They're a Weird Mob | |
---|---|
Directed by | Michael Powell |
Written by | Richard Imrie |
Based on | They're a Weird Mob by John O'Grady |
Produced by | Michael Powell |
Starring | Walter Chiari Chips Rafferty Claire Dunne |
Cinematography | Arthur Grant |
Edited by | Gerald Turney-Smith |
Music by | Score: Alan Boustead Lawrence Leonard Songs: Reen Devereaux Walter Chiari Mikis Theodorakis [1] |
Production company | Williamson-Powell International Films |
Distributed by | British Empire Films |
Release dates |
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Running time | 112 minutes |
Country | Australia |
Language | English |
Budget | A$600,000 (est.) or £234,925 [2] |
Box office | A$2,417,000 (Australia) [3] |
They're a Weird Mob is a 1966 Australian comedy film based on the 1957 novel of the same name by John O'Grady under the pen name "Nino Culotta", the name of the main character of the book. It was the penultimate collaboration of the British filmmakers Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger.
Nino Culotta is an Italian immigrant, newly arrived in Australia. He expected to work for his cousin as a sports writer for an Italian language magazine. However, on arrival in Sydney, Nino discovers that the cousin has abandoned the magazine, leaving a substantial debt to Kay Kelly. Nino declares that he will get a job and pay back the debt.
Working as a labourer Nino becomes mates with his co-workers, despite some difficulties with Australian slang and culture of the 1960s. Nino endeavours to understand the aspirational values and social rituals of everyday urban Australians, and assimilate. A romantic attraction builds between Nino and Kay despite her frosty exterior and her conservative Irish father's dislike of Italians. [4]
A tone of mild racism exists in the film between Anglo-Saxon/Anglo-Irish characters such as Kay Kelly's dad Harry (Chips Rafferty) and Nino. Harry says he does not like writers, brickies or dagos. Nino is all three. But this is undermined when Nino, sitting in the Kelly house notices a picture of the pope on the wall. Nino says "If I am a dago, then so is he". Realising the impossibility of referring to the pope by that derogatory term, Harry gives in.
Cast notes
They're a Weird Mob was optioned in 1959 by Gregory Peck with him to direct but not appear, but he could not come up with a workable screenplay. [9] Michael Powell first read the novel in London in 1960 and wanted to turn it into a film but Peck had the rights. Powell obtained them three years later and brought in his long-time collaborator Emeric Pressburger, who wrote the screenplay under the pseudonym "Richard Imrie." [10]
The film was one of a series of movies financed together by Rank and the NFFC. [11] £166,925 of the budget came from the NFFC and Rank, the rest from the production company Williamson-Powell International Films. [2]
Walter Chiari had previously visited Australia during the filming of On the Beach (1959), which starred his then-girlfriend Ava Gardner. Claire Dunne was working as a weather girl when cast in the female lead. [10]
It was one of Muriel Steinbeck's last acting roles. [12]
The film started filming in October 1965 and was shot at a number of locations in the area of Sydney: [13]
The film has been credited with the revival of the moribund Australian film industry, which led to the Australian "New Wave" films of the 1970s. [14]
They're a Weird Mob grossed $2,417,000 at the box office in Australia, [3] equivalent to $35,700,000in 2022. [15] However it performed poorly outside Australia. [16] The NFFC reported its overseas earnings on the film as £207,821. [17] John McCallum said:
We never anticipated that the 'Mob' would do well outside Australia, and it didn't. In fact, it did below-average 'business in England, and apart from a few sales on the Continent it hasn't been sold anywhere else. Italy was a disappointment, particularly as we had Walter Chiari as the star. The trouble there was we couldn't translate Kings bloody Cross into Italian, or rather, when we did, there was no joke. Chiari tried hard, and we got other translators, but it just lost all meaning. We had intended to develop a TV series out of the film, but we realised that there was no future in it for export. [18]
In 1968 John McCallum wrote that of the $2 million the film had then earned, only $400,000 had been returned to the film-makers. [19] He later reflected, "It's our own fault; we were green and we signed a very bad distribution contract. We had an investment from Rank, who also distributed the film, and they bit very hard on the distribution. They took 35 percent, and that's far too high. Twenty-five's a fair thing. That extra ten percent was the killer. It's as simple as that." [18]
However, during the making of the film John McCallum worked with Lee Robinson. The two men formed Fauna Productions and had a great success in television starting with Skippy.
A behind-the-scenes documentary was shot called The Story of the Making of 'They're a Weird Mob'. It aired on in Sydney on 12 August 1966 and in Melbourne on 22 August 1966 and went for one hour. [20]
The film has been released on Region 4 DVD by Roadshow. The DVD includes a TV special, "The Story of Making the Film They're a Weird Mob" as well as a picture gallery, theatrical trailer and optional subtitles.
The film has been released on Region 2 DVD by Opening in the Les films de ma vie series. The DVD has fixed French subtitles for the original English soundtrack.
Black Narcissus is a 1947 British psychological drama film jointly written, directed and produced by Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger, and starring Deborah Kerr, Sabu, David Farrar, and Flora Robson, and featuring Esmond Knight, Jean Simmons, and Kathleen Byron.
Emeric Pressburger was a Hungarian-British screenwriter, film director, and producer. He is best known for his series of film collaborations with Michael Powell, in a collaboration partnership known as the Archers, and produced a series of films, including 49th Parallel (1941), The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp (1943), A Matter of Life and Death, Black Narcissus (1947), The Red Shoes (1948), and The Tales of Hoffmann (1951).
Edward Sidney Devereaux, better known professionally as Ed Devereaux, was an Australian actor, director, and scriptwriter who lived in the United Kingdom for many years. He was best known for playing the part of Matt Hammond the head ranger in the Australian television series Skippy the Bush Kangaroo. He was also involved in the series behind the scenes, Devereaux writing the script and directing the episode The Veteran (1969), for which he received much critical acclaim. Devereaux based the story of the episode "Double Trouble" on an idea conceived by his children, wrote the screenplay of "Summer Storm" and the script for "The Mine". He also played the part of Joe in the Australian 1966 film They’re a Weird Mob. The film was a local success.
A Matter of Life and Death is a 1946 British fantasy-romance film set in England during World War II.
The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp is a 1943 British romantic-war film written, produced and directed by the British film-making team of Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger. It stars Roger Livesey, Deborah Kerr and Anton Walbrook. The title derives from the satirical Colonel Blimp comic strip by David Low, but the story is original. Although the film is strongly pro-British, it is a satire on the British Army, especially its leadership. It suggests that Britain faced the option of following traditional notions of honourable warfare or to "fight dirty" in the face of such an evil enemy as Nazi Germany.
The British film-making partnership of Michael Powell (1905–1990) and Emeric Pressburger (1902–1988)—together often known as The Archers, the name of their production company—made a series of influential films in the 1940s and 1950s. Their collaborations—24 films between 1939 and 1972—were mainly derived from original stories by Pressburger with the script written by both Pressburger and Powell. Powell did most of the directing while Pressburger did most of the work of the producer and also assisted with the editing, especially the way the music was used. Unusually, the pair shared a writer-director-producer credit for most of their films. The best-known of these are The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp (1943), A Canterbury Tale (1944), I Know Where I'm Going! (1945), A Matter of Life and Death (1946), Black Narcissus (1947), The Red Shoes (1948), and The Tales of Hoffmann (1951).
The Spy in Black is a 1939 British film, and the first collaboration between the British filmmakers Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger. They were brought together by Alexander Korda to make the World War I spy thriller novel of the same title by Joseph Storer Clouston into a film. Powell and Pressburger eventually made over 20 films during the course of their partnership.
Smithy is a 1946 Australian adventure film about pioneering Australian aviator Sir Charles Kingsford Smith directed by Ken G. Hall starring Ron Randell. It was Hall's last feature film as a director.
David Farrar was an English stage and film actor.
Eric Harold Portman was an English stage and film actor. He is probably best remembered for his roles in three films for Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger during the 1940s.
Walter Annicchiarico, known as Walter Chiari, was an Italian stage and screen actor, mostly in comedy roles.
John Patrick O'Grady was an Australian writer. His works include the comic novel They're a Weird Mob (1957) using the pen name Nino Culotta and the poem The Integrated Adjective, sometimes known as Tumba-bloody-rumba.
Jacinta Tynan is an Australian news presenter and journalist.
They're a Weird Mob is a popular 1957 Australian comic novel written by John O'Grady under the pseudonym "Nino Culotta", the name of the main character of the book. The book was the first published novel by O'Grady, with an initial print run of 6,000 hardback copies. In less than six months, the book had been reprinted eight times and sold 74,000 copies. In the first year of publication, over 130,000 copies were sold. By the time of O'Grady's death in 1981, They're A Weird Mob was in its forty-seventh impression, with sales approaching the one million mark. Published by Ure Smith, the manuscript had been earlier rejected by publisher Angus & Robertson, and is reputedly the result of a ten pound bet between O'Grady and his brother, novelist Frank O'Grady.
Miracle in Soho is a 1957 British drama film directed by Julian Amyes and starring John Gregson, Belinda Lee and Cyril Cusack. It was written by Emeric Pressburger. The film depicts the lives of the inhabitants of a small street in Soho and the romance between a local road-builder and the daughter of Italian immigrants.
Cop this Lot (1960) is a popular Australian comic novel written by John O'Grady under the pen name "Nino Culotta", the name of the main character of the book. It is a sequel to the even more popular They're a Weird Mob.
Squeeze a Flower is a 1970 Australian comedy film directed by Marc Daniels and starring Walter Chiari.
Muriel Myee Steinbeck was an Australian actress who worked extensively in radio, theatre, television and film. She is best known for her film performance portraying the wife of aviator Sir Charles Kingsford Smith in Smithy (1946) and for playing the lead role in Autumn Affair (1958–59), Australia's first television soap opera.
Ajax Films was an Australian production company and studio that operated in the 1960s and 1970s. It was crucial to the revival of the Australian film and TV industry in the 1970s because it was involved in many of the early feature films from that era, either as a production partner or provider of facilities. Ajax also produced a large number of documentaries, cartoons and advertisements.
Two Weeks in September is a 1967 British-French drama film directed by Serge Bourguignon and starring Brigitte Bardot, Laurent Terzieff, Jean Rochefort and James Robertson Justice.