Mama's Gone A-Hunting

Mama's Gone A-Hunting
Directed byPeter Maxwell
Written byBruce A. Wishart
Based onstory by Robert Bruning
Produced byRobert Bruning
StarringGerard Kennedy
Vince Martin
Judy Morris
Carmen Duncan
CinematographyRussell Boyd
Edited byRod Hay
Production
company
Gemini Productions
Distributed byNetwork 7
Release date
  • 26 May 1977 (1977-05-26) (Channel 7, Sydney)
Running time
96 minutes
CountryAustralia
LanguageEnglish
Budget$90,000[1]

Mama's Gone A-Hunting is a 1977 Australian television film.[2] The title is taken from the English nursery rhyme and lullaby, Bye, baby Bunting. The film featured many well known Australian actors of the period, including Gerard Kennedy, Carmen Duncan, and starred Judy Morris

It was one of a series of TV movies Robert Bruning made for Channel 7.[3] He sold it to Paramount to distribute world wide.[4]

Plot

A psychiatric prison escapee, Elliot, and his partner, David decide to kidnap a baby and hold it for a $500,000 ransom.

The parents of the child, Joshua and Helena, go to the Sydney Opera House, leaving their child with a babysitter, Tessa. Before Elliot and David can complete the kidnapping, Tessa decides to take the baby for herself.

They chase after her to Sydney's Central Railway Station, where David is killed by a train while looking for Tessa. Tessa leaves the baby with an Old Woman in a restaurant at the station. She fights with Elliot, pushing him against a stone pylon, causing him to fall to his death.

Tessa returns the baby to its parents.

Cast

Production

The film was shot in Sydney.[1]

Bruning called it "a modern-day thriller. A great deal of the action happens around Central Railway Station [in Sydney] at night. It's a fairly exciting project." The cast included Queenie Ashton who said "It isn't a big role, but as things are at the moment I need the work."[5]

Reception

The Age wrote that "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."[6]

References

  1. ^ a b "First Look for a Thrill". Sydney Morning Herald. 8 August 1976. p. 89.
  2. ^ Ed. Scott Murray, Australia on the Small Screen 1970-1995, Oxford Uni Press, 1996 p103
  3. ^ Beilby, Peter; Murray, Scott (September–October 1979). "Robert Bruning". Cinema Papers. pp. 517–519.
  4. ^ "Selling our films to the world". Sydney Morning Herald. 29 May 1977. p. 47.
  5. ^ Leslie, Bill (17 October 1976). "Our Queenie to bounce back". Sydney Morning Herald. p. 31.
  6. ^ Pinkney, John (27 May 1977). "'Mr Bruning's Films Need Pruning'". The Age. p. 3.


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