La route est ouverte

This is an impressive film, crammed with poetic images. The strong story, elegantly told, revolves around a team of cattle-drovers who undertake an epic task: to move a herd of 1,000 cattle from the north coast of Australia 1,600 miles across the outback to Queensland. A late wartime flag-waver, this movie was Ealing Studios' first foray into 'empire' subject matter. With Australia's Northern Territory facing the threat of invasion by the Japanese, a small group of assorted individuals decides to drive a herd overland to keep it from falling into the enemy's hands. Relying on their own inherent grit and resourcefulness, the overlanders cope with crocodiles, drought, desertions and stampedes as they try to bring their cattle safely into Brisbane. Chips Rafferty, as Dan McAlpine, the leader of the team, personifies Australian qualities of toughness and decency. Nicely understated action scenes and a relaxed, naturalistic style of acting make this a very watchable movie. The viewer is skilfully drawn in, and quickly develops genuine concern for the likeable characters. All in all, an excellent film.

Many Australians are unaware of the threat posed to the top end of Australia as a direct result of a Japanese attack on Darwin during WW11. Many residential owners of farms and properties, including livestock were either destroyed or moved to safety. This film covers one such major attempt to shift thousands of prime livestock south - away from the perceived threat of advancing enemy troops. This epic cattle drive involved a massive droving venture on a scale not attempted before (1,600 miles) - which the threat of an approaching invader left little time to properly organise. This arduous journey stretched from Western Australia, through the Northern Territory to Brisbane Queensland, a vast and challenging area indeed.

This film, being the first of British Ealing Studios/Australian branch productions - covers the trials of this mighty excursion, detailing the many dangers and obstructions encountered by the small band of locals - determined to save their livelihoods while keeping the vital meat supply from an approaching enemy. Aussie, Chips Rafferty does well as the lanky stockman who suggests and implements the risky drive, while another Aussie Peter Pagan turns in able support as 'Sinbad' the ex-British sailor. Lovely Australian nursing orderly Daphne Campbell plays the daughter of a family who also joins the mighty trek southward - along with several experienced Aborigines hired as stockmen assisting with the cattle. All cast members work well together making this an impressive first-off Brit/Aussie feature. Young Daphne Campbell turned down future offers of roles overseas to stay home and raise a family.

While this production was financially successful, the following Ealing feature "Eureka Stockade" (a fine and much more involved venture) did not sell well, unfortunately ending Ealing's Australian arm's operations. Both are recommended vintage productions for equal interest as entertainment and history. The often barren Outback settings are effectively shot in stark B/W adding further drama.

The acting is a little awkward (Chips Rafferty excepted) and it doesn't matter a damn. It's a problem-solving picture. There's a large herd of cattle on the coast of the Northern territory and six people must lead it overland to pastures just north of Brisbane; obstacles crop up, and we watch, absorbed, as our characters take the most rational path around them. Our heroes (yes, even the Scottish sailor - well, PERHAPS the Scottish sailor) have enough native charm to make us care about them, and even if they didn't, the vastness of the landscape and the detailed realism of their trek would do the job just as well.

Two bonus, uncalled-for pleasures: the music (John Ireland's first and last film score), and the cinematography - amazingly attractive when you consider that Australian landscapes (rather dull to begin with) tend not to photograph well, certainly not in the harsh bright sunlight that Harry Watt, in the interests of realism, chose to shoot in. Watt was right to choose harsh sunlight. The film is half documentary, half fiction, without feeling like an awkward cross between the two. You'll read that Watt's talents were limited, and I can readily believe they were, but in "The Overlanders" his weaknesses come across as little more than extensions of his strengths. It's exactly the film he wanted, needed and in all likelihood was born to make.

This is a simple story well told, although some allowance has to be made for the limited acting skills of the principals, and for the obvious budgetary constraints (let's not forget the world was recovering from a major upheaval in 1946 when the film was made).

The characters are believable, as are their motivations and reactions to obstacles. The women are as sure-footed as the men (unusually for the time), and the same can be said for the aboriginals with respect to the white characters.

It doesn't quite qualify to be classified with (the original) "Flight of the Phoenix" but watching it is a far better way to spend a couple of hours on a wet afternoon than watching the remake of THAT excellent film.

In summary - believable (and tight) story line, above average script, acceptable acting but let down by some minimalist cinematography which doesn't make the best use of the available landscape.

The most striking characteristic of this film is its splendid cinematography - for a cineast enjoying fine photography, this is an inexhaustible gold mine of fine sequences. The story is no less impressing, it's a true story, of how a determined farmer decided to rather drive his thousands of cows across all Australia than leave to the Japanese, as the invasion was imminent. It's a wondrous epic of surmounting atrocious difficulties, constantly under the threat of the herd starting a stampede, which the thousand bullocks actually do twice, and the question of the miracle of how so many cows could be well and appropriately directed into a film must arise. Well, they did it, and as a true story made almost like a documentary, it is better and more impressing than most westerns, excelling them all in downright determined stalwartness obliged by necessity, in absolutely genuine Aussie style.