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'Two rival newspaper editors in New York send writing teams to the South Pacific to find new material; one sends an American, "Headlines" Haggerty, and a "silly-ass" Englishman, Clarence Worthington, and the other sends two women [Clara and Dolly]. The four reporters meet on board the same ship and are marooned together on the tropical Australian coast after a Japanese submarine sinks their ship. They are rescued by a girl who gives them shelter in a tumbledown shack where she lives with her gruff father and precocious little nephew, Horace. With their Australian friends the four reporters uncover and foil a plot by the Japanese to invade Australia' (Andrew Pike and Ross Cooper. Australian Film, 1900-1977 (1980), p. 256)
Notes
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Andrew Pike and Ross Cooper note that A Yank in Australia that not only "embraced familiar absurdist elements from American farce," but was also "narrated from an American viewpoint" (p.256). The problems inherent in the film saw its premiere held back until 1944, and after that very few screenings took place. A critic from Brisbane's Sunday Mail described it a 'nose dive to a new low level in Australian production futility' (ctd. Pike and Cooper, p.256). It was eventually given limited release in England in 1945 (as a support film) and also screened briefly in New York.
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Last amended 23 May 2014 07:00:11
