''The Sentimental Bloke'' is a 1918 Australian

silent film A silent film is a film with no synchronized recorded sound (or more generally, no audible dialogue). Though silent films convey narrative and emotion visually, various plot elements (such as a setting or era) or key lines of dialogue may, when ...

based on the 1915 verse novel ''

The Songs of a Sentimental Bloke ''The Songs of a Sentimental Bloke'' is a verse novel by Australian poet and journalist C. J. Dennis. Portions of the work appeared in '' The Bulletin'' between 1909 and 1915, the year the verse novel was completed and published by Angus & Robert ...

'' by

C. J. Dennis Clarence Michael James Stanislaus Dennis (7 September 1876 – 22 June 1938), better known as C. J. Dennis, was an Australian poet and journalist known for his best-selling verse novel ''The Songs of a Sentimental Bloke'' (1915). Alongside ...

. Produced and directed by

Raymond Longford Raymond Longford (born John Walter Hollis Longford, 23 September 18782 April 1959) was a prolific Australian film director, writer, producer and actor during the silent era. Longford was a major director of the silent film era of the Australian ...

, the film stars Arthur Tauchert,

Gilbert Emery Gilbert Emery Bensley Pottle (June 11, 1875 – October 28, 1945), known professionally as Gilbert Emery, was an American actor who appeared in over 80 movies from 1921 to his death in 1945. He was also a playwright, author of seven Broadway play ...

, and

Lottie Lyell Lottie Lyell (born Charlotte Edith Cox, 23 February 1890 – 21 December 1925) was an Australian actress, screenwriter, editor and filmmaker. She is regarded as Australia's first film star, and also contributed to the local industry during the ...

, who also co-wrote the film with Longford. A major critical and commercial success upon its release in Australia, the film was also popular in New Zealand and Great Britain, and is generally considered the greatest Australian silent film, and one of the best Australian movies of all time. The film inspired a sequel, ''

Ginger Mick ''Ginger Mick'' is a 1920 Australian silent film directed by Raymond Longford based on ''The Moods of Ginger Mick'' by C. J. Dennis, which had sold over 70,000 copies. It is a sequel to ''The Sentimental Bloke'' (1919) and is considered a los ...

'' (1920), and a 1932 remake. In 2004, the

National Film and Sound Archive The National Film and Sound Archive of Australia (NFSA), known as ScreenSound Australia from 1999 to 2004, is Australia's audiovisual archive, responsible for developing, preserving, maintaining, promoting and providing access to a national co ...

released a fully restored version of ''The Sentimental Bloke'', making it one of the few Australian silent films to survive intact.

Plot

Bill is a

Woolloomooloo Woolloomooloo ( ) is a harbourside, inner-city eastern suburb of Sydney, New South Wales, Australia. Woolloomooloo is 1.5 kilometres east of the Sydney central business district, in the local government area of the City of Sydney. It is in a low ...

larrikin Larrikin is an Australian English term meaning "a mischievous young person, an uncultivated, rowdy but good hearted person", or "a person who acts with apparent disregard for social or political conventions". In the 19th and early 20th centuri ...

, who vows to abandon his life of

gambling Gambling (also known as betting or gaming) is the wagering of something of value ("the stakes") on a random event with the intent of winning something else of value, where instances of strategy are discounted. Gambling thus requires three el ...

(playing

Two-up Two-up is a traditional Australian gambling game, involving a designated "spinner" throwing two coins or pennies into the air. Players bet on whether the coins will fall with both heads (obverse) up, both tails (reverse) up, or with one coin ...

) and drinking after a spell in gaol following a raid on a two up game. He falls in love with Doreen (Lyell), who works in a pickle factory, but faces competition from a more sophisticated rival, Stror 'at Coot. Bill and Doreen argue, but are eventually reunited and get married. Bill gives up drinking and hanging out with his mate, Ginger Mick, and becomes a family man. He gets an offer from his uncle to manage an orchard in the country, and he and Doreen settle down there with their baby.

Cast

* Arthur Tauchert as Bill, the Bloke *

as Doreen *

as Ginger Mick *Stanley Robinson as the Bloke's friend *Harry Young as the Stror 'at Coot *Margaret Reid as Doreen's mother *Charles Keegan as the parson *William Coulter as Uncle Jim *Helen Fergus as nurse *

as himself

Production

C. J. Dennis' original book had been a best seller since its publication in 1915. It was read by executive J. D. Williams who gave

a copy and suggested it might make a good movie. Longford gave it to his partner Lottie Lyell and she was supportive. Finance was provided by an Adelaide company, the

Southern Cross Feature Film Company Southern Cross Feature Film Company was a short lived film production company that made some of Australia's most famous silent films, mostly directed by Raymond Longford. One of the key figures behind it was Sir David Gordon. History The company w ...

who had funded ''

The Woman Suffers ''The Woman Suffers'' is a 1918 Australian silent film directed by Raymond Longford. It is a melodrama starring Lottie Lyell. Two-thirds of the movie still survives.Merv Wasson, "The Woman Suffers: Why Ever Was She Banned?", ''Cinema Papers'', Ju ...

''. C. J. Dennis was reluctant to give away the movie rights for fear it would affect book sales, however he eventually agreed after prolonged negotiations and a royalty payment of £1,000, half the film's budget. Lyell is thought to have co-authored the

screenplay ''ScreenPlay'' is a television drama anthology series broadcast on BBC2 between 9 July 1986 and 27 October 1993. Background After single-play anthology series went off the air, the BBC introduced several showcases for made-for-television, fe ...

which relocated the story from Melbourne to Woolloomooloo in Sydney. Arthur Tauchert had extensive experience working in suburban vaudeville but had only made two short movies prior to this. The movie was shot in 1918 on location in Woolloomooloo, with the orchard scenes done at Hornsby Valley near Sydney, and interiors at open-air sets at Wonderland City, Bondi (which meant Longford could avoid paying excessive rental for using sets at the

Rushcutters Bay Studio Rushcutters Bay Studio was an Australian film studio built by Charles Cozens Spencer in 1912 at Rushcutters Bay, Sydney. For a number of years it was the leading film studio in Sydney, being the base of operations for Australasian Films. In 19 ...

). Some shots of sunsets and sunrises for the inter titles were done in Adelaide.Andrew Pike and Ross Cooper, ''Australian Film 1900–1977: A Guide to Feature Film Production'', Melbourne: Oxford University Press, 1998, 90. Sydney authorities refused to allow police uniforms to be depicted, or for shooting to take place in the city's gaols. However Longford managed to persuade Commonwealth dockside officials to appear as policemen and let him use an old watch house in Woolloomooloo.

Reception

The movie was first screened privately at Adelaide Wondergraph on 26 November 1918. It took a while for the film to be released as Australasian Films refused to screen the movie in the Union Theatre chain. However it was seen by

E. J. Carroll Edward John Carroll (28 June 1874 - 28 July 1931), better known as E.J. Carroll, was an Australian theatre and film entrepreneur. He produced several films of Snowy Baker and Raymond Longford and helped establish Birch, Carroll and Coyle. Difficu ...

who decided to distribute it in Australia and overseas. ''The Sentimental Bloke'' uses

intertitle In films, an intertitle, also known as a title card, is a piece of filmed, printed text edited into the midst of (i.e., ''inter-'') the photographed action at various points. Intertitles used to convey character dialogue are referred to as "dialo ...

s taken from the original poem written in

Australian slang Australian English is a major variety of the English language spoken throughout Australia. Most of the vocabulary of Australian English is shared with British English, though there are notable differences. The vocabulary of Australia is drawn ...

and was a hit when it opened in

Melbourne Town Hall Melbourne Town Hall is the central city town hall of Melbourne, Victoria, Australia, and is a historic building in the state of Victoria since 1867. Located in the central business district on the northeast corner of the intersection between S ...

on 4 October 1919, breaking all existing box office records. It was also popular in Britain and New Zealand, but did not succeed in the U.S., where test audiences failed to understand the language. Despite being recut with Americanised intertitles, having some scenes cut out, and being renamed for the American market as ''The Story of a Tough Guy'', it was withdrawn from distribution. The initial success of ''The Sentimental Bloke'' prompted a sequel in 1920, ''

'', and a remake in 1932 using the latest sound recording equipment from the United States. The sequel was a hit but the remake, although directed by the prolific actor and partner of

Hoyts The Hoyts Group of companies in Australia and New Zealand includes Hoyts Cinemas and Val Morgan. Hoyts operates more than 450 cinema screens and 55,000 seats, making it Australia's second largest movie exhibitor after Event Hospita ...

F. W. Thring Francis William Thring (2 December 1882 – 1 July 1936), better known as F. W. Thring, was an Australian film director, film producer, producer, and film exhibitor, exhibitor. He has been credited with the invention of the clapperboard. Early ...

, did not fare as well as the original. E. J. Carroll also sponsored a stage version of the book in 1922 produced by Bert Bailey and starring Walter Cornoch as the Bloke and

Tal Ordell Talone Ordell (1880–1948), better known as Tal Ordel, was an Australian actor, writer and director. Ordell was probably born in Calcutta, India, seventh child of Victorian-born parents William Odell Raymond Buntine, drover, and his wife Susanna, ...

as Ginger Mick. In 1931

claimed that the film had been made for £900 and grossed £50,000 around the world.

Rediscovery

A 1952 fire in a Melbourne film library destroyed all but two boxes of film archives. The boxes revealed a complete 35mm nitrate positive of ''The Sentimental Bloke'', which the following year were sent to a Sydney laboratory for duplication on to new 16mm acetate stock. The original nitrate copies were believed to have been destroyed in the 1960s. The new print was screened at the 1955

Sydney Film Festival The Sydney Film Festival is an annual competitive film festival held in Sydney, Australia, usually over 12 days in June. A number of awards are given, the top one being the Sydney Film Prize. the festival's director is Nashen Moodley. Histo ...

to great acclaim, although Longford was not invited, as the organisers did not realise he was still alive.Graham Shirley, Restoring and re-releasing 'The Sentimental Bloke', ''National Film and Sound Archive'', 12 May 2009
Retrieved 24 July 2012 The film also screened at the

1987 Cannes Film Festival The 40th Cannes Film Festival was held from 7 to 19 May 1987 in film, 1987. The Palme d'Or went to the ''Under the Sun of Satan (film), Sous le soleil de Satan'' by Maurice Pialat, a choice which was considered "highly controversial" and the prize ...

. An original 35mm negative of the film was discovered in 1973 at the Film Archive at George Eastman House International Museum of Photography and Film in

Rochester, New York Rochester () is a City (New York), city in the U.S. state of New York (state), New York, the county seat, seat of Monroe County, New York, Monroe County, and the fourth-most populous in the state after New York City, Buffalo, New York, Buffalo, ...

. The canisters had been mislabelled as ''The Sentimental Blonde'' but were discovered by luck. The film was the U.S. version which had some scenes deleted and included intertitles for the American audience. It was however, a better quality print than any of the Australian copies, and provided a base for a complete restoration. The National Film and Sound Archive commenced on a full restoration project for the film in 2000 using the various pieces of archive material available. The project included colour tinting as close as possible to the original. This 'new' version premiered at the 2004

and has played at the 2005

London Film Festival The BFI London Film Festival is an annual film festival founded in 1957 and held in the United Kingdom, running for two weeks in October with co-operation from the British Film Institute. It screens more than 300 films, documentaries and shor ...

. It has since been released as a two DVD set which includes a booklet describing the film's history.Warren Brown, 'The Sentimental Bloke', ''Rewind'', 5 September 2004
Retrieved 24 July 2012

References

External links

* *
Raymond Longford & Lottie Lyell by William M. DrewThe Sentimental Bloke at the National Film and Sound Archive
at

National Library of Australia The National Library of Australia (NLA), formerly the Commonwealth National Library and Commonwealth Parliament Library, is the largest reference library in Australia, responsible under the terms of the ''National Library Act 1960'' for "mainta ...

Ina Bertrand, ''Raymond Longford's The Sentimental Bloke: The Restored Version'', Screening the Past.''The Sentimental Bloke''
at

AustLit AustLit: The Australian Literature Resource (also known as AustLit: Australian Literature Gateway; and AustLit: The Resource for Australian Literature), usually referred to simply as AustLit, is an internet-based, non-profit collaboration betwee ...

{{DEFAULTSORT:Sentimental Bloke, The 1910s Australian films The Songs of a Sentimental Bloke Australian drama films Australian silent feature films Films based on Australian novels Australian black-and-white films Films based on poems Films directed by Raymond Longford Articles containing video clips 1918 drama films Silent drama films