New Australian Cinema

This book traces the development of Australian cinema through the influence of Hollywood and of British films of the forties and fifties.

This book traces the indebtedness of Australian cinema to the classical narrative style of Hollywood film-making, comparing the problems faced by the Australian cinema of the seventies and eighties with those encountered by British filmmakers of the forties and fifties.The institutions and products of the Australian film industry have been extensively surveyed, yet few analyses consider the sources of the film revival that took place in the 1970s and 1980s. This book represents a body of thinking about Australian cinema that asks where the origins of films lie. The book begins by tracing the indebtedness of Australian cinema to the classical narrative style of Hollywood film-making, with its firm grasp of melodrama. It continues by comparing the problems faced by the 'high' British cinema of the 1940s and 1950s with those faced by Australia in the 1970s and 1980s in the attempts by both countries to establish national film industries. New Australian Cinema will increase the scope of the discussion about the revival of Australian cinema and help us to make cultural sense of the films themselves.