The Moth of Moonbi
( dir. Charles Chauvel
)
Australia
:
Australian Film Productions
,
1926
Z1719800
1926
single work
film/TV
'Charles Chauvel's first feature tells the story of a country girl, Dell Ferris (the Moth of Moonbi), drawn to the bright lights of the big city where her inheritance is soon frittered away with high society revelling. A wiser Dell returns to Moonbi Station where she is beset by the cattle rustler Jack Bronson, but finally finds peace and happiness with the faithful head stockman, Tom.
Shot on location in the bush outside Brisbane the film was also made at an improvised studio at the rear of a guest house in the city. Despite cold weather, cast and crew camped out with pack-horses and sheep for fresh meat. This first effort of Chauvel's (he appears in the film in blackface as an Aboriginal stockman) showed signs of the action director's career characteristics. He shot on difficult locations with new acting talent and told an Australian story which gave heroic dimensions to ordinary lives. Scenes of station life are authentic pictures of cattle yards, transportation by train, and the sale yards. The production cost 4400 pounds and was released at the Wintergarden Theatre, Brisbane on 25 January 1926' (National Film and Sound Archive).
'This article explores Australian romance fiction from the 1880s to 1930s to contemplate how Australian women writers conceptualized romantic love, gender relations, marriage, and the role of the romantic couple within the nation and British Empire. It argues that short stories about love and romance novels prior to Australian Federation (1901) tended to be more pessimistic about the outcome of romantic love in the colonies; both male and female writers of love stories were too aware of the hardships that befell women in the colonies, especially along the frontier. After Federation, however, many of the obstacles to love that had developed in the colonial romance persisted, but in the post-Federation romance novel women writers began to imagine that Australian culture, environment, and character – particularly the two heroic national types, the “Australian Girl” and the “Coming Man” – were ultimately sufficient to overcome such obstacles. Thus post-Federation romance novels are more likely to have happy endings. In these romances, a successful marriage between an Australian and a Briton also served the higher purpose of either nation- or empire-building.'
Source: Publisher's blurb.
