Cirrus@Austlit

'The Black Opal centres around a gem found by a farmer's son in a cave, known to the blacks in the west of New South Wales. His rustic fiancee is lured to the stage by an actor, who obtains the opal and involves the young man in her murder. The pseudonym is said to be that of a Sydney journalist.'

- E. Morris Miller, Australian Literature, 1940

The outback station of Wallaby is in the grip of a drought. Unable to stop the bank from repossessing his land, veteran farmer Jo Galloway is forced to move his wife and daughter to the city in the hope that his son Gilbert can help them. Gilbert has supposedly been studying there, but Jo soon finds out that he has been corrupted by the highlife. Worse, Gilbert has long been embezzling the family funds to support his life of luxury and decadence. A number of 'melodramatic' episodes unfold, including a murder and a suicide, before the family is finally able to unite and return to the Wallaby (just as the rains begin to fall once more).

John Tulloch, in Legends on the Screen (1981), notes that the natural threat of drought (represented in naturalistic mode) and the social threat constituted by the corrupt city (in melodramatic mode) are, in effect, opposite sides of the same coin. The independent bush woman, Molly (see A Girl in the Bush), appears to represent the 'right' balance between nature and culture.

A Son of the Bush is a tale of the bush and horse-racing, with a touch of adventure. Australian poets are freely quoted. (E. Morris Miller, Australian Literature, 1940)

'You will like this flashing drama of Australia's outback because of the thrills; because of the glorious romance of it; because its [sic] "Dinkum Aussie;" because its hero is a real man; because its heroine is one of Australia's own out-door sunset girls–and won't you love her! You'll like it because of all that–and more! If you've never been out in the bush, come now! If you do know the glory of the bush–and maybe its hardships, too–we won't have to ask you to come to see this picture. The lure of it will get into your blood–every old memory will crowd your brain–you'll smell the gum-leaves and the wattle–it will take you right back home. See Snowy Baker in a hundred new stunts; see him take a header with a horse into the river; see the great kangaroo hunt with hundreds of kangaroos and horses; the buck-jumping in the stock-yard-and all the thrills that run riot in this big feature!'

Source:

'Northcote Theatre', Preston Leader, 16 November 1918, p.2. (Via Trove Australia)