Nicholas Papademetriou Movies
Australian filmmaker Paul Goldman directs the comedy The Night We Called It a Day, based on the actual events during Frank Sinatra's 1974 tour stop in Sydney. Joel Edgerton plays Rod Blue, a long-haired rock promoter in Australia during the '70s. He hopes to save his floundering career by spending all his money booking Frank Sinatra (Dennis Hopper). But when Sinatra arrives with his girlfriend Barbara Marx (Melanie Griffith), he insults the locals by calling reporter Hilary Hunter (Portia de Rossi) "a two-dollar whore." Union leader and future Australian prime minister Bob Hawke (David Field) tries to cancel the tour unless he apologizes, and it's up to Rod and his assistant Audrey (Rose Byrne) to step in and save the tour. Tom Burlinson performs Sinatra's vocal parts. The Night We Called It a Day was shown at the 2003 Cannes Film Festival. ~ Andrea LeVasseur, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Dennis Hopper, Melanie Griffith, (more)
- 1990
Carl Fitzgerald (Sam Neill) is a shy, unassertive man, given to following orders from anyone around him who will take the trouble to boss him about, starting with his nagging mother. In this story, he is very much down on his luck and is forced to take a job as dishwasher in a Greek restaurant in Brunswick, his rundown neighborhood in Melborne. There, he swifly is hauled off to bed by an assertive young waitress. While he is with the girl, he accidentally kills his co-worker, a hysterically abusive and drug-dealing Turk, He calls on his old friend Dave for help in disposing of the man's body. The best solution Dave can come up with is to dump the body in another person's grave, but he manages to boss Carl around a lot in the process. And even Dave's wife gives Carl what-for, lambasting him for his overall uselessness. Somehow, despite his passivity, Carl manages to seem like the ultimate victor in all these confrontations. ~ Clarke Fountain, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Sam Neill, Zoe Carides, (more)
- 1986
Australian aborigine David Kennedy marries white woman Susan Leith and settles down in Sydney. Susan's father, a wealthy businessman, ends up in prison over a botched deal. Without his father-in-law's influence to help him, Kennedy has trouble looking after his family and dealing with big-city life. He returns to his own people, leaving his wife to raise their son by himself. Seven years later Kennedy returns to Sydney, hoping for a reunion with his 12-year-old son. But first he must run the gauntlet of legal obstacles set up by the justifiably embittered Leith. Short Changed was scripted by Robert J. Merritt, himself an aborigine. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- David Kennedy, Susan Leith, (more)
