The F.J. Holden

If people are looking for a 'road movie' in the slick US style of American Graffiti, The FJ Holden will not be your cup of tea. For all intents & purposes The FJ Holden is a road movie, however this time it is set in the late 70's in Bankstown, NSW. Bankstown at the time was basically a working class suburb,with the majority of the population coming from public housing estates. It would be of no surprise then that the kids from such an area, were basically poor, both in material goods & education. Young teenage men only had limited social outlets, their cars & their girlfriends & this is the films focus. There is no great outpouring of verbal dialogue in the film, for if it did, the whole movie, as a period piece, would have looked contrived. Take the movie for what it is, a general view of suburban life as seen by a young man struggling to come to grips with his first faltering steps to manhood. It's not pretty, but as a cinematic history of life in the the 70's, it is unrivalled. Michael Thornhill is to be congratulated in his attempts to capture a snapshot of Australian youth in the suburbs.

FJ Holden is a time capsule of a typical western suburbs working class teenager's life in the 70's albeit that the producers have used an element of poetic license to tell the story. The movie reminds me of American Graffiti, that iconic movie set in the early 60's which spun off onto TV as the very successful Happy Days series. We have always tended to watch this movie from the inside out because my wife and I were a part of some of the major scenes at the infamous "Brickies" or "The Brickyard" where illegal drag races took place late on Friday and Saturday nights. We first met the producers at the old Castlereagh Dragway just outside of Penrith NSW. They approached us after our car, a 1968 Camaro SS had just won several heats and mentioned that they would like both us and our car in the movie. Our car is in the opening scene at Brickies on the right of screen racing toward the camera. It also appears after the race driving past, and as the sun is rising driving away from the police. We were also in several scenes around the fire and when the "stolen" white Pontiac Parisienne (with no motor, I may add....lol) was pushed into Homebush Bay and drifted away refusing to sink. The majority of that scene wound up on the cutting room floor because the roars of laughter from us all as the car unexpectedly drifted into the dark were not to the producers liking. As the car slowly drifted away all went quiet in anticipation and one guy yelled out "Shit, my lumber jacket is in that car, and it has my wallet in it" which made us all break into laughter with the odd inappropriate and unsympathetic comment being made. I also recall that they quickly switched to a long telescopic lens and a large spot light to capture the car finally sinking into the middle of the bay. Probably still there too as no attempts were made to recover it. Then, over the 5 days of shooting these scenes the fire that was used to keep warm and add to the atmosphere of the movie eventually overheated the concrete it was on and the concrete literally blew up with fire going everywhere. Many, many more funny things happened over these 5 days and if the director had kept the outtakes they would have enough material for a movie that would make a more typical 1970's scene than the actual movie could ever have achieved. You just can't write the stuff that happened there, along with the constant wise cracks and sledging from the smart arse westies. All in all, being part of that 5 days of filming made it hard to watch the final movie without a smile on our faces knowing what really went on behind the scenes.

I recently watched the Australian grindhouse film The FJ Holden (1977) on Tubi. The story centers around Kevin and Bob, two buddies who travel the countryside indulging in partying, drinking, and drugs. They encounter Anne who sparks a chain of events after Kevin tries to have sex either her in front of Bob.

Directed by Michael Thornhill (The Journalist), the film stars Paul Couzens, Eva Dickinson (Glenview High), Carl Stever, and Sigrid Thornton (The Man from Snowy River).

In many ways, The FJ Holden feels like an Australian version of "Porky's." The banter between the main characters is fun, featuring solid zings and one-liners. However, Kevin's character can be frustrating at times, with his mood swings feeling inconsistently authentic. Eva Dickinson delivers a captivating performance, and the film includes splashes of nudity. The storyline is entertaining and unfolds in a fun manner, leading to a satisfying conclusion.

Overall, The FJ Holden isn't a masterpiece, but it's engaging enough to hold your attention. I would give it a 5.5/10 and recommend watching it once.

The acting is dodgy (both the main actors had little experience), the storyline pretty boring, the scenery bland.

I grew up in this part of sydney, and movies showing Australian suburbia were rare, so this was reasonably popular as it showed a slice of life of Australia - which we never saw on the big screen.

I remember Australians growing up in the time would refer to it, and it was pretty famous.

But its overall, pretty bad. Bad acting, plot is very basic and not particularly interesting - but it does show what life was like at the time pretty well, so its of value as a historical/social piece. Even a bit of casual racism played off as a joke!

Parts of it are so bad they are funny, and the two actors, instead of acting drunk, actually *really* get drunk in one scene, and can barely say their lines.

Its a really bad Aussie film, but yes, of interest to people who grew up in that time, or that part of Sydney.

The closest U.S comparison I can make here to Michael Thornhill's 1977 coming of age drama is George Lucas' earlier 1973 American Graffiti.

The differences, where there are some, are marked however. Both feature - the strongest link - cars, this is in the F.J.Holden of the title, which as far as I can find out, was an General Motors model that was cheap and popularly souped up into a 'muscle' car. Like the American models in Lucas' film, these become far more than modes of transport, being every courting young man's way of life, to cruise around in, showing off like preening peacocks.

In a small town in New South Wales (filmed in Sydney) in the 70s, Bob and his mate Kevin are out boozing and cruising for girls to pick up. Kevin meets Anne. The two friends basically behave like slobs and fairly irresponsible ones at that, getting in trouble with the police and getting drunk and holding the occasional street drag race. When sex gets in the way of the the two, their friendship is tested.

For those that were either there, or were of that generation (I'm just a little too young) then this must bring back memories and hold a more special place for such. For the rest of us, the picture looks dated, but not in the interestingly way that American Graffiti does. I'm sure many a 'new' Australian would now cringe with some embarrassment at how their male young are perceived. These young fellas don't have the looming Vietnam conscription to force them to go off the rails a bit, which was a significant factor in American Graffiti.

There's some quite earthy dialogue and sex scenes to match - I would suggest a modern '15' rating here in the U.K. (in Australia, such DVDs as this one is, are marked "M", for 'mature' audiences).

Such is the nostalgia for both the time/place and the cars themselves, it makes giving a rating difficult, as judging whether it's a good film or not is masked by many personal feelings. Radio Times magazine online don't even list it - seems it's quite a scarcity, so I'm plumping for 6/10, though seven wouldn't be unreasonable.

I viewed the DVD as part of the 12 disc boxed set 'Australian Cinema Collection'.