"His word against mine' and 'today ends at dawn'

'His word against mine' is an interesting penultimate episode for D4 because it seems like it's really keen to not say what it wants to say, which is, this is the final episode with Gerard Kennedy as Frank Banner. The storyline aside from Banner's resignation (to get married) is a bit slender from a 2025 POV but perhaps it had more impact when it was first broadcast - it's a slightly non-sequiturish story of a local councillor who's accused of being gay and ultimately, well, is. Or is bisexual, rather. He concedes/confesses this to the Ds but he doesn't outright confess to his wife - which isn't the usual D4 way, there's no real closure there, not that we necessarily needed it.

And nor is there any real closure on Frank Banner. We simply end on the three originals in the car driving to do some job or other, I'm not entirely sure what. 

The following episode starring John Stanton still has Kennedy in the opening credits, i.e., they didn't bother making a special opener for what they already knew was a dead show. Stanton's character Tom Morgan is completely brilliant, very non-sexy (but how sexy was Frank Banner?) and more like Columbo than anything else. The character has taken a transfer from Bairnsdale, where he's been a long time, and he has attitude plus. 

The moustache isn't a bad look for Stanton but presumably also he had to distinguish himself from the character of Pat Kelly in Homicide. Those Homicide eps were still screening while this was being filmed. 

I'm 99% certain these images above are from a car park close to the Crawfords Abbotsford premises, somewhere near Duke St. 

Mick Peters here is reading the Age from 16 April 1975 p. 2, probably the article by John Pinkney, below. If the third paragraph in the second column isn't an easter egg, what is?! Add to the mix the fact that John Pinkney (who was married to my aunt) also wrote scripts for Crawfords shows, and you get... um... something added to the mix. I don't know what pen name John used, he didn't use his real name, I suppose it would have been a conflict of interest considering he was also a TV critic.*

Admittedly the episode does end on a rather crappy note with a madwoman wandering alongside the Yarra saying 'boy, where are you boy?' - fairly silly really. But D4 could have gone so much further into the late 70s with Stanton as Morgan, in many ways (from what little we saw) a lot more complex than Banner whose character roots were in tawdry soap opera. 

* Though IMDB says he wrote thousands of episodes of Bellbird so, I don't know. 

momentous events

I'm not being glib. Labor won the election tonight in a landslide, unbelievable, I loved it, I am still a bit stunned by the whole thing.

I mentioned a few days ago the death of David Thomas but not the death of Gerard Kennedy. Obviously this impacted on me as he has been decidedly very prominent in my life over the last year. I am about three episodes from the end of the series (GK was only in two of the final 3!). Will definitely get around to watching these this week, will report back. 

Laura and I went to the German Film Festival screening of the first five episodes of Berlin Alexanderplatz (and we are going to see the rest of them over the coming weeks). Pretty extraordinary, but some parts preposterous, but others marvellous. I love a wallow. 

'billy's choice'

D4 7 October 1974, 'Billy's Choice'. It's a half decent storyline but what means the most to me is the marvellous three guest stars of Hilda Scurr, Keith Eden and John Stanton. YESSSS. And one other wonder (see below). 

Stanton is a mad bastard. 

Scurrfection! 

One scene with the amazeballs Denise. 

Scurr and Eden are terrific in this, a really sympathetic criminal couple (well he's a crim, she just deals with it). Great work everyone. 

coburg lake reserve in d4 'standover'

David Clendinning, Amber Mae Cecil and of course Gerard Kennedy in a great end-of-episode chase sequence that takes us from Pentridge to the Coburg Lake Reserve. The episode is 'Standover', from 15 August 1973. This episode also has Norman Yemm in it but not enough Norman Yemm, as if there could ever be enough Norman Yemm!

 

d4 waste ground

Not a lot to say about this episode ('Waste Ground', 4 July 1973) except a great performance/character courtesy John Hargreaves, who's playing a student 'writing a thesis for sociology'. 

And, yep, Gerry Duggan again... 

Nelson Place South Melbourne. I don't know exactly whereabouts. This is the scene where Banner tells Marg that he came from a broken home. Basically the only thing we've ever been told about his life except the occasional weird reference to him hanging around with people's fathers when he was a boy. 

And this is where he sees the personal collection of a young Hitler enthusiast. Nazism not strongly examined in the episode. 

 

joan letch again again again

Another marvellous small role from Joan Letch in Division 4 episode 'Two Pot Screamer' screened 5 March 1973. She plays Doris King. She's just a brilliant actor. 

division 4: 'man's only a battler'

Obscure name for a very excellent episode of D4 from 22 March 1972. My worlds collided in this one where the crooks are chased onto the 'Westgate Bridge Freeway' which at that point is incomplete. 

In a way the actual pictures of the empty freeway aren't all that amazingly exciting. You heard it from me (if you hadn't already realised). 

But it gets a bit thrilling when John Stanton (who plays a criminal) breaks away and is chased by Gerard Kennedy to what might well be the Aerodrome and therefore the future Westgate Park. 

Yeah it is just one more case of I wish I could reach into the screen and turn the camera around a bit but you can't have everything, or really anything. 

division 4 - a key to paradise

This episode of Division 4 was first screened on 11 August 1970. It's very, very loosely based on the Ronnie Biggs story (British train robber hotfoots it to Australia) but that's really only the jumping off point. One of the interesting things about it is that part of the episode takes place in the Ranelagh Estate in Mount Eliza. 

Ostensibly this house is in Mornington, and the street is Ozone street or something like that. But it's very clear where they are. 

The house number is 115, probably 115 Rutland Ave I suppose, although I checked google earth and that house isn't there. 

I have nothing else to say.