''Fortress'' is a 1985

Australian Australian(s) may refer to: Australia * Australia, a country * Australians, citizens of the Commonwealth of Australia ** European Australians ** Anglo-Celtic Australians, Australians descended principally from British colonists ** Aboriginal Au ...

thriller film Thriller film, also known as suspense film or suspense thriller, is a broad film genre that evokes excitement and suspense in the audience. The suspense element found in most films' plots is particularly exploited by the filmmaker in this genre ...

directed by

Arch Nicholson Arch Nicholson (1941 – 24 February 1990) was an Australian film director. He was born in Melbourne and grew up in Western Australia, originally training to be a teacher. Seeing ''Last Year at Marienbad'' made him want to become a filmmaker an ...

and written by

Everett De Roche Everett De Roche (July 12, 1946 - April 2, 2014) was an American Australians, American-Australian screenwriter who worked extensively in the Australian film and TV industry. He was best known for his work in the thriller and horror genre, with su ...

, and starring

Rachel Ward Rachel Claire Ward (born 12 September 1957) is an English-Australian

, based on

Gabrielle Lord Gabrielle Craig Lord (born 1946) is an Australian writer who has been described as Australia's first lady of crime.Pressley, Alison (2007) "Lord and lady" in ''Good Reading Magazine'', April 2007, pp. 22–23 She has published a wide range ...

's 1980 novel of the same name.

Plot

Sally Jones is the sole teacher of a

one-room school One-room schools, or schoolhouses, were commonplace throughout rural portions of various countries, including Prussia, Norway, Sweden, the United States, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, the United Kingdom, Ireland, and Spain. In most rural and s ...

in the

Outback The Outback is a remote, vast, sparsely populated area of Australia. The Outback is more remote than the bush. While often envisaged as being arid, the Outback regions extend from the northern to southern Australian coastlines and encompass a n ...

, where she has nine pupils ranging in age from six to sixteen. One ordinary day, the younger children claim to have seen cartoon characters on the edges of the school playground. Sally dismisses this as fantasy, until four armed men wearing

Halloween mask Halloween costumes are costumes worn on Halloween, a festival which falls on October 31. An early reference to wearing costumes at Halloween comes from Scotland in 1585, but they may pre-date this. There are many references to the custom during ...

s enter the school, led by a man Sally calls "

Father Christmas Father Christmas is the traditional English name for the personification of Christmas. Although now known as a Christmas gift-bringer, and typically considered to be synonymous with Santa Claus, he was originally part of a much older and unrel ...

" due to his Santa Claus mask. The men force Sally and the children into a van. Sally orders the children to gather their knapsacks and lunches and comply with the men. In the van, Sally and the older students overhear the men discussing holding the school for ransom, threatening to murder one child a day until their demands are met. Pretending innocence, Sally asks the kidnappers to stop for a rest break, while secretly ordering one of the children to hide in the woods and go for help. The kidnappers immediately realize one of their victims has gone missing and threaten to shoot one of the other children, forcing Sally to call the boy back. Sally and the children are barricaded inside a cave. One of the children recognizes the cave as one he used to explore with his cousins and indicates there may be an alternate exit. Sally and some of the older children explore the cave, discovering the exit across an

underground river A subterranean river is a river that runs wholly or partly beneath the ground surface – one where the riverbed does not represent the surface of the Earth. It is distinct from an aquifer, which may flow like a river but is contained within a per ...

. The older children and Sally help the younger children across this river to the outside. The group comes across a farmhouse occupied by an old man and his wife. However, the kidnappers have reached the farmhouse first. When the old man puts up a struggle, the kidnappers shoot him and his wife. Another kidnapper, objecting to the murder, is killed by Father Christmas. Sally and the children are locked into the barn along with an armed kidnapper while the other kidnappers go on a supply run. Sally concocts a plan for the oldest schoolgirl, Narelle, to distract the kidnapper by flirting with him while another boy steals his shotgun. The plan is successful and the kidnapper is killed, but the boy is badly injured by a stray shotgun blast. The children and their teacher flee into the Outback. Now realizing that passivity will not save them, they decide to fight back. Discovering a cave, they proceed to fortify it, using lessons they learned in class about the hunting methods of

indigenous Australians Indigenous Australians or Australian First Nations are people with familial heritage from, and membership in, the ethnic groups that lived in Australia before British colonisation. They consist of two distinct groups: the Aboriginal peoples ...

to build a pit with sharpened spikes and using their school supplies to make spears. One of the kidnappers is killed in the spike pit, but Father Christmas makes it to the cave, where he is attacked by Sally and the children. Several months later, police investigators visit the school to speak to Sally about the condition of the body of Father Christmas. Sally claims no knowledge, insisting that she and the children rolled a large boulder onto him that killed him instantly. The investigators are unnerved by the presence of the children, who suddenly surround them. The investigators leave without further questions. Sally regards the preserved human heart on display among the school's science experiments, then, satisfied, dismisses the children for the day.

Cast

Rachel Ward Rachel Claire Ward (born 12 September 1957) is an English-Australian

as Sally Jones *

Sean Garlick Sean Garlick (born 6 August 1969) is an Australian former professional rugby league footballer, former policeman, former actor and now a businessman. He was educated at Matraville High School from which he graduated in 1987. He began his caree ...

as Sid O'Brien *

Rebecca Rigg Rebecca Rigg is an Australian actress. She is known for her roles in television and film. She started out as a child actor in ''Fatty Finn'' (1980), before also being featured in the films ''Hunting'' (1991), ''Spotswood'' (1992) and ''Ellie ...

as Narelle *Robin Mason as Derek *Marc Aden Gray as Tommy O'Brien *

Beth Buchanan Beth Christine Buchanan (born 10 March 1972) is an Australian actress and Social Worker. She is best known for the television roles in sitcom ''Hey Dad!'', Gemma Ramsay in ''Neighbours'', and Susan Croydon in ''Blue Heelers''. She was also a l ...

as Leanne *

Asher Keddie Asher Keddie (born 31 July 1974) is an Australian actress. Beginning her career in the television series ''Five Mile Creek'' in the mid 1980s, Keddie received wide recognition for her role in the television series ''Offspring''. Her significant ...

as Sue *Bradley Meehan as Richard *Anna Crawford as Sarah *Richard Terrill as Toby *

Peter Hehir Peter Hehir (born 1949) is an Australian actor. He is best known for his role as Bert Duggan on the soap opera ''The Sullivans'' from 1976 to 1978. His film appearances included ''Rikky and Pete'' (1988), ''The Girl Who Came Late'' (1991), '' ...

as Father Christmas *

David Bradshaw David Bradshaw (born September 28, 1944) is an American artist based in Cecilia, Louisiana, and East Charleston, Vermont. He is a painter, sculptor, and printmaker. Biography Born in New York City, David Bradshaw was raised in Washington, D ...

as Pussy Cat *

Vernon Wells Vernon Michael Wells III (born December 8, 1978) is an American former professional baseball center fielder. He played in Major League Baseball (MLB) for the Toronto Blue Jays, the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim, and the New York Yankees. Wells ...

as Dabby Duck *Roger Stephen as Mac the Mouse *

Wendy Playfair use both this parameter and , birth_date to display the person's date of birth, date of death, and age at death) --> , death_place = , nationality = , other_names = , citizenship = , education = , ...

as Old Woman *Ed Turley as Old Man *Elaine Cusick as Mrs. O'Brien *Laurie Moran as Mr. O'Brien *Nick Waters as Detective Sergeant Cotter * Terence Donovan as Detective Sergeant Mitchell *Ray Chubb as Publican

Production

The novel ''Fortress'' by Gabrielle Lord was inspired by the 1972

Faraday School kidnapping The Faraday School kidnapping occurred on 6 October 1972 at a one-teacher school in the rural town of Faraday in Victoria, Australia, where two plasterers, Edwin John Eastwood and Robert Clyde Boland, kidnapped six female pupils and their teach ...

of an isolated rural single teacher school and was influenced by William Golding's 1954 novel ''

Lord of the Flies ''Lord of the Flies'' is a 1954 novel by the Nobel Prize-winning British author William Golding. The plot concerns a group of British boys who are stranded on an uninhabited island and their disastrous attempts to govern themselves. Themes i ...

''. At one stage it was thought the novel would be filmed by

Rupert Murdoch Keith Rupert Murdoch ( ; born 11 March 1931) is an Australian-born American business magnate. Through his company News Corp, he is the owner of hundreds of local, national, and international publishing outlets around the world, including ...

and

Robert Stigwood Robert Colin Stigwood (16 April 1934 – 4 January 2016) was an Australian-born British-resident music entrepreneur, film producer and impresario, best known for managing Cream, Andy Gibb and the Bee Gees, theatrical productions like ''Hair'' ...

's Associated R&R Films as a follow-up to ''

Gallipoli The Gallipoli peninsula (; tr, Gelibolu Yarımadası; grc, Χερσόνησος της Καλλίπολης, ) is located in the southern part of East Thrace, the European part of Turkey, with the Aegean Sea to the west and the Dardanelles ...

'' (1981). However, this never happened. The film rights were purchased by

Crawford Productions Crawford Productions is an Australian media production company, focused on radio and television production. Founded in Melbourne by Hector Crawford and his sister, actress and voice artist Dorothy Crawford, the company, also known as Crawfords ...

, who intended to make a feature film for local release and a telemovie for

HBO Home Box Office (HBO) is an American premium television network, which is the flagship property of namesake parent subsidiary Home Box Office, Inc., itself a unit owned by Warner Bros. Discovery. The overall Home Box Office business unit is ba ...

in the US. Half the budget was from HBO, who insisted the lead be played by an actress who was familiar to the American public.

wrote the script and originally

Bruce Beresford Bruce Beresford (; born 16 August 1940) is an Australian film director who has made more than 30 feature films over a 50-year career, both locally and internationally in the United States. Beresford's notable films he has directed include ''Br ...

was announced as director. He dropped out and then

was hired. Crawford and HBO wanted

Bess Armstrong Elizabeth Key "Bess" Armstrong (born December 11, 1953) is an American film, stage and television actress. She is best known for her roles in films '' The Four Seasons'' (1981), '' High Road to China'' (1983), ''Jaws 3-D'' (1983), and ''Nothing i ...

to play the lead.

Actors Equity The Actors' Equity Association (AEA), commonly referred to as Actors' Equity or simply Equity, is an American trade union, labor union representing those who work in live theater, live theatrical performance. Performers appearing in live stage ...

objected, so

Sigrid Thornton Sigrid Madeline Thornton (born 12 February 1959) is an Australian film and television actress. Her television work includes ''Prisoner'' (1979–80), ''All the Rivers Run'' (1983), ''SeaChange'' (1998–2019) and ''Wentworth'' (2016–2018). S ...

was accepted as a compromise. However, two months prior to shooting Thornton became pregnant and HBO and Crawford insisted on Armstrong. Actors Equity would not relent and the film shut down, despite the fact $700,000 had already been spent. The project was later re-activated when

Rachel Ward Rachel Claire Ward (born 12 September 1957) is an English-Australian

(a British actress who had moved to Australia) was approved.David Stratton, ''The Avocado Plantation: Boom and Bust in the Australian Film Industry'', Pan MacMillan, 1990 p266-268 The film was then shot in Australia during 1985 over 12 5-day weeks at Hillside. The school they used in the film was the Rosehill primary school, near Bairnsdale, East Gippsland and in the Grampians.

Release

The film was initially released directly to

cable television Cable television is a system of delivering television programming to consumers via radio frequency (RF) signals transmitted through coaxial cables, or in more recent systems, light pulses through fibre-optic cables. This contrasts with broa ...

by the

channel in the United States on 24 November 1985. It contains scenes of

graphic violence Graphic violence refers to the depiction of especially vivid, brutal and realistic acts of violence in visual media such as film, television, and video games. It may be real, simulated live action, or animated. Intended limitedly for mature ...

unusual for TV productions of the time. It was released to cinemas in Australia on June 26, 1986. It won the

American Cinema Editors Founded in 1950, American Cinema Editors (ACE) is an honorary society of film editors that are voted in based on the qualities of professional achievements, their education of others, and their dedication to editing. Members use the post-nominal ...

for direction of Photography in 1986.

References

External links

*
''Fortress''
at Crawford Productions website
''Fortress''
at Oz Movies {{DEFAULTSORT:Fortress (1985 Film) 1985 films 1980s adventure films 1980s crime drama films Survival films Australian action adventure films 1985 drama films 1980s English-language films Films directed by Arch Nicholson 1985 thriller films