AustLit
Latest Issues
AbstractHistoryArchive Description
Australia's only fully war-time feature, The Rats of Tobruk focuses on three friends who are cattle droving in the outback just before the outbreak of World War II. By 1941, restless Bluey Donkin, easy-going Milo Trent, and Shakespeare-quoting Englishman Peter Linton have decided to join the Australian Imperial Forces (A.I.F.) and later find themselves in North Africa fighting Rommel's army.
After early successes against the Italian army, the Australian 9th Division finds itself besieged in Tobruk. When not fighting, the men have comic encounters with a barber, while Peter falls for a nurse, Sister Mary, after being wounded. The other two men are also later wounded, but it is Peter who is eventually killed just before the others are able to repel the enemy. Bluey and Milo are then later transferred to New Guinea, where Bluey is injured and Milo killed by a sniper. Bluey manages to kill the sniper.
A romance subplot occurs between Bluey (who prior to leaving Australia was not prepared to settle down with any woman) and the daughter of a squatter, Kate, who is in love with him. When Bluey finally returns home, he and Kate are united.
Notes
-
'The Rats of Tobruk may not be Charles Chauvel’s best movie, but it deserves serious consideration as his best movie about war – which is to argue that it is in some ways superior to his more famous and better-loved Forty Thousand Horsemen (1940), made four years earlier. Horsemen is a more entertaining and better constructed film, fully deserving of its place in the Australian pantheon, but The Rats of Tobruk gives us a better depiction of its subject – the grim, dusty, desperate siege of Tobruk in Libya in 1941, during which a combined force of British, Indian and Australian troops held off Rommel’s Afrika Korps for eight months' (Paul Byrnes, Australian Screen).
-
Further Reference:
- Pike, Andrew, and Ross Cooper. Australian Film, 1900-1977 : A Guide to Feature Film Production. (1998), p.205.
Publication Details of Only Known VersionEarliest 2 Known Versions of
Works about this Work
-
Unsung Aussie Filmmakers – Grant Taylor : A Top Ten
2019
single work
essay
— Appears in: FilmInk , 29 July 2019; -
What Do Mad Max's Six Oscars Mean for the Australian Film Industry?
2016
single work
column
— Appears in: The Conversation , 1 March 2016; 'The career of Dr George Miller reminds me of that of Charles Chauvel, one of the greatest showmen of the Australian cinema. Both men – though separated by many decades – have employed epic cinematic forms and nationalistic themes. ...' -
Rewind : The Making of Breaker Morant
2016
single work
column
— Appears in: FilmInk , 25 April 2016; -
Aussie Cinema Classics Revisited
2014
single work
column
— Appears in: The Courier Mail , Saturday 5 April 2014; (p. 11) 'The great Australian film director Charles Chauvel only made nine feature films in his career...' -
Our Golden Age
2014
single work
column
— Appears in: The Weekend Australian , 29-39 March 2014; (p. 12-13)
-
Great Australian War Film : 'The Rats of Tobruk'
1944
single work
— Appears in: The Argus , 8 December 1944; (p. 2)
— Review of The Rats of Tobruk 1944 single work film/TV -
New Films in Sydney Theatres
1944
single work
— Appears in: The Sydney Morning Herald , 11 December no. 33374 1944; (p. 5)
— Review of The Rats of Tobruk 1944 single work film/TV -
How an Australian Film is Made : Back Stage News on Production of 'The Rats of Tobruk'
1944
single work
— Appears in: The Argus , 16 September 1944; (p. Supp. p.6) -
Filming 'The Rats of Tobruk'
1944
single work
— Appears in: The Argus , 7 December 1944; (p. 2) -
New York Calls 'The Rats' a Most Harrowing Bore
1951
single work
— Appears in: The Argus , 25 May 1951; (p. 7) -
Our Golden Age
2014
single work
column
— Appears in: The Weekend Australian , 29-39 March 2014; (p. 12-13) -
Aussie Cinema Classics Revisited
2014
single work
column
— Appears in: The Courier Mail , Saturday 5 April 2014; (p. 11) 'The great Australian film director Charles Chauvel only made nine feature films in his career...'
- North Africa, Africa,
-
cPapua New Guinea,cPacific Region,
- ca. 1940-1941
- ca. 1942-1944