AustLit

Chopper Squad follows the adventures of a helicopter surf rescue team based on Sydney's northern beaches, as they deal with various difficult rescues and occasionally come into close contact with desperate criminals.

The program suffered from long hiatuses between the pilot and series one, and between series one and series two. Furthermore, Don Storey notes, in his Classic Australian Television, that

Unfortunately, the quality of the scripts varied immensely. Some episodes had excellent dramatic narratives, and the viewers would be on the edge of their seats watching the rescue process. Other plots were contrived merely to justify the use of a helicopter, or to show off some other facet of the surf rescue operation, or were just corny. This variation in quality occurred not only from episode to episode, but quite often within an episode.

However, Storey concludes that

If the scripts left a lot to be desired, the same could not be said for the other aspects of the programme. The actors all gave good performances, and the technical quality is excellent by any standards. Extensive external location work was used, with internal sets being kept to a minimum. The camerawork is second to none, highlighting the magnificent scenery of the Sydney coastline to great effect.

Albert Moran, in his Guide to Australian TV Series, notes that 'World distribution rights to the series were bought by Paramount Pictures, which sold the production to Malaysia, Hong Kong, Singapore, Thailand, the Philippines and Britain'.

When the owner of a surfing supply store, who has been receiving mysterious death threats, is brutally beaten outside his store, he takes an old friend up on his offer to 'go to ground' with his wife at the friend's beachside holiday house. But the two couples are followed to their sanctuary by a mysterious motorcyclist, and soon find themselves trapped inside the house by their would-be assassin.

Peter Clarke, a former member of British Intelligence–inactive for years but still subject to the agency, aware as they are of his role in a homicide–is called on to deliver a package to his native Australia: the package contains an audio tape of recordings that will erase a listener's memory. Clarke's handler also hopes that the package will draw an enemy agent out because, by listening to the tape, he will neutralise himself. But this is only one of the parties who is interested in the potential of these recordings.

A relatively short-lived drama series based in a secondary school in one of Sydney's more impoverished suburbs, Glenview High focused on teacher Greg Walker, dividing its attention between his work with his students and his homelife with his brother and two flatmates.

Don Storey, in his Classic Australian Television, notes that 'Glenview High frequently looked at the problems faced by city kids preparing for a world of uncertainty, with less opportunity and high unemployment. It also dealt with the frustration of the education system from the point of view of both teachers and students.' Albert Moran, conversely, notes in his Guide to Australian TV Series that 'Glenview High was mildly concerned with social issues in and around school, kids, teachers and parents but with each episode needing to tie its stories up inside the hour, social problems were mostly solvable and social issues were raised but not explored.'

Storey summarises the program as follows:

Grundy's claimed that Glenview High could not be compared to Class of 74/75, a valid statement with which the critics agreed. Glenview was a better product than Class, but it could not be considered an outstanding series: the scripts sometimes lapse into melodrama, with corny and contrived endings, and being produced entirely on video gives it a cheap look.

(Note: Moran mistakenly lists Ken James and Rebecca Gilling as playing teachers, rather than their actual roles of Greg Walker's brother Tom and flatmate/air hostess Robbie Dean.)

'A reunion of longtime friends is just a facade for one to kill the other, take over her identity, and set into motion a scheme to destroy the Capitol.'

Source: Australian Television Information Archive. (Sighted: 25/6/2013)

A private investigator is called over to Perth, Western Australia, by the widow of an old friend: her seemingly respectable bank-manager husband has committed suicide, and the trigger seems to be a network of pornography and blackmail.

A pair of prison escapees plan to abduct a rich couple's baby and hold it for ransom, but have not calculated on the presence of an obsessive babysitter.

John Pinkney's review of the film, published in the Age in 1977, was dismissive. He wrote:

'This handsome telefilm had almost everything on its side – from Russell Boyd's poetic photography and Peter Maxwell's direction to the assured acting of such principals as Gerard Kennedy and Carmen Duncan.

'Even the unhappy writer, Bruce Wishart, achieved verisimilitude most of the time. But the story, written in an off moment by Bruning himself, got Wishart in the end'.

Source: John Pinkney, 'Mr Bruning's Films Need Pruning'. Age 27 May 1977, p.3.

When husband and wife Gary and Pat Keating stumble across a murdered couple and a traumatised adolescent in a remote farmhouse, Pat remains behind with the boy while Gary, a former long-distance runner, sets out to the nearest town to find help–but on the way there, he crosses the path of two violent escaped prisoners.

Recently released from a sanatorium, Kate Hersey is seemingly unaware that her husband, John, has been pursuing an affair with her sister, Marianne. When a series of strange events begin to plague the block of flats in which (in John's absence) the sisters live together, Marianne assumes someone is confusing her with Kate. But Kate, aware of her sister's betrayal, has her own plan to gain both her husband's money and revenge, before fleeing with her own lover.

Running for twelve years and a total of 510 episodes, Homicide was a seminal Australian police-procedural program, set in the homicide squad of the Victoria Police. According to Don Storey in his Classic Australian Television, it represented a turning point for Australian television, prompting the development of local productions over the purchase of relatively inexpensive American dramas. Indeed, Storey quotes Hector Crawford as saying that his production company intended three outcomes from Homicide: demonstrating that it was possible to make a high-quality local drama series, counteracting criticism of local performers, and showing that Australian audiences would watch Australian-made dramas.

As Moran notes in his Guide to Australian TV Series, the program adopted a narrative structure focusing on crime, detection, and capture, rather than on character studies of the lead detectives. The early episodes were produced by a small crew (Storey notes that the crew was frequently limited to four people: cameraman, grip, director, and assistant director), requiring some degree of ingenuity to achieve a polished result (including, in some cases, the actors performing their own stunts). However, the program received extensive support from the Victoria Police (who recognised, in its positive portrayal of police officers, a valuable public-relations exercise) and, as its popularity grew, from the public.

The program's cast changed extensively over its twelve years on the air, though it remained focused on a small group of male detectives, with the inclusion of irregular characters such as Policewoman Helen Hopgood (played by Derani Scarr), written on an as-required basis to reflect the involvement of women in the police force. In Moran's words, 'The other star of Homicide was the location film work. These ordinary, everyday familiar urban locations were what gave the series a gritty realism and familiarised audiences with the shock of recognition at seeing themselves and their milieus on air'.

A short children's adventure program, which (according to Moran, in his Guide to Australian TV Series) 'concentrated in a pleasant, innocent fashion on a group of children who created their own make-believe town, taking on such jobs as firefighter, police officer and so on'.

The program was the first Australian production for New Zealand-born Roger Mirams, who had arrived in Australia in 1956 to work as a cameraman for the Olympic Games. After this series, Mirams, in Moran's words, 'became an active force in the industry, especially children's drama, over the next 30 years'.

Revue.

Intended as an experiment over three Friday nights in May 1959, the production commenced at 11.30pm on each of those evenings, and was extended to eight performances due to popular demand. The focus of the revue was largely directed towards theatrical enterprises and identities, thus appealing to many within the Melbourne theatre industry.

The sketches and songs presented (as identified in the programme) were:

• 1.'Overture'
• 2. 'Theatre Guide' (Brian)
• 3. 'That Certain Business'
• 4. 'Expresso for Two'
• 5. 'Taxing Our Patience' (Brian)
• 6. 'Song of Summer' (Margaret)
• 7. 'Poem' (Brian)
• 8. 'Girl Guides' (Bill and John)
• 9. 'TV Canine' (Brian)
• 10. 'I've Got a Play' (John)
• 11. 'Tatt's a Pity' (Margaret)
• 12. 'Old Girls' (Bill)
• 13. 'Spanish Poem' (Brian)
• 14. 'Loved and Lost' (Margaret)
• 15. 'Cat's Cradle' (Bill and John)
• 16. 'Freddie' (Freddie)
• 17. 'Infidel Castro' (Brian and Margaret)
• 18. 'Monotonous' (John)
• 19. 'Gala Premiere' (Bill and Margaret)
• 20. 'Opera Poem' (Brian)
• 21. 'Shades of Carmen Miranda' (Bill)
• 22. 'Finale' (ensemble).

Revue.

The items as billed in the program are:

First Wave

1. 'Prologue' (John); 2. 'Off the Beach' (ensemble); 3. 'The Seagull' (John); 4. '1702' (Noel and Judy); 5. 'Linguaphoney' (Mary, Margaret, John, and Noel); 6. 'Boy Next Door' (Judy); 7. 'Football Followers' (John, Noel, and Clark); 8. 'April in Fairbanks' (Margaret); 9. 'Square' (John); 10. 'Star' (Noel); 11. 'House Full' (Paul); 12. 'Ornamental Orientals' (John and Margaret); 13. 'Calypso Calamity' (Noel); 14. 'The Handkerchief' (Judy and Clark); 15. 'Salvation Sob Story' (John); 16. 'Intro' (Noel); 17. 'Fruit Bowl' (ensemble) .

Second Wave

1. 'Me and the Boy Friend' (ensemble); 2. 'The Carol Singer' (Noel); 3. 'Lessons in Love' (Margaret); 4. 'Expresso Opinion' (John, Judy, Margaret, and Noel); 5. 'The Tatooist' (Paul); 6. 'Smile-a-While' (John and Margaret); 7. 'Apres-Moi' (Judy); 8. 'In Modern Dress' (Noel and John); 9. 'TV Anonymous' (Beris); 10. 'Coffee after Ten' (Margaret); 11. 'Cymbolic' (Noel); 12. 'They Also Serve' (Paul, John, and Judy); 13. 'Loved and Lost' (Margaret); 14. 'The Orator' (John); 15. 'Lost in a Forest' (Judy); 16. 'Moomba Mayhem' (ensemble); 17. 'Walkabout Sweetheart' (John); 18. 'Finale' (ensemble).

• A song titled 'Face You're Wearing' (by Barry Prendergast) is indicated in the programme's 'Lyric and Music Credits' section, but does not appear in the list of songs and sketches.

Revue.

The items as billed in the program are:

First Wave

1. 'Off the Beach' (ensemble); 2. 'On the Beach' (Mary and John); 3. 'The Seagull' (John); 4. 'Don't Baby Me' (Noel and Beris); 5. 'Linguaphoney' (Mary, Margaret, John, and Noel); 6. 'The Girl Who Couldn't Quite' (Beris); 7. 'Matinee Idyll' (John and Noel); 8. 'Maid of the Mountains' (Mary); 9. 'Solo Recital' (Noel); 10. 'Lady Objects' (Mary); 11. 'Apples with Chappels' ^ (John, Noel, and Margaret); 12. 'Lost in a Forest' (Mary); 13. 'Intro' (Noel); 14. 'Fruit Bowl' (ensemble).

Second Wave

1. 'Me and the Boy Friend' (ensemble); 2. 'The Carol Singer' (Noel); 3. 'Story of Three Loves' (Mary, Margaret, and Beris); 4. 'Calypso Calamity' (Noel); 5. 'Salvation Sob Story' (John); 6. 'When You Got Me' (Noel and Mary); 7. 'April in Fairbanks' (Margaret); 8. 'Smile-a-While' (John and Mary); 9. 'Intro' (Beris); 10. 'Model Muddle' (Margaret, John, and Noel); 11. 'High Noon' (Beris); 12. 'Food for Thought' (Noel, Margaret, and John); 13. 'Sin Song' (Mary); 14. 'Finale' (ensemble).

• Songs with (^) were written by Peter Pinne.