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28 out of 30 people found the following review useful:
Portrays a different Australia which has long gone, 23 September 2003

Author: Bruce Corneil from Melbourne, Australia

Must say that I really enjoyed "They're a Weird Mob".

In the 1970s the rise of Paul Hogan and the "Bazza" McKenzie movies spawned an extremely phony, grossly exaggerated and generally unfunny style of Australian TV and film comedy. It was unfunny because it was contrived. There's an enormous difference between genuine Australian humor and the deliberately manufactured "Ocker" nonsense which sadly continues to this day.

"Weird Mob" was a largely true and accurate portrayal of typical Australian attitudes, lifestyles and aspirations of the era . Looking at this film today, however, provides a stark reminder of just how much this country has changed over the past forty years. It's certainly no longer the sun drenched "workers paradise" where the áverage punter can live comfortably in a Sydney Harbourside home on a basic wage and buy a crayfish (lobster) for a couple of dollars on Saturday night. Those days and the abundance of opportunities which they offered are, sadly, long gone.

This movie was a celebration of Australian egalitarianism. It really was one big endless summer. No much wonder that nostalgia is such a major growth industry in these uncertain times.

Some will say that we all tend to look back through rose colored glasses and that we should ask ourselves 'Was it REALLY that good" ? Speaking as someone who was there at the time ...take it from me .. YES .. it was !

21 out of 21 people found the following review useful:
An icon of Aussie culture!, 2 August 2003

Author: John (opsbooks) from Blue Mountains, Australia

Recently restored and remastered (within a limited budget) for DVD release, this movie was a revelation in Aussie ways and customs, a near-to-totally honest portrayal of what it was like for immigrants arriving here back in the last half of the 20th Century (yes, it seems a long time ago).

The house that Nino built occupied a block in Greenacre, NSW, less than half a mile from where I was living at the time. I must have driven by it thousands of times. Previous prints screened on TV have been abysmal with washed out colour and scratchy images and sound. To see this near-as pristine print (for the most part) was an eye-opener and the scenes of Greenacre, Bankstown and other Sydney locations brought memories flooding back.

The cast of fine supporting actors makes the film worth watching, while the lead actor is simply perfect. One can't imagine anyone else in the part. The film flags towards the end but generally, it's great viewing.

17 out of 17 people found the following review useful:
"Great Big Country, won't you come and play...", 26 February 2002
Author: bamptonj from Melbourne

'THEY'RE A WEIRD MOB' tells the story of an Italian's migration to Australia during the 1960's and his effort to adapt to this unusual breed of Englishmen living on the opposite side of the world that he soon comes to love.

The film is one of few Australian films made in the 1960's, and therefore given its subject matter, one of the most important time capsules of that era. 'THEY'RE A WEIRD MOB' was also probably the first Australian film made with a realistic eye to international distribution, not only because much of the movie seems to delight in explaining and translating many examples of Aussie lingo, but because it takes delight in simply showing Australians being Australians – and "them being a weird bloody bunch!" Technically, it is well-made movie and the acting quite decent. I was actually surprised by the number of shots achieved with hand-held cameras and steady-cams. Perhaps for what it is, it is a little too long, but no matter.

The movie paints an extraordinarily funny picture of how the ordinary Australian viewed himself in the 1960's: optimistic and belonging to an overwhelmingly cheery, egalitarian community. The working-male is presented not as a bludger, but as a generally reliable worker who enjoys nothing more than indulging in leisure activities with either his family or his mates. Upon finding work on a construction site in suburbia, Nino works diligently under the sun oblivious to his colleague's slower pace. He is told by his "mates" in a sympathetic tone to take a break: "there's plenty of time mate, she'll keep...roll yourself a smoke, mate / come and have a cuppa".

The movie almost seems like a propaganda movie for prospective immigrants, as Australia paints itself a destination inexhaustive of employment opportunities and as the land of opportunity, which in all truth it was. For instance, not only does our Italian protagonist find a job on his first day in the country, but even his future father-in-law - a prosperous building company magnate - started out from humble beginnings as a bricklayer upon his family's migration to Australia the generation before. For a learned critique of how Australia enjoyed "such a good lot" in the 1950s and 1960s, read the book 'The Lucky Country' (1964) by Donald Horne. 'THEY'RE A WEIRD MOB' paints ordinary Australian's as being overwhelmingly receptive of `New Australians' to such a point that they delight in submersing immigrants in the full extent of their customs and traditions which they relish as the best in the world.

More than anything else, the movie is a testament to the policy of assimilation during the post-war boom. As Nino makes a sturdy effort to adapt himself to the customs of the new country, most of the people he comes across display nothing if not their utmost admiration and respect for him becoming an Australian. On a ferry in the Sydney harbor, however, Nino comes across a drunkard who, after witnessing another group of ‘New Australians' having a lengthy exchange in their mother tongue exclaims "Bloody dagoes, why don't you go back to your own country?!" Sitting down, he asks Nino for a light of his smoke, to which Nino reluctantly but politely obliges in almost natural English. When he subsequently affords more hostility to the family, Nino consoles them in Italian to which the drunkard demonstrates his utmost surprise. This latent premonition of multiculturism – that is, that a New Australian could maintain links with his native country and its culture, yet still behave in all manners like an 'Australian' - was, for then, too much to ask of a previously insular, overwhelmingly Anglo society. Surprisingly, the drunkard is the only person in the move to adopt an outwardly racist tone, the movie generating the feeling that Australia is accepting of all immigrants who take a dedicated effort to assimilate.

Predating Bazza McKenzie and Paul Hogan by some years, the movie could legitimately be described as a document of propaganda, though this definition should not detract from its historical or artistic merits. Most Australian's would enjoy watching this movie for the parodies of Australian speech and lifestyle. For instance, a national in-joke is realized with Graham Kennedy playing himself in a hilarious cameo that serves to reveal the traditional Sydney-Melbourne rivalry. Asking for directions, he is given the cold shoulder by a loyal Sydney-sider to which he responds: "You're a Sydneyite?...I thought so. You're a weird mob up here, you don't appreciate art" to which he is told that it "must be a bloody weird mob in Melbourne if they keep watching you on TV." In any event, Australians would no more cringe at this film than they would at their parents' or grandparents' generation who actually had the privilege or misfortune - depending on how critical you are of the times and its achievements - of living in the time we see on the screen.

18 out of 20 people found the following review useful:
More than just a historical curiosity, and better than you think, 7 June 2000

Author: Spleen from Canberra, Australia

Whoever you are, you probably have no desire to see this film. I understand. I had no desire to see it either. It was a blockbuster in its day, but only in Australia, and Australians are among the last people on the face of the planet who'd want to see it now. We don't want to be reminded what our country was like in the mid-1960s. Not that "reminded" is the right word, for most of us either weren't born or weren't here in 1966 (I certainly wasn't), and so it's easy for us to suppose that this film is nothing more than (a) a sustained exercise in wog-bashing, and (b) a celebration of everything we've all been earnestly trying to escape ever since the introduction of decimal currency and decent coffee. I'm sure most Australians, like me, will be thinking: If I watch this movie, how much will it make me cringe?

The short answer: okay, it probably WILL make you cringe now and then; but it's more moving, more witty, and more enlightened, than you might think. No wog-bashing. And it's NOT, as I feared, the 1960s equivalent of "Crocodile Dundee". Neither a kangaroo nor a swagman in sight. Powell even resists the temptation to show the Sydney Opera House as he pans over the harbour, probably because it hadn't yet been built.

I wouldn't have seen it if it hadn't been directed by Michael Powell. And here I have grounds for disappointment, since there's none of Powell's usual visual inventiveness or splendour. But fair enough: visual splendour would have been beside the point in this kind of comedy, and it may have been fatal. It's not that there's anything WRONG with the cinematography. To compensate for the fact that it's not another "Black Narcissus" we get a nice, light, and in the end surprisingly touching, comedy. The obvious cultural misunderstandings (Nino thinks, for a while, that there's a region of Sydney called "King's Bloody Cross" - that kind of thing) are neither laboured nor over-stated. Nor are they really the point of the film. Sure, Nino solemnly does what everyone tells him to do as if he were an anthropologist entering a mosque, but the story takes us further than this.

By the way, you'll note that almost every spoken sentence contains either a "bloody" or a "bugger". Powell later said that this was the key to getting past the censors. If he'd been conservative and had his characters swear only once or twice, the censors would have insisted on minor cuts; but since everyone swears constantly, it's impossible to cut one scene without cutting the rest, so the film emerged unscathed - with a G rating!

9 out of 11 people found the following review useful:
a movie about another time in Australia, immigration theme, 16 September 2005

Author: petersj-2 from Australia

I recently watched the DVD of this movie. Way back in the sixties it was a big hit at a time when very few Australian movies were being made. I am delighted to say that the movie holds up remarkably well. It is now a charming curiosity of another time. The plot is by now well known but I wondered if I would cringe over the way Australians were portrayed. I need not have worried as the characters are warm and earthy. It was wonderful to see some of those fine actors of the past, most of whom have passed away. Chips Rafferty is superb in one of his last movies. The only character that does not work is the love interest Clare Dunne who has a very cold screen presence. She sounds like she is taking elocution lessons on screen. The most pleasant surprise is Walter Chiari as Nino. He is delightful. Chiari had a troubled career, especially in his Broadway misadventure in the flop musical "The gay time" opposite Barabara Cook. The musical however sounds wonderful now, perhaps it was ahead of its time. In this film Chiari is enchanting and dam cute too. The real joy for most Aussies is seeing a brief appearance by the undisputed king of Aussie television Graham Kennedy. Graham allows the script and director to send him up. There will sadly never be another Graham but hopefully there will be many more Australian movies as charming as this. It really was a pleasant surprise. Do see it.

7 out of 8 people found the following review useful:
A "bloody" good movie - along with the book, the film provides a timeless piece of well recommended entertainment and history., 25 November 2000

Author: Paul

A "bloody" good movie - accurate, very accurate from my perspective as someone with Italian heritage who migrated to Australia in 1964 . The character and experiences of Nino could've been either of my two uncles who migrated in the mid-1950's.

Notwithstanding the story, it's an amazing photo story of what Australia was like for millions or migrants in the'60's - particularly the larger cities of Sydney and Melbourne. The character of the Aussies is spot on - you can meet them any day on any street in any city of Australia right now. The aussie "mateship" unique to the Australian psyche is very well portrayed; the Aussie mentality of always willing to give a bloke a fair go and taking people for what they are - fair dinkum - and not who they are is also well captured. The actors are the creme de la creme of Australian theatre, tv, radio and film - most of them appearing in many Australian dramas of later years such as Homicide, Division 4, Number 96, Prisoner, Skippy(Ed Devereaux & Tony Bonner), and Crocodile Dundee (John Meillon)

It's a refreshing retro to an era of quality storylines, acting and the promotion of individual potential. The language, the 6 o'clock closings of the pubs, the white aussie's prejudice to the 'Eye-tie"(ITalian) and anyone else who wasn't a Smith, Brown, McKenzie, O'Farrell is as accurate as I experienced. And all served up with a laugh.

Along with the book, the film provides a timeless piece of well recommended entertainment and history.

9 out of 12 people found the following review useful:
No we're not., 23 February 2004

Author: ptb-8 from Australia

This charming valentine to life in Australia in the 1960s and particularly in Sydney shows truly how good it is to live here.

Fortunately we are still not too far away from some of the Anglo working class types shown. It is only because the population has grown so much, particularly in Sydney since this time that 2004 is a difference in society. It was filmed just before the Vietnam War and recreational drug influx by US soldiers polluted Sydney morals and living standards, and on the verge of a huge American influence in advertising and consumer goods. Australia's immigrants were British and European up until that point. In the 80s there was a big rise in Arabic and Asian immigrants which has changed the face of Sydney literally.....but somehow the "Australian" sense of humor and egalitarian attitudes seen on this lovely film sort everyone out even today. The 2001 film DIRTY DEEDS is a good chaser to WEIRD MOB because it is set in 1969, and at the height of the American changes in Sydney.

6 out of 7 people found the following review useful:
SPOILERS! How (and IMHO why) the film differs from the book., 4 September 1999

Author: HenCat from Perth, Western Australia

*** This review may contain spoilers ***

A classic piece of Australiana. Like all Australian films of the era seemed to, it even had a foreign star! Plus cameos from established stars like Graham Kennedy.

The film differs somewhat from the book.

In the book, Harry Kelly is just another house builder like Joe Kennedy (Ed Devereaux), not the large-scale construction firm boss in the film.

Consequently we see a lot more of Mr Kelly in the film and also of his daughter Kay, right from the start where Kay is in the process of evicting Nino's magazine from the building. In the book there was no La Seconda Madre office, no cousin Leonardo, no missing thousand pounds, and therefore no eviction. In the books Nino continued to write articles for the magazine until well after he got a job working for Joe.

The scene in the cafe where Kay is trying to eat spaghetti with a spoon is where Nino first meets her in the book. (As an Italian-Australian myself I know it really is better to use a fork.)

I believe all the extra stuff referred to above was in the interest of giving Chips Rafferty (as Mr Kelly) and Clare Dunn (as Kay) much larger roles in the film than their characters had in the book.

8 out of 11 people found the following review useful:
Keith Loone - My Father, 31 May 2005
Author: matthewloone4 from Australia

My late Father filmed this very funny movie and as a boy we heard many stories about the fun times both cast and crew had together whilst filming.

If any one out there knows more stories about Keith Bryan Loone, please feel free to email me. Dad died in 1988 and would love to hear more stories about himand his work. Dad used to work for Ajax films in Balmain then from memory went freelance and filmed quite a few movies over the years working with Australia's top directors, actors, writers and crew. They're weird mob is one of the original funny movies Australia produced with an international cast complete with local actors who later in life also filled our screens in memorable movies. I would like to hear more what people think of this classic.

2 out of 3 people found the following review useful:
Nothing is real in this world that wasn't, except ..., 14 December 2009

Author: gr679317 from Australia

*** This review may contain spoilers ***

I loved John O'Grady's books, and laughed myself silly, in my early teens in Australia. The books presented a world that was unknown to me, of Aussie battlers and the land of the "fair go" - Australia's first pizza house had not yet opened - the hardship of the 1962 recession passed me by as I dutifully went to and from high school, oblivious to the pressures that caused both my parents health to fail. I didn't know anyone who spoke like O'Grady's characters, but the caricature was funny, and the romantic plot was pure Jane Austen.

As a fifteen year old, I loved the film. Today, as I watched it again on DVD, the gulf of time is horrifying. The obsessive colourless and characterless household interiors of the battlers and toffs alike is scarily real. The funniest scene is afternoon tea with the men unable to pick up a meringue without crushing it.

The pointless bravado of slang that is impenetrable to outsiders. Why is it funny? The overt humour of making fun of those not in the know rebounds and we are left pathetically trying to be different. I still can't tell the difference between a schooner and a midi - just ask for a bigger glass of beer if that is what you want, because the pubs closed at 6 o'clock.

That this slang-based "look at us" humour is not a thing of the past also stuns me - think of the 1990s verse novel and film "The Monkey's Mask" - the book was published overseas with a glossary of archaic authentic Aussie words that most of us never use, and it is hard not to cringe when they appear on screen - both films play the travelogue card, with many scenic shots of Syndey and that damned opera house still unfinished. I'm not envious, I'm really not.

Still amazed what this time capsule tells us about the fictional world of Australia in the 1960s - but I'm still bound to love it because it would be unbearable to destroy my 15 year old idyll.

The documentary on the DVD was also stunning - the film meant something to Michael Powell and Walter Chiari, about egalitarianism and the "fair go" - easy to say, but still so much harder to live by.

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