Bill Hunter Movies

This low-budget Australian period piece examines the effects of WWII on the women and children left behind when the country sent troops into battle. Dorothy (Lisa Hensley) oversees the family farm while her husband fights; she's aided by two Italian prisoners of war, Alfredo (Steve Bastoni) and Joseph (Domenic Galati), as well as a Jewish mother and daughter seeking asylum from Nazi Germany. Her children take to the Italians immediately, viewing them as father figures while their real dad's away. Meanwhile, the young German woman becomes smitten with Joseph, with dire consequences. ~ Michael Hastings, All Movie Guide

The thriller A Difficult Woman features Caroline Goodall as Anne, a pathologist for a multinational drug corporation. Her good life takes a turn for the worse after her best friend is killed. Anne decides she must solve the mystery of the murder and starts applying her scientific skills to the evidence. ~ Perry Seibert, All Movie Guide

Wendy Hughes plays a gorgeous nurse tending to emotionally disturbed Australian soldiers during WWII. Private Gary Sweet seems to be the most well-adjusted of the patients, which Hughes finds attractive. The fly in the ointment is jealous, maladjusted-patient Richard Moir. His campaign of cruelty, calculated to humiliate and unhinge Sweet, serves only to draw Sweet closer to Hughes. His own love for Hughes unrequited, Moir kills himself. Hughes is then abruptly deserted by Sweet, who feels responsible for Moir's death. Despite all her good intentions and her heartfelt compassion, Hughes is left alone upon war's end. Indecent Obsession is based on a work by popular Australian novelist Colleen McCullough (Tim, The Thorn Birds). ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

A pair of Melbourne detectives working in the Zero Tolerance Unit set out to uncover a web of corruption in the directorial debut of famed Australian comic Tony Martin. Though a highly publicized accident involving a dead magistrate quickly relegates dedicated lawmen Ben Kinnear (Mick Molloy) and Mike Paddock (Bob Franklin) back to lowly uniformed duty, the pair can't help but notice an odd link between the accident and the questionable business associations of a suspicious casino boss they had been investigating. Realizing that they can no longer accept the widespread corruption that surrounds them, Ben and Mike set out to bust the crooked casino hustler and rid their city of the criminal element. ~ Jason Buchanan, All Movie Guide

In this moody black and white drama, very much in the mode of the American "western," but with its own film noir characteristics, a whole town is heaved out of its doldrums when a pair of mysterious strangers come visiting. In the beginning of the film, Angel (Aden Young) is traveling with his friend Max (Dennis Miller) on a ship to Honeyfield, a town on the coast of Australia. He is coming home to die. Instead, he dies on board the ship, willing his boots to Angel, and an unopened package to someone called "The Dead Man," in Honeyfield. Also on the ship is a man named Tatts (David Field), a far less pleasant personality. When Angel gets off to head into Honeyfield, Tatts decides to follow along unseen. The package, Angel was told, contains something its intended recipient has been looking for without knowing it. On finding the recipient, a mean-spirited old man (Norman Kaye) who is more or less the boss and owner of the town, he learns that the package contains opium. Angel gets involved with other citizens of the town, and gets to know what became of the woman Max was coming back to. Just being a fresh face is enough to stir things up, but Angel brings things to a boil by bringing up memories of the past. The pot boils over, though, when Tatt comes into town and begins playing his games. ~ Clarke Fountain, All Movie Guide

Dead Man's Float is a very short and occasionally sweet juvenile melodrama. A cheeky bunch of children who think they're pretty smart are in for a rude awakening when they confront a gang of drug smugglers who play for keeps. Since the film is aimed at the kiddie trade, the youngsters prevail over the villains, though it's nip and tuck for a while there. The film is nothing if not energetic, with its cast of unknowns breezing through the proceedings with confidence. Filmed in Australia, Dead Man's Float entertains during its swift 75 minutes, even though it doesn't stick to the ribs. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Based on a true story about the execution of a psychopathic American G.I. by the U.S. Army in 1942, this wartime drama opens in Melbourne, Australia. U.S. forces and the Australians are at loggerheads, and this antagonism reaches a flash point when Edward J. Leonski (Reb Brown) is spotted running away from the scene of a brutal murder. That action sparks a gun battle between American and Aussie soldiers at a train station that makes it seem as if the two nations are at war with each other. U.S. Major Patrick Dannenberg (James Coburn) covers up the shooting incident and puts top priority on hunting down the killer. It is suggested that orders from the highest echelons of the U.S. military demanded the execution of the killer in order to preserve a working relationship with the Australians. Meanwhile, Aussie Detective Sgts. Adams (Bill Hunter) and Martin (Maurie Fields) are also looking for the murderer, hoping to bring him to justice in an Australian court of law. When Leonski's roommate belatedly turns him in, his attorney gets seriously ill and Major Dannenberg has to take over his defense. There is no doubt the man is mentally unbalanced, as witnessed by his behavior in Melbourne's bars and brothels in the first half of the movie. At the trial, Dannenberg unsuccessfully argues for his client's internment in an asylum for the criminally insane. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, All Movie Guide

When a political reporter disappears in Southeast Asia, it is up to his wife to find him. She enlists the help of a former boyfriend, who is still coping with his unresolved feelings for her. ~ Iotis Erlewine, All Movie Guide

Andrew Stanton, who helped write Toy Story and Monsters, Inc., co-wrote and directed this computer-animated comedy-adventure about finding a very small fish in a very large ocean. Marlin (voice of Albert Brooks) is a more-than-slightly paranoid Clown Fish who is extremely devoted to his young son, Nemo (voice of Alexander Gould), the only survivor after an undersea predator swallowed up Nemo's mother and her other offspring. It's not Marlin's nature to explore unfamiliar waters, but when he and Nemo are accidentally separated near the Great Barrier Reef en route to Nemo's first day of fish school, Marlin gathers his courage and sets out to find his son. What Marlin doesn't know, however, is that while Nemo was looking at a boat passing on the surface, he was caught in a net and given a new home in a dentist's aquarium. As Marlin searches for his son, he makes friends with a friendly but absent-minded Regal Blue Tang named Dory (voice of Ellen DeGeneres), a Great White Shark named Bruce (voice of Barry Humphries) who is trying to cut fish out of his diet, a beach-rat Sea Tortoise named Crush (voice of Andrew Stanton), and Nigel (voice of Geoffrey Rush), a Pelican who can take Marlin's search from the ocean to dry land. Finding Nemo's impressive voice cast also includes Willem Dafoe, Allison Janney, Eric Bana, Stephen Root, and Brad Garrett. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide

The first of two consecutive films to see director Peter Weir team with Mel Gibson (the other being The Year of Living Dangerously), Gallipoli follows two idealistic young friends, Frank (Gibson) and Archy (Mark Lee), who join the Australian army during World War I and fight the doomed Battle of Gallipoli in Turkey. The first half of the film documents the lives of the young men in Australia, detailing their personalities and beliefs. The second half of the movie chronicles the ill-fated and ill-planned battle, where the Australian and New Zealand Army Corps is hopelessly outmatched by the enemy forces. Gallipoli was the recipient of eight prizes at the 1981 Australian Film Institute Awards. ~ Matthew Tobey, All Movie Guide