The Kangaroo Kid (film)

Last updated

The Kangaroo Kid
Kangaroo Kid.jpg
Poster
Directed by Lesley Selander
Written by Sherman Lowe
Based onstory by Anthony Scott Veitch
Produced by T.O. McCreadie
Harry C. Brown (assoc)
Ben Sheil (exec)
Starring Jock Mahoney
Veda Ann Borg
CinematographyW. Howard Greene
Edited byAlex Ezard
Music by Wilbur Sampson
Production
company
Allied Australian Films
Distributed by British Empire Films (Aust)
Eagle Lion (US) [1]
Release dates
September 1950 (US)
March 1951 (Sydney) [2]
Running time
72 mins
CountriesAustralia
United States
LanguageEnglish
Budget£90,000 [3]

The Kangaroo Kid is a 1950 Australian-American Western film directed by Lesley Selander.

Contents

Plot

In the 1880s, the Remington detective agency sends Tex Kinnane to Australia to track down a notorious gold robber and murderer called John Spengler. In Sydney, Tex makes friends with Baldy Muldoon and travels with him to the small town of Gold Star, where Baldy's wife runs the local saloon. Tex adopts a baby kangaroo and earns the name "Kangaroo Kid". He is hired as a stage coach driver and befriends barmaid Stella Grey, who offers to look after his kangaroo.

Tex is challenged to a shooting match by local thugs Phil Romero and Robey, but Tex outshoots them, causing a fistfight. Sgt Jim Penrose warns him about his behaviour. Penrose visits his girlfriend, Mary, who says that her father, miner Steve Corbett, has been acting strangely since Tex arrived and wants to leave town.

Vincent Moller, an American living in Australia for health reasons, plans to rob the stage coach with Crobett, Romero and Robey and implicate Tex. Corbett is reluctant to join in and Moller plans to kill him.

Tex is driving the stage when it is held up by Romeo and Robey, who kill the guard and knock out Tex, leaving him in the bush. Sgt Jim Penrose is convinced he is guilty. He tracks down Tex and puts him in gaol for robbery and murder. Moller visits Tex and agrees to arrange his escape if he leaves the country quickly. This makes Tex suspicious. He escapes and proves that Moller is John Spengler.

Tex takes Moller back to America but promises to return for Stella. [4]

Cast

Production

The McCreadie brothers had made two films and for their third decided on a co-production with Hollywood. [6] It was intended to be the first of a series of co-productions and was budgeted at US$200,000 [7] Producer Howard Brown had extensive experience making movies on location. [8]

The film was based on a story by Australian writer, Tony Scott Veitch, but rewritten by an American screenwriter. John English was originally announced as director, but was later replaced by Lesley Selander. [9] At one stage Richard Denning and Adele Jergens were announced for the leads. [10]

Selander arrived in February 1950 and filming began the following month. [11] Location shooting was done in Sofala and interior work at Commonwealth Film Laboratories in Sydney. There was an American director, cinematographer and four imported actors: Jock Mahoney, Veda Ann Borg, Martha Hyer and Douglas Dumbrille. Douglas Dumbrille had previously appeared in another Australian-set Western, Captain Fury (1939). Hyer was a last-minute replacement for Dorothy Malone, who was too ill to travel. [12] It was an early star role for stunt man Jock Mahoney.

Filming took six weeks and Selander returned to the United States in May. [13]

Selander later said "the facilities there were rather primitive by Hollywood standards but we had fun, loved the people and got a kick out of the whole thing. Jock is without a doubt the best athlete I've ever seen, smooth and sleek as a cougar." [14]

Reception

The movie was meant to be the first of a series of co-productions involving the McCreadie Brothers' Embassy Pictures – two more Kangaroo Kid films were announced, to be shot in December 1950 [15] [16] – but this did not eventuate. [9] Reviews were unenthusiastic. [17] [18]

Reviewer Stephen Vagg described the film as "very much a meat pie Western – an essentially American story transplanted to Australia... directed by prolific B-Westerner Lesley Selander." [19]

See also

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Peter Finch</span> English-Australian actor (1916–1977)

Frederick George Peter Ingle Finch was an English-Australian actor of theatre, film and radio.

<i>Jedda</i> 1955 Australian film

Jedda, released in the UK as Jedda the Uncivilised, is a 1955 Australian film written, produced and directed by Charles Chauvel. His last film, it is notable for being the first to star two Aboriginal actors, Robert Tudawali and Ngarla Kunoth in the leading roles. It was also the first Australian feature film to be shot in colour.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Michael Wilding</span> English actor

Michael Charles Gauntlet Wilding was an English stage, television, and film actor. He is best known for a series of films he made with Anna Neagle; he also made two films with Alfred Hitchcock, Under Capricorn (1949) and Stage Fright (1950); and he guest starred on Hitchcock's TV show in 1963. He was married four times, including to Elizabeth Taylor, with whom he had two sons.

Ronald Grant Taylor was an English-Australian actor best known as the abrasive General Henderson in the Gerry Anderson science fiction series UFO and for his lead role in Forty Thousand Horsemen (1940).

<i>The Overlanders</i> (film) 1946 film

The Overlanders is a 1946 British-Australian Western film about drovers driving a large herd of cattle 1,600 miles overland from Wyndham, Western Australia through the Northern Territory outback of Australia to pastures north of Brisbane, Queensland during World War II.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Guy Doleman</span> New Zealand actor

Guy Doleman was a New Zealand born actor, active in Australia, Britain and the United States. He is possibly best remembered for being the first actor to play Number Two in the classic cult series The Prisoner.

<i>Wake in Fright</i> 1971 film by Ted Kotcheff

Wake in Fright is a 1971 Australian New Wave film directed by Ted Kotcheff, written by Evan Jones, and starring Gary Bond, Donald Pleasence, Chips Rafferty, Sylvia Kay and Jack Thompson. Based on Kenneth Cook's 1961 novel of the same name, it follows a young schoolteacher who descends into personal moral degradation after finding himself stranded in a brutal, menacing town in outback Australia.

<i>Bitter Springs</i> (film) 1950 film

Bitter Springs is a 1950 Australian–British film directed by Ralph Smart. An Australian pioneer family leases a piece of land from the government in the Australian outback in 1900 and hires two inexperienced British men as drovers. Problems with local Aboriginal people arise over the possession of a waterhole. Much of the film was shot on location in the Flinders Ranges in South Australia

<i>Botany Bay</i> (film) 1953 film by John Farrow

Botany Bay is a 1953 American adventure film directed by John Farrow and starring Alan Ladd, James Mason and Patricia Medina. It was based on a novel of the same name by Charles Nordhoff and James Norman Hall.

Sons of Matthew is a 1949 Australian film directed and produced and co-written by Charles Chauvel. The film was shot in 1947 on location in Queensland, Australia, and the studio sequences in Sydney. Sons of Matthew took 18 months to complete, but it was a great success with Australian audiences when it finally opened in December 1949.

<i>Kangaroo</i> (1952 film) 1952 film by Lewis Milestone

Kangaroo is a 1952 American Western film directed by Lewis Milestone. It was the first Technicolor film filmed on location in Australia. Milestone called it "an underrated picture."

<i>Orphan of the Wilderness</i> 1936 Australian film

Orphan of the Wilderness is a 1936 Australian feature film from director Ken G. Hall about the adventures of a boxing kangaroo. It starred Brian Abbot who disappeared at sea not long after filming completed.

<i>Bush Christmas</i> (1947 film) 1947 Australian film

Bush Christmas is a 1947 Australian–British comedy film directed by Ralph Smart and starring Chips Rafferty. It was one of the first films from Children's Entertainment Films, later the Children's Film Foundation.

Tom McCreadie (1907–1992), better known as T. O. McCreadie was an Australian film director and producer, who was also involved in distribution and exhibition for many years.

<i>The Hayseeds</i> 1933 film

The Hayseeds is a 1933 Australian musical comedy from Beaumont Smith. It centres on the rural family, the Hayseeds, about whom Smith had previously made six silent films, starting with Our Friends, the Hayseeds (1917). He retired from directing in 1925 but decided to revive the series in the wake of the box office success of On Our Selection (1932). It was the first starring role in a movie for stage actor Cecil Kellaway.

Pagewood Studios was a film studio in Sydney, Australia, that was used to make Australian, British and Hollywood films for 20 years.

Anthony Scott Veitch was an Australian writer of radio, films, novels and TV. He worked for a number of years in British film and TV. His feature credits include The Kangaroo Kid (1950) and Coast of Skeletons (1964). He wrote more than 100 novels, including westerns and historical fiction.

The 1950 Great Britain Lions tour was a tour by the Great Britain national rugby league team of Australia and New Zealand which took place between May and August 1950. The tour involved a schedule of 25 games: 19 in Australia including a three-test series against Australia for the Ashes, and a further 6 in New Zealand including two test matches against New Zealand. A scheduled fixture in Forbes, New South Wales, against a Western Districts team, was abandoned when the chartered plane could not land due to bad weather. Captained by Ernest Ward, the Lions returned home having won 19 and lost 6 of their games. The team won the first test match of the tour but lost the second and third to lose the Ashes Test series to Australia. The team also lost both Test Matches in and against New Zealand. Despite being a British team – five of the squad were Welsh – the team played, and were often referred to by both the press at home and away, as England.

The 1948–49 Kangaroo tour was the seventh Kangaroo tour, in which the Australian national rugby league team travelled to Great Britain and France and played thirty-seven matches, including the Ashes series of three Test matches against Great Britain, an international match against Wales and two Test matches against the French. It followed the tour of 1937-38 and a cessation of overseas international tours due to World War II. The next was staged in 1952-53.

The 1937–38 Kangaroo tour was the sixth Kangaroo tour, in which the Australian national rugby league team travelled to New Zealand, Great Britain and France and played thirty-eight matches, including the Ashes series of three Test matches against Great Britain, and two Test matches each against the Kiwis and French. It followed the tour of 1933-34. Following a cessation of overseas international tours due to World War II, the next tour was staged in 1948-49.

References

  1. "Australian-Made Film 'Quickies'". The Advertiser . Adelaide. 4 January 1950. p. 3. Retrieved 23 August 2012 via National Library of Australia.
  2. "AUSTRALIAN "WESTERN"". The Sydney Morning Herald . 1 March 1951. p. 11. Retrieved 23 August 2012 via National Library of Australia.
  3. "Hollywood stars for film here." The Argus (Melbourne) 4 January 1950: 5, accessed 28 December 2011
  4. "Kangaroo Kid". The Australian Women's Weekly . 30 December 1950. p. 34. Retrieved 23 August 2012 via National Library of Australia.
  5. "Corn-blonde Here To Play in New Film". The Sunday Herald . Sydney. 5 March 1950. p. 11. Retrieved 23 August 2012 via National Library of Australia.
  6. "Films You Will Soon Be Seeing:: Studio Gossip:: Short Story "Into The Straight"—Australian Racing Film". The Sydney Morning Herald . 5 January 1950. p. 8. Retrieved 23 August 2012 via National Library of Australia.
  7. "FILM VENTURE IN N.S.W." The West Australian . Perth. 4 January 1950. p. 4. Retrieved 23 August 2012 via National Library of Australia.
  8. STEPHEN STRASSBERG (23 July 1950). "AUSTRALIAN LOCATION: American Company Shoots Western 'Down Under' Traveler Menagerie". The New York Times. p. X4.
  9. 1 2 "U.S. Actors To Make Films In Australia." The Sydney Morning Herald 4 Jan 1950: 4 accessed 28 December 2011
  10. "Australia Beckoning Power, Others; Andrews to Portray Evans' Father" Schallert, Edwin. Los Angeles Times 7 November 1949: B7.
  11. "TO MAKE FILM IN AUST". The Courier-Mail . Brisbane. 23 February 1950. p. 6. Retrieved 23 August 2012 via National Library of Australia.
  12. "Studio That Hired Her Is in Dark About Film Actress". The Sydney Morning Herald . 7 March 1950. p. 9. Retrieved 23 August 2012 via National Library of Australia.
  13. "HOPS OFF". Sunday Times . Perth. 7 May 1950. p. 5. Retrieved 23 August 2012 via National Library of Australia.
  14. Tuksa, Jon, ed. (1976). Close up : the contract director. Scarecrow Press. p. 241.
  15. THOMAS F. BRADY (12 July 1950). "BACALL CONTRACT AT WARNERS ENDS: HIS CREDO: MERRIMENT". The New York Times. p. 33.
  16. "Martin, Lewis Hitting Fast Film Stride; Jock O'Mahoney Series Star" Schallert, Edwin. Los Angeles Times 13 July 1950: B9.
  17. "... REVIEWS OF NEW FILMS..." The Sunday Herald . Sydney. 4 March 1951. p. 5 Supplement: Features. Retrieved 23 August 2012 via National Library of Australia.
  18. "NEW FILMS". The Advertiser . Adelaide. 10 August 1951. p. 5. Retrieved 23 August 2012 via National Library of Australia.
  19. Vagg, Stephen (24 July 2019). "50 Meat Pie Westerns". Filmink.