Mango Tree, The (1977) – Nostalgia Central

In 1975, author Ronald McKie won the Miles Franklin Literary Award (Australia’s most prestigious annual literary prize) for the novel this film was based on.

It was a fine and sensitive study of a boy growing up in a Queensland town in World War I, of life at home with his grandmother, of school, first love, and tragedy.

In the book, the mango tree was important. Jamie climbed it, and found in its high branches a thinking place – a “confessional.”

The film, less fine and less sensitive than the book, keeps the title, The Mango Tree, but forgets the tree, focusing more on people than on symbolism.

Written and produced by Michael Pate, with Michael Lake as associate producer and Kevin Dobson as director, The Mango Tree was filmed around Bundaberg in Queensland – the author’s home town.

Brian Probyn, director of cinematography, captures the heat and the mood of that tropical city – the old houses high on stumps, the lush growth, the cane fields, the red earth- while Leslie Binns, the art director, and Pat Forster, costume designer, re-create the whole feeling of the period.

Music composed and conducted by Marc Wilkinson evokes this too.

Geraldine Fitzgerald, that distinguished Irish American actress, plays Grandma Carr, indomitable, proud, and compassionate as this elderly gentlewoman.

Only one thing is wrong – Miss Fitzgerald’s accent. Crisp and clear as her words are, they have the twang of America, not of Australia. It is impossible to believe that the Grandma of Miss Fitzgerald is a native of the Murrumbidgee.

Producer’s son Christopher Pate, as Carr, is not the most photogenic leading man, but he is fine and thoughtful as the lad growing into manhood.

Sir Robert Helpmann, as the drunken professor, is outstanding. Gerard Kennedy as Preacher Jones, Gloria Dawn as Pearl, Carol Burns as Maudie, and Gerry Duggan as Scanlon, the policeman, are skilled and in character.

Grandma Carr
Geraldine Fitzgerald
Professor
Robert Helpmann
Jamie Carr
Christopher Pate
Preacher Jones
Gerard Kennedy
Pearl
Gloria Dawn
Maudie Plover
Carol Burns
Angus McDonald
Barry Pierce
Miss Pringle
Diane Craig
Wilkenshaw
Ben Gabriel
Laura Montague
Maggie Millar
Scanlon
Gerry Duggan
Somers
Terry McDermott
Joe Speight
Jonathan Hardy
Constable McHendry
Gary Day
Stinker Hatch
Jonathan Atherton
Tommy Smith
Tony Barry
Dr Robards
Kurt Ludescher
Captain Hinkler
Tony Bonner
Miss Abernathy
Pamela Norman
Spruiker
Ian Murdoch
Mayor
Leo Wockner
Adams
Roger Collins
Jackie Winn
Frank Davies
Matron
Betty Ross
Jenkins
Maurice Hughes
Mrs Plover
Joy Verity
Mary Winter
Sallyanne Williams
Miss Jones
Joan Blogg
Williams
Wilson Irving
Browning
Russell Sinclair
Ken Davis
Tony Foley
Reverend Kirkeby
Frank Geary
Chow Hing
Ronney Yeung
Eklund
Kevin Ballantyne
Prentice
Charles Deane

Director
Kevin James Dobson

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