Photo: Bruce Postle (Renegades).
Reliving
I
am standing in a queue at the Swin burne film store behind another budding young filmmaker (later to build a strong reputation for him self by d irectin g a featu re film regarding violent skinheads and neo-Nazi psychology). I am holding a w ood en M ille r trip od w ith wooden legs and sharp metal tips. It is 1979. In front of me, a loud discussion is taking place in regard to the quality of the various film laboratories Melbourne has to offer. A lab called MasterColour (now defunct) and another called Victorian Film Lab oratories (now defunct) are being com pared. The merits of M asterColour are being praised in prefer ence to the ap p arent in com p eten ce o f my own favourite, Victorian Film Laboratories. As an impas sioned film student with an undying loyalty to my preferred laboratory and loyal lab-technicians, I pipe up, “Depends on what your standards are G... (name
10
d eleted to a v oid fu rther attack) ...” with all the tact, subtlety and superiority I can muster. Suddenly, the lights go out. I am lying flat on my back on the film store floor. A fist had come at me from out of the blue and connected with my face. Still holding the tripod, I thrust it upwards, metal feet first, connecting with the aforementioned wannabe film maker’s stomach. He lurches forward in pain as he launches himself upon me with a furious barrage of blows. My tim e-honoured ritual of self-defence, learned during brief forays into the concrete jungle of the Broadmeadows train line, automatically takes over as I curl up in the fœtal position and act pathetic. John Haddock, the storeman, Eugene, the ever-faithful and reliable technician (both notably absent from this book), and various other students destined for future greatness, pull the two of us apart to lick our wounds. W e snarl at each other.
of one’s territory. It was about the Steenbeck I had fortuitously booked out months in advance (appar ently). It was about the one Arri SR cam era I had booked out for my entire shoot months in advance. It was about kids from the suburbs sticking it to the private school pricks (even though the closest I’d ever been to a private school was the gates of M LC ). It was about the obscure o b je ct o f desire we were both lusting after.
The testosterone-driven explosion was not just about film laboratories. It was about the marking out
It was about the Swinburne film school. How to define Swinburne? Swinburne was about
It was about ambition, passion, lust, desire, frus trated creative expression, lack of equipment, lack of a film library, lack of screenings, lack of actors, lack of svengalis, com petition, deadlines, content over style, form over substance, quality, Brian Robinson and his three intersecting rings of spectacle, conflict and characterization. It was about struggling for what was achievable and, if necessary, beating each other senseless to get it.
C IN EM A PAPERS • OCTOBER 1996