Cirrus@Austlit

Certain Women began as a short series in 1973 and continued on as a serial until 1977. At the centre of the narrative were six women from three generations of a Sydney family. Dolly has two daughters Freda and Jane. Jane has three daughters Marjorie, Helen, and Gillian.

In a short piece announcing the extension of the series after the broadcast of the first six episodes television critic Valda Marshall said the decision to make further episodes 'should also keep the women's libbers happy ... so far as I know, it's the first TV series made here specifically as a starring vehicle for women'.

Source: Marshall, Valda. 'ABC's 'Women' Given Longer Reign'. The Sun-Herald, 25/3/1973, p. 77.

A period drama set in the 1890s, the narrative concerns eighteen-year-old Ella Belairs, who returns to her home in Ballarat, Victoria after having spent her childhood in Fiji.

A serial set in the inner-Sydney suburb of Paddington, which 'tells the continuing story of a group of characters who work and live there - a kind of Sydney "Coronation Street."'

Source:

Nan Musgrove, '"Lane End" Should Please "Bellbird" Fans', Australian Women's Weekly, 8 December 1971, p.10.

A feature-film version of the popular ABC serial Bellbird, Country Town sees the district gripped by a severe drought and undergoing severe financial hardship. When young reporter Philip Henderson arrives to further investigate the town (having already published a series of articles that have outraged the local population), he is met with hostility and wariness. Old tensions and enmities are also stirred following Henderson's arrival, but the town eventually rallies together to hold a fund-raising gymkhana. A pub gathering later breaks into celebrations as the much-needed rains arrive.

The Aussie Soap Archive notes that while Country Town retains many of the main characters from the TV series, it is more a standalone piece of cinema than a television spinoff. Interestingly, many of the main television characters do not play pivotal roles in the film's narrative. Instead, they are incorporated into group scenes in the pub and at town meetings: 'Nevertheless they are well-integrated into the proceedings ... Their presence adds texture and complexity to the examination of the town and its travails. In their appearances, the various characters serve to present their own take on the events of the story and how things affect their own situation, resulting in a film that presents various viewpoints and seems to have a realistic scope. The repeated brief interludes where yet another batch of struggling farmers or business people falling on hard times are introduced do not become repetitive and successfully accentuate the severity of the drought problems'. (sighted 16 September 2009).

'Described as a "space adventure", the story concerns the operations of three spacemen from earth who land (by mistake) on an unknown planet Mythodon. There they find two groups, that are far advanced technically, but with the same old problems of wars and misunderstandings. The Earthmen become deeply involved in the local events, with the main plot centring on the 'Sleep ing Beauty' theme. In this case the Prince is sleeping, as well as the Princess, and the reason could arouse deep envy in today's Earth children — because learning on Mythodon takes place while the children are unconscious, plugged in by electrodes to an education machine.'

Source:

'Sleeping Beauty Theme in Space Play', Canberra Times, 14 January 1969, p.12.

Australia's first successful television soap opera, Bellbird was devised by writer Barbara Vernon and telecast by ABC Television between 1967 and 1977. The serial is set in a rural farming community, with the storylines examining the lives of various people from in and around the fictional township of Bellbird. Among the long list of characters introduced during the course of the series were the crusty farmer Jim 'The Colonel' Emerson and his glamorous wife Maggie, the local mechanic Joe Turner and his wife Olive, local policeman Constable Des Davies and his wife Fiona, the unpleasant stock and station agent John Quinney, and Jim and Marge Bacom, proprietors of the local pub that served as a central meeting place.

Episodes one and four from the first season of Bellbird are published in Close Up: Scripts from Australian Television's Second Decade. Editors Don Reid and Frank Bladwell provide a summary of the episodes:

Episode 1: Melbourne teacher Michael Foley sells his house and leaves the city in his Rolls Royce to live in the country township of Bellbird. Lori Chandler, a librarian, has agreed to take him in as a boarder at her property, Bellbird Station. The local P and C committee members find this immoral, however, and demand she renege on her decision. Meanwhile, Glenda Chan, a young Chinese woman, is being pressured to sell her house by local real-estate agent Charles Kozane, who uses Jack Baker, an old friend of the Chans', as his cover. Baker currently tends the garden for Glenda. She is informed that not only is the garden on council land but her family has also been squatting on land originally bought by Lori Chandler's grandfather. Kozane knows that Lori won't sell the land while Glenda still lives in the house, and is attempting to convince her to take Jack's 'generous' offer.

Episodes one and four from the first season of Bellbird are published in Close Up: Scripts from Australian Television's Second Decade. Editors Don Reid and Frank Bladwell provide a summary of the episodes:

Episode 4: Michael Foley's presence as the new teacher, his living arrangements, and his car become topics of interest within the town. While Mrs Lang finds the whole situation a lot of fuss about nothing, she is nevertheless determined that her daughter will have nothing further to do with Tony Buckland. Charles Kozane invites Foley to his office to apologise for his behaviour, but then asks him to help convince Lori that she shouldn't get involved with the 'Chinese' problem. Kozane is disappointed when Foley not only insists he has no plans to get involved in anything or with anybody in this 'god-forsaken burg,' but also openly criticises his 1920s' Chicago-style methods. The episode ends with Glenda informing Lori about Kozane's attempts to get her out of the house. Lori exclaims with savage bitterness, 'Charlie Kozane! Of all the Grade A stinkers! Charlie Kozane!'

'A shy and lonely country girl discovers hope in the city when a sailor shows her the way to the 'patch of blue'.'

Source:

[Television guide], The Canberra Times, 28 August 1967, p.19.

'The loquat tree outside Jim Emerson's station homestead in northern New South Wales is his pride and joy–but it is a pest trap.'

Source:

Radio Times, 21 May 1964, p.45.