you thought this was a normal HNC blog but it was actually my HNC blog : November 2021

now im going to write the kinda unusalally as i hava alot of thoughts i need to get down and john keeps bugging me for somthing on my blog to prove to him i'm actually doing work so i'm just gonna sit here and talk unfiltered about the australain new wave for abit and see how this goes so john since you've made it abundantly clear that you know very little about the austrailian new wave, dispite the fact you own a book with a pretty good selection of information regarding it (obviously you haven't read your own book) i feel i should best start by explaining what exactly it is in a way so simple even my friend george could understand. if i were to sum up the australian new wave in a sentence or two it would be "giving voices to those unheard" and that is simply because a major theme of the austrailian new wave is telling THIER stories and i put enthisis on thier because these stories are very australian in nature, they are stories that could only be told in australia by australians so to elaborate on that with the context you love so much, australia was a mixed country with various types of people and cultures all ocuping the same space, amongst these people were various aspiring young film makers who had stories to tell, ok so thats the australian people but what was going on with thier film industry at the time you may ask, well what film industry is what i'd ask you back and then answer my own question for you, during the late 1960's australian simply didn't have a film industry, the films shown in australia at the time were simply imported hollywood features and whilst this inspired the aspiring film makers of australia just as they would have with any country but australia did't have films of its own, in britian for example we have the hollywood imports to watch but we also have our own little bit of cinema where we see stories that have characters that talk like us, live in places like us and deal with the kinda things we do but the australians didn't have thier own voice to tell thier stories which is what created the vital theme of australias new wave, telling stories that hadn't been told and shinning light onto places people and ideas that weren't normally seen which was a theme that australian films in the following decades continued to follow even after the new wave but i'm getting ahead of myself first i need to talk about how these silent voices got thier voice and that was by what i call bullying the government ok whilst bullying might not be the best term as the australian government was actually all for creation of a film industry especially seeing the success other countries new waves had brought there film industy they were still hesitent to make such a big investment so they need a push. thanks to that very helpfull documentery series sent to me by david i learnt of a man called david stratton and aside from giving me loads of resources and helping me with my choice of films, he also plays an important part in the new wave. stratton was a film critic who was invitted to a film festival in australian which rounded up various young filmakers and allowed them the screen thier work and whilst the quality of what was shown varried the event was enough to push the australian government into providing funding and shone the spotlight on directors such as peter weir who i'll come back to later or maybe not as he's actually the director of the first film i'd like to discuss. picnic at hanging rock is a 1975 film directed by the previously mentioned weir which was the second film he'd worked on in the directors chair. the film takes place at the tictular hanging rock more speciffically in the year 1900 and focuses on a group of school girls that go missing, no i suppose i should start by explaining how this film fits into the wider new wave and what about it is so specifically australian