MovieChat Forums > On the Beach (1959) Discussion > Australia? Why Bother?

Australia? Why Bother?

posted 10 years ago by bastasch8647
23 replies | jump to latest

Love this movie, but for the near total deficit of local color, it could just as easily have been filmed in California or Florida. The US has plenty of beach coves such as shown as the film's favorite swimming-sailing spot. And any souther-type (sunny, not a lot of trees) beach looks pretty much like any other. Australia was simply not exploited for its own interest and beauty. It was just a backdrop. Take the scene when Dwight returns and Moira and her Dad are talking about their horse - that area looked like many semi-arid locales, with sparsely-treed rollling hills, in the US (although a few of the trees did have sort of an "Aussie look"). The fishing trip, too, could have been doubled by many US mountain streams. They could have saved a huge amount of money by producing the film in the US with a few Australian establishing shots done by a secondary crew. Seems a long way to travel to shoot the action against such a neutral, nondescript background.

[–] lenlarga 10 years ago

Are you sure they could have saved money? I thought it was way more costly to shoot in the US.

[–] davidmrenton 9 years ago

i suspect the reason is the US Department of Defense wouldn't give them a sub, so they used a Royal Navy sub stationed in Australia.Access to a Submarine was kinda necessary.

[–] hobnob53 9 years ago

They had to shoot in Australia because they need scenes filmed in real places like Melbourne, and to give the film a strong sense of reality. Filming in California wouldn't have worked at all. The last thing a movie of this kind needed was to be studio-bound. Kramer always planned to film on location, and good that he did.

It is true that the U.S. Department of Defense refused to cooperate in the making of this film because of its negative depiction of nuclear war. (Good God!) So Kramer got a "loaner' sub from the Royal Australian Navy. Unfortunately the Aussies didn't have any nuclear subs (no one did except the U.S.) so the director had to use a conventional submarine. In the opening scenes of the sub sailing into harbor you can plainly see the exhaust being vented from its port side, something which of course does not exist on an atomic submarine.

[–] david_colbourne 9 years ago

Should have had more kangaroos, that would have made it very Australian.

[–] EtaoinShrdlu001 7 years ago

They could have had a dingo eat that baby.

You Fill Me with Inertia.

[–] Darvidd 9 years ago

The boat was Royal Navy, not RAN-we didn't have subs at that stage-nuclear subs do carry diesel generators as back ups and to provide emergency propulsion capacity.

"What is an Oprah?"-Teal'c.

[–] hobnob53 9 years ago

Ah, thank you. Didn't know you guys didn't have any subs in '59. I had only read that the RAN supplied all the vessels shown in the movie (such as the aircraft carrier HMAS Melbourne). But its nationality aside, the submarine shown was not a nuclear one.

[–] bastasch8647 9 years ago

...just a belated thanks to all of you who replied to my OP. I can see that if the Aussies let 'em use an Oz submarine, they would have naturally filmed in Australia.

:)

[–] hobnob53 9 years ago

Yes, but filming on location was too good an opportunity to pass up, and certainly added to the film's realism, despite its numerous flaws.

[–] bastasch8647 9 years ago

Agreed about the realism re: settings like the Melbourne Library and the sub's entrance/exit passage by "Point Lonsdale". But the Davidson farm, with its rolling, arid hills, "looked like" many similar spots in southern California. The mountain stream could have been filmed in the U.S. with no one the wiser. As much as I dislike the Armand Assante remake, at least it displayed Australia to much better advantage. I'm happy they filmed in Oz, but even as a kid seeing it on the wide screen I was thinking, "was this really filmed Down Under...?"

[–] hobnob53 9 years ago

Funny, I never had the feeling that this was filmed anywhere but on location. I saw it in the theater as a kid too and it never occurred to me that it was not Australia. Besides, by 1959 filming overseas was pretty common. No way could they have adequately made this picture in California...other than the San Francisco and near-San Diego scenes, of course!

The 2000 made-for-cable remake was a disgrace in all departments, especially in the way most of the lead characters were drawn. I also don't believe it used its Australian locations to any meaningfully better advantage than did the '59 film.

[–] puirt-a-beul 8 years ago

I think your points are valid, bastasch, plus your suggestion that pretty much all of the establishing location shots could have been done by a Second Unit crew. I agree strongly that locations like the Davidson farm didn't seem particularly Australian, and I'm an Aussie myself who grew up in the bush. It certainly didn't look like any of the farmland outside Melbourne that I've ever seen.

I must confess, I also had a bit of a beef with the casting. I understand why people like Ava Gardner, Anthony Perkins and Fred Astaire would be appealing in marketing terms, and I myself like all three as actors, but there was nothing at all that seemed Australian about them in any way, either in personality or speech. Surely they could have done better? (I'm not just being snotty; I found it genuinely distracting.)

You might very well think that. I couldn't possibly comment.

[–] bastasch8647 8 years ago

Sorry for this late reply - and thanks for yours. Yes, the casting left much to be desired, even though as you said, the actors were likable enough (or so I thought until I read of Gardner's mean description of Melbourne as kind of a "nowhere" place). Another problem with most of the characters in the film is that they are too old. Much of the book's tragedy is derived from the sheeer youth of the main characters. Moira was, iirc, only 23 years old, Dwight not much past 30, and the Holmeses in their late 20s (again iirc). Moira was a slender blonde with straight hair, looking nothing like Gardner at the time. Much more a Sue Lyon than an Ava Gardner...

[–] marktayloruk (2383) 10 months ago

Osborne around 30.

[–] marktayloruk (2383) 10 months ago

Osborne around 30.

[–] hobnob53 8 years ago

Hi p-a-b,

As you know I'm not an Aussie and so can't speak from experience, but from everything I've read all of On the Beach was shot on location in Australia, save for the scenes at San Francisco and San Diego; also, part of the Grand Prix sequence was filmed at a track in Riverside, California, while the rest of it was shot on Phillip Island in the state of Victoria. This includes the Davidson farm, which must lurk somewhere in Victoria or maybe NSW.

Stanley Kramer complained that he had to build an entire studio to make the film because of the dearth of facilities in and the limitations of the Australian film industry at the time, something he wouldn't have had to do had much of the film been shot in the U.S.

The casting is a problem but the main issue was that in 1959 there were almost no Australian actors of any note outside their home country, and of course the film needed bankable stars. (And Hollywood stars were bigger draws abroad than native actors even in their own countries.) I've always felt the role of Peter Holmes could have been played by native Australian Rod Taylor, newly arrived in Hollywood, but he wasn't yet the name Perkins was.

And I can't see Chips Rafferty as nuclear scientist Julian (formerly John) Osborne!

[–] mariakelly-04164 7 years ago

I'm just glad that Hugh Jackman wasn't hurt!

Laugh while you can, Monkey Boy!

[–] ae36 7 years ago

Didn't Ava Gardner once say that Melbourne was "the perfect place to make a picture about the end of the world"?

I guess she was complaining about the lack of night life as compared to that of Hollywood.

What I noticed about gardner is how old she looked.

She was only 37 when she filmed this movie-- but looks 10 years older.

People got old fast back then it seems.

Our of curiosity I looked at images of her from the early 1950's -- in 5 short years or so she lost a huge amount of ground looks wise.

That's what heavy smoking and drinking will do to a person a guess.

[–] mariakelly-04164 7 years ago

You are right that she was too old for the character. Maybe they used her because they might have thought that she still had some star presence that would have her fans to see the movie.

Besides, I think that the producers thought that having Gregory Peck, Ava Gardner and Fred Astaire (in his first dramatic role) would help the movie due to the fact that everyone dies at the end of the movie.

Laugh while you can, Monkey Boy!

[–] EtaoinShrdlu001 7 years ago

She looked like some boozed-out old broad, which is just what the character called for.

Who wants a 25 year old hitting on Gregory Peck?

You Fill Me with Inertia.

[–] bastasch8647 7 years ago

In the book Moira is under 25 years of age, and Dwight is also much younger. The character is anything else than a boozed-out old broad. She's a smart, beautiful young blonde who uses alcohol to assuage the feelings of meaninglessness brought on by the war that ended all wars. Her relationship - non-sexual - with Dwight brings meaning into both of their lives. Too bad Hollywood wrecked both the characters' ages and their relationship.

[–] raymondoz2007 (2053) a year ago

People got old fast back then it seems..............except Cary Grant

[–] Druff (1465) 2 years ago

The original novel was written by a brit who had become an Australian citizen. The Australian setting is key to the plot of being spared in the actual WWIII itself, but then being hit by slowly traveling fallout. I assume with all of that in mind, the production execs simply decided to shoot the whole thing in Australia and be done with it. It was their money and they spent it 60 years ago, why in the world would anyone care now?