Tom Long Movies

A talented dancer who was abducted and tortured by three mysterious women struggles to come to grips with his harrowing experience in director Ana Kokkinos' adaptation of Rupert Thompson's unsettling novel. A beautiful and charismatic dancer who has immersed himself in a dream world of graceful movement, Daniel (Tom Long) maintains an amiable but somewhat detached relationship with his girlfriend, and a passionate relationship with his mentor and choreographer Isabel (Greta Scacci). When Daniel ventures out for cigarettes one day and doesn't return, the women in his life are devastated. Upon returning without explanation eleven days later, the profoundly shaken Daniel is unable to articulate his experience and loses his ability to dance. To make matters worse, Daniel is unable to engage emotionally with even the people who were closest to him before the strange incident. Now, in order to reclaim his identity by confronting his abductors, Daniel sets out to find the three women with only his memories of the ambient sounds that flowed into his window to guide him. ~ Jason Buchanan, All Movie Guide

Di Drew directed the family-friendly film Hildegarde. Life has been difficult for Kim Powell (Tara Morice) and her three children ever since the family patriarch passed away. After a pair of local bird smugglers "ducknap" their pet Hildegarde, Kim's children -- Chris (Sam Geer), Jeremy (Dayne Hudson), and Isabel (Gezelle Byrnes) -- team up to stop the illegal poachers and save all their feathered friends. Hildegarde was screened at the Brisbane Film Festival. ~ Perry Seibert, All Movie Guide

In this comedy, as American astronauts prepare to make one giant leap for mankind, a small Australian town stumbles through its own small steps to help. In the summer of 1969, Cliff Buxton (Sam Neill) leads a team of scientists overseeing the operations of one of the world's largest radio telescope dishes, nestled in a New South Wales community of sheep farmers. As NASA prepares for Apollo 11, the first manned voyage to the moon, Buxton and his crew are asked if they will allow their telescope's dish to be used as a backup receiver for the television transmission from the moon, should the main receiver in California fail. Buxton and his men are more than happy to help, and the village is agog as they gear up for their own small part in one of the world's greatest adventures. Mayor McIntyre (Roy Billing) and his wife May (Genevieve Mooy) are thrilled to be greeting a small but steady stream of important visitors, though many of the locals are not especially good with etiquette, and several members of Buxton's team, most notably high-strung Mitch (Kevin Harrington), are less than enthusiastic about Al Burnett (Patrick Warburton), the know-it-all NASA technician brought in to oversee the Australian operations. When a change in Apollo 11's schedule means the Australian dish will have to pick up the vital broadcast from the moon, Cliff, Mitch, and Al must put aside their differences to pull the show together. Though played for laughs, The Dish was inspired by actual events. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide

The second film of Emma-Kate Croghan, who made her debut in 1996 with Love and Other Catastrophes, Strange Planet is a romantic comedy about two apparently different groups of friends. During 12 months, we follow six characters and their problems in search of love and happiness. Judy, Alice, and Sally live together and are best friends, but they have different needs and ambitions. Judy tries to cure her passion for elderly men by concentrating on her career; Alice suffers from a broken heart and high morals; and Sally wants everything. Ewan, Joel, and Neil run a law firm together and also have their problems. Ewan does not like his new adult life of responsibility, so he quits; Joel's world falls apart when his wife leaves him; and Neil is desperately looking for someone to love. The coming of the millennium provides the crucial moment when they meet in a secluded beach house on New Year's Eve 1999 and everything is unraveled. The film was screened at the Stockholm International Film Festival in 1999. ~ Gönül Dönmez-Colin, All Movie Guide

Based on the best-selling memoirs of the late Dame Mary Durack, this big-budget Australian historical drama miniseries traces three generations of the Duracks. After several family deaths, the Duracks flee Irish famines of the 1840s for a better life Down Under, where they make a fortune with Queensland cattle -- only to lose it all in a property crash near the turn of the century, prompting patriarch Patsy Durack (Stephen Dillane, of Welcome to Sarajevo) to reflect, "If it's kings we are, it's kings in grass castles that may be blown away in the wind." Compressing 75 years into four hours, the Durack saga is set against the wider tapestry of pioneering Australian history during the 19th Century. Premiered March 29, and April 5, 1998 on Seven Network Australia. ~ Bhob Stewart, All Movie Guide

The daily, 30-minute Australian soap opera Echo Point was set in the fictional town of the same title. Created by John Edwards, Sandra Levy, and Christopher Lee (not the horror film actor), the series divided its time equally between the "young" and "old" characters, whose individual trials and tribulations somehow always managed to converge. The cast included onetime child star Sean Scully (Almost Angels, The Prince and the Pauper) and the ubiquitous Rowena Wallace. A Southern Star production, the 130-episode Echo Point was seen on Australia's Ten Network from June 5, 1995 to December of that same year. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide