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TCM Special Theme: New Waves Around the World: ‘Australian New Wave’
TCM, beginning at 5 p.m.
Tonight’s final Tuesday night look at new wave cinematic movements around the world on Turner Classic Movies features films from Down Under. The 1970s through the late ’80s was a time of great resurgence in popularity worldwide for the Australian film industry, after its decline starting in the 1940s. Through funding from the Australian government, the film industry in the country was saved. Nearly 400 films were made during this time, and many of them had a tendency toward featuring violence, which made American audiences compare it to Hollywood movies made at the same time. Productions from the Australian New Wave that TCM will be featuring tonight, in order, are: the 1971 adventure drama Walkabout (pictured), directed by Nicolas Roeg (also the cinematographer), who was nominated for the Palme d’or at the Cannes Film Festival; Peter Weir’s 1977 mystery The Last Wave, starring Richard Chamberlain; the 1979 drama My Brilliant Career, directed by Gillian Armstrong and starring Sam Neill and Judy Davis in her second feature-film role, for which she won Best Actress and Most Outstanding Newcomer at the BAFTA Awards; Weir’s 1982 war drama The Year of Living Dangerously, starring Mel Gibson, Sigourney Weaver and Linda Hunt, winner of the Best Supporting Actress Oscar; writer/director Jane Campion’s feature-film debut, the 1989 drama Sweetie, winner of Best Original Screenplay at the Australian Film Institute for Gerard Lee and Campion; and Weir’s atmospheric 1975 mystery
Picnic at Hanging Rock, nominated for three BAFTA Awards and winner of Best Cinematography for Russell Boyd.