John B. Murray Movies
- 1989
A lustful adolescent is hot for an older--and married--woman. ~ Kristie Hassen, All Movie Guide
- 1985
Based on Raymond Radiguet's book of the same (French) title, this erotic film revolves around a September-May adulterous love affair. Unlike the book, the setting is the Australian outback in 1943, and the French heroine Marthe (Katia Caballero) has been legally "quarantined" by the Aussie government for the duration of the war. That is to say, her Italian husband has been put in jail, and she is not allowed to leave the country. After meeting schoolboy Paul Hansen (Keith Smith), sexual sparks ignite a smoldering desire, and the two eventually are engaged in an all-out affair. Rumor and innuendo and Paul's parents notwithstanding, the affair runs its course -- but the tragedy that ends the book has been written out here. As this film was released, director Marco Bellocchio was completing his own 1987 version of the same story, Il Diavolo in Corpo. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Katia Caballero, Keith Smith, (more)
Even today, the Australian outback (the never-never of the title) is a daunting place to be left alone. In 1901, it was even more rugged and wild. In this artful drama, Jeannie Gunn (Angela Punch McGregor), a very genteel and citified Victorian-era newlywed, joins her husband in the Northern Territory to help manage a station ("station" is Aussie for "a large ranch"). There she gradually sheds her prim ways and, thanks to her friendship with the local Aborigines, becomes a representative of an entirely new class, sometimes called "Australian outback women." In addition to chronicling the transformation of a Victorian woman, this film offers insight into the situation of Aborigine society at the time, and it received high praise from Australian reviewers. It is based on the diaries of Jeannie Gunn herself. ~ Clarke Fountain, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Angela Punch McGregor, Arthur Dignam, (more)
Effusive piano tuner Norman Kaye is on the less sunny side of forty and still unattached. Shy and self-effacing office worker Wendy Hughes is likewise getting on in years sans a lifetime companion. From the outset, we know that Kaye and Hughes will somehow come together. This, however, is the only predictable aspect of this quirky Australian comedy. Director Paul Cox co-wrote the ever-fresh screenplay of Lonely Hearts with John Clarke. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Wendy Hughes, Norman Kaye, (more)
- 1973
Four Australian directors explore different angles of the title topic in this generally downbeat anthology. In "The Husband" a husband increases his arousal during lovemaking by imagining his wife in different sexual liaisons without realizing that his fantasy may based on fact. The second vignette "The Child" centers on the resentful son of a widow who is having an affair with another. While his mother is off galavanting with her new love, the boy is left in the care of a governess whom he grows to love. The poor boy begins to fear that his new friend will be fired as soon as his mother returns and so goes off on a walk to sort out his feelings. He wanders into a field and it is there he sees his governess making love to his mother's boyfriend. This causes the emotionally fragile lad to shatter and blindly run towards the river where he crazily hops into a boat and begins rowing into the current. The lover, wanting to save the child from harm dives in and tragedy ensues. In "The Priest," a priest wrestles with his love for a nun. Though they want to marry, the nun forces them to leave their orders in the correct way. It is a way filled with red-tape and takes so long that the relationship withers and they remain in their vocations. The final segment "The Family Man" deals with a slob of a husband who decides to celebrate the birth of his third child by having a little fling while his wife recuperates in hospital. He enlists the aid of a buddy and together they get drunk, pick up two floozies and head to his beachhouse. When the gals learn about his wife, they stomp out of the house. Time passes and the husband brings his family to the house for vacation. Much to his horror he finds that the two women have placed a large incriminating sign upon it leaving him to try to explain it all to his wife. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide
