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AbstractHistoryArchive Description
Italian sports journalist Nino Culotta is lured to Sydney during the mid-1960s to work for his brother's new magazine for migrant Italians. When he arrives in the country, however, Nino finds out that there is no magazine and that his brother has taken off with the investors' cash. Left in the lurch is his brother's business partner, Kay Kelly. Nino vows to pay off his brother's debt and gets a job as a builder's labourer. In doing so, he learns how to talk, act, and drink like an Australian male. His numerous attempts to woo Kay are repeatedly rebuffed with humorous results, but in the end she falls in love with him. Nino's introduction to the country and its culture finds him bemused but ultimately confident that he has a future here.
The Australian Centre for the Moving Image suggests this film is 'very much a product of the assimilationist view dominating Australian immigration policy at the time'.
Publication Details of Only Known VersionEarliest 2 Known Versions of
Works about this Work
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Straight to the Pool Room : Top 10 Films about the Australian Dream
2016
single work
column
— Appears in: The Guardian Australia , 25 April 2016; 'The housing market may not sound like the most stimulating territory for a story, but it has been the basis of some of Australia’s greatest films' -
Wogs Laughing - All the Way to the Bank
2016
single work
column
— Appears in: The Sunday Mail , 31 January 2016; (p. 28) -
How Weird Does This Mob Still Seem?
2012
2012
single work
criticism
— Appears in: Inside Story , May 2012; -
Who's the Weird Mob Anyway? Assimilation and Authenticity in They're a Weird Mob
2011
single work
criticism
— Appears in: Making Film and Television Histories : Australia and New Zealand 2011; (p. 241-245) -
'Modern' Cinematic Encounters : Border Crossing and Environmental Transformation in Some Recent Australian Films
2011
single work
criticism
— Appears in: Studies in Australasian Cinema , 24 August vol. 5 no. 2 2011; (p. 185-192) 'In Australia (and globally), refugees and 'the environment' are major sources of anxiety that define the experience of living in modern times. Contemporary social policy is then a representational technology that speaks to environmental and crosscultural transactions within 'modern' Australian cinematic texts. This article tracks the conversational contours between policy on climate change and border control in Australia and representations of self-other and self-environment relations in Australian film produced in the latter period of the Howard era (1996-2007). Films have frequently sought to mobilize a range of visions and understandings of both security and sustainability, and of the associated productions of policy, identity and space. Such exchanges necessitate critical scrutiny of the politicized cultural contexts that produce them - and an awareness of the normative reassertions that accompany these cinematic mediations of modern Australian experience.' (Author's abstract)
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They're a Weird Mob
2008
single work
review
— Appears in: Senses of Cinema , no. 47 2008;
— Review of They're a Weird Mob 1966 single work film/TV -
Contexts in which to Place They're a Weird Mob and into which You Might Never Have Placed it Before
2005
single work
review
— Appears in: Senses of Cinema , July - September no. 36 2005;
— Review of They're a Weird Mob 1966 single work film/TV -
Who's Afraid of Film-Making?
1966
single work
review
— Appears in: The Bulletin , 27 August vol. 88 no. 4512 1966; (p. 42)
— Review of They're a Weird Mob 1966 single work film/TV -
The Old Wave at Bondi
1966
single work
review
— Appears in: The Bulletin , 27 August vol. 88 no. 4512 1966; (p. 41)
— Review of They're a Weird Mob 1966 single work film/TV -
Talking About My Generazione
2005
single work
column
— Appears in: The Australian , 18 May 2005; (p. 10) -
Laying Our Cultural Foundations
2007
single work
criticism
— Appears in: The Age , 17 November 2007; (p. 19) -
Larrikin Ockers and Decent Blokes : The National Type in Australian Film Comedy
2009
single work
criticism
— Appears in: Creative Nation : Australian Cinema and Cultural Studies Reader 2009; (p. 154-165) - y 'They're a Weird Mob' Perth : Centre for Research in Culture and Communication (Murdoch University) , 2003 Z1666352 2003 single work criticism Research undertaken by a student of the Centre for Culture and Communication (Murdoch University) into They're a Weird Mob (1966). Includes aspects relating to the production phase, critical reception, principal performers and production crew, references and a synopsis
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Wogboy Comedies and the Australian National Type
2009
single work
criticism
— Appears in: Diasporas of Australian Cinema 2009; (p. 73-82)'Popular Australian film comedy since the early 1970s has been dominated by reinventions of the national type. These reinventions involve transformations of the urban larrikin and the bush battler, first established in silent film classics such as The Sentimental Bloke (Raymond Longford 1919) and in Cinesound Studio's Rudd family comedies of the 1930s, directed by Ken G. Hall. These comic types continue to surface in popular film and television as the larrikin, ocker or decent Aussie bloke, exemplified in the 1970s by Bazza McKenzie, in the 1980s by Crocodile Dundee, in the 1990s by Darryl Kerrigan in The Castle, and most recently by cable TV showman Steve Irwin until his untimely death in 2006. Yet despite decades of multiculturalism, little attention has been paid to the impact of post-war, non -British immigration on Australian comic types. This chapter examines three popular comedies which champion ethnically marked characters as either 'New Australians' (They're a Weird Mob, Michael Powell 1966), 'wogboys' (The Wog Boy, Alexsi Vellis 2000) or `chockos' (Fat Pizza, Paul Fenech 2003). It asks whether 'wogboys' and 'chockos' - as diasporic, multicultural or new world comic types - have trumped the larrikins and ockers of Australian screen comedy, or whether 'wogsploitation' films are popular with Australian film and television audiences precisely because they tap into a long. standing national type without disturbing its key characteristics.' (Publication abstract)
- 1950s