Sunstruck

A very popular family comedy of 1972 sees The "They're A Weird Mob" formula apply again with pretty good results. Primarily a farce about tubby British schoolteacher Harry Secombe immigrating to Oz for Sun and fun but being marooned in the blazing outback instead, it also may have been a positive local conservative establishment response to the bitter and cruel Ted Kotcheff masterpiece OUTBACK or maybe the superb but bleak Nicholas Roeg drama WALKABOUT each produced in the 2 years before SUNSTRUCK. The poster for SUNSTRUCK had the hilarious shot of Secombe in his swimming briefs, on a beach also wearing a graduation cape and mortar board toasting his own delight at 'being in Australia'. The film is very funny and was a big hit for a month or so in 1972 with school holiday audiences. Also a charming and rewarding opportunity to see ex goon Harry in a showcase all to his wonderful self.

Rangy denim-wearing blonde female lead Maggie Fitzgibbon (who recently died aged 91) will be remembered by older Brits as Vivienne Cooper in the sixties TV series 'The Newcomers'.

Here the positions are reversed as it's 'Welsh pom' Harry Secombe who's the stranger in town in yet another film set Down Under that mentions the heat but neither the aborigines nor the enormous spiders.

This is the last feature film of that much loved actor Harry Secombe.He did tour Australia and was extremely popular there.Hence this film.It is an adequate time filler.

Well-loved little film that has stood the test of time. Rare dramatic performance from ex-goon, the late Harry Secombe. Here he plays a Welsh schoolteacher who has long dreamed of a move to Australia, where minimal research has led him to believe that sun, surf and girls are on tap! On his arrival at hicksville, the one-horse town of Kookaburra Springs in the blazing outback and where he has been commissioned to run the local school there, reality and fantasy clash head on.

Best described as a fish-out-of-water comedy, the film plays it for laughs, pathos, romance and light drama. Absolutely nothing to offend anyone. Filmed in and around the Parkes area (THE DISH!!) the cast here is uniformly good and lends Secombe great support.

Scripted by Stan Mars, at no stage does the film lag. True it is a little dated, but what would you expect just on thirty years later? Neat music score from Brian West....oh yeah, plenty of sun too!!!

Being and Australian I can relate to this movie especially as I was educated at a Country School. The Hotel is the center of town and all business, talk and public discussion goes on there, especially back in the 1960's. And so it goes that all business about the town was conducted in the hotel and if you were a "wowser" (you didn't have a beer) you were on the outer. Stanly (the new teacher from england) soon learns about "having a beer", and is subsequently accepted into the community. I would like this movie and its message to be passed on to future generations so lets get into the 21st Century and bring it out on DVD. -U2SPATS