Outback Ethnography: Revisiting Fred Zinnemann's 'The Sundowners'

Appearing at a moment in time when Australian national cinema had practically ground to a halt, Hollywood filmmaker Fred Zinnemann's 1960 adaptation of a Jon Cleary novel about the physical and romantic travails of itinerant sheepshearers presaged key works in the Australian film revival of the following decade. Drawing on interviews conducted with Zinnemann and Cleary, Neil Sinyard examines the film's origins, themes and place in its director's oeuvre.

Additional keywords:
Deborah Kerr, Robert Mitchum, Dorothy Hammerstein, Robert J Flaherty, Peter Ustinov, John Meillon, droving, mateship, 1960s, Australian film revival, The Irishman, Sunday Too Far Away