionism'. He emphasises that 'Of course, all this unnaturalistic splendour could just be attributed to shoddy film-making, but I don't think so. The change in tone and the way things are shot in different locations, such as Sarah's farm and the factory, is very striking, whilst the town itself shifts between the two. There seem to be two different realities, and a slippery border between them.'

Source: Tabula Rasa (http://www.tabula-rasa.info/AusHorror/Razorback.html). (Sighted: 15/6/2012)

Melvin Purple is a shy young man and, just like his father Alvin, irresistible to women.

Set in Indonesia, The Year of Livingly Dangerously is based on the real events that occurred in the country in 1965. The story revolves around Guy Hamilton, who has arrived in Jakarta on his first overseas posting for the Australian Broadcasting Service. Having had no time to build relationships or contacts, he stumbles around the city, attempting to cover the political tensions that are daily increasing. He is eventually taken under the wing of a small but well-connected Chinese-Australian cameraman, Billy Kwan, who recognises great potential in Hamilton. Hamilton is groomed by Kwan, who then sets up exclusive interviews for him while also engineering a romance with Jill Bryant, the young assistant at the British Embassy. Bryant warns Hamilton that violence is about to break out between right-wing factions and the Communist Party of Indonesia, but he pursues the story anyway. Billy Kwan, disheartened by all the people he once believed in, decides to make a public protest against President Sukarno. When the situation eventually escalates into violence, Hamilton is caught between his career ambitions, his conscience, and his feelings for Jill Bryant.

A journalist uncovers a government conspiracy that puts Sydney at risk from nuclear testing.

According to MemorableTV.com, this television film was planned as the pilot for a series called Foreign Correspondent, but the show was never picked up.

Source: Memorable TV.com (http://www.memorabletv.com/australia/tvad.htm). Sighted: 4/11/2011

Set in the South Australian town of Streaky Bay, Blue Fin is the story of a young boy's relationship with his father, owner of the fishing trawler Blue Fin, and the chance the boy has to prove himself.

Based on an original idea by Peter Weir, The Last Wave concerns a young Sydney lawyer who, while defending four Aboriginal men against a murder charge, becomes troubled by dreams. He soon begins to feel the pull of magic forces beneath the surface of civilisation. A series of apparently random occurences assume a disturbing pattern and the city becomes a facade for a place of ancient ritual.

On St Valentine's Day 1900, three schoolgirls and a teacher from an exclusive English-style boarding school go missing at the mysterious Hanging Rock in central Victoria. One of the girls is found alive a week later, but the others are never seen again. As morale within the school begins to disintegrate, the headmistress's increasingly incoherent anger is turned towards one student, leading to tragic consequences. Although the police suspect Michael Fitzhubert, a young English aristocrat, and his manservant Albert, who were in the area at the time the girls disappeared, the mystery is never solved. As Paul Byrnes (Australian Screen) notes, the suggested scenarios range from the 'banal and explicable (a crime of passion) to deeply mystical (a crime of nature).'

'A small town in rural Australia (Paris) makes its living by causing car accidents and salvaging any valuables from the wrecks. Into this town come brothers Arthur and George. George is killed when the Parisians cause their car to crash, but Arthur survives and is brought into the community as an orderly at the hospital. But Paris is not problem free. Not only do the Parisians have to be careful of outsiders (such as insurance investigators), but they also have to cope with the young people of the town who are dissatisfied with the status quo.'

Source: Internet Movie Database (http://www.imdb.com). (Sighted: 22/6/2012)