Iconic Australian director, producer and writer Brian Trenchard-Smith is Ozploitation royalty. As Franklin echoed Hitchcock, Brian Trenchard-Smith brought a uniquely Spielbergian ambience to Australian cinema, especially with his Ozploitation classics Frog Dreaming and BMX Bandits staring Nicole Kidman. He also epitomized genre bending with his Australian Kung fu classic The Man from Hong Kong. His ability to take Ozploitation films to a broader and sometimes family friendly audience (no small feat for a genre defined often by violence, fast cars and an apocalyptic wasteland where mutant barbarians roam free) is something that will be respected by generations of film makers to come. Brian Trenchard-Smith, the man who brought you Turkey Shoot sat down to talk to The Australian Film Network Journal about his illustrious career and the future of Australian independent cinema.
You are a man of many talents; do you prefer writing or being behind the camera?
Brian: Or in the edit bay? Each stage of production has a different vibe. I enjoy the rush of ideas when conceiving a project. That's a high. I enjoy the collaborative process of script development and pre-production particularly if I'm allowed to lead; not always the case in television. The shoot is a different kind of rush; juggling logistics and creative judgements, governed by deadlines, every on set hour precious. It's daily combat, for which my sport of fencing epee is good training. Deflect obstacles, dodge and weave, keep the point moving forward. There's certainly a quickening of the pulse in the second half of the day. Then there's the editing, a contemplative and analytical study of the script you have brought to life. Or death. Aye, there's the rub. The shock of the first cut is always followed in due course by the satisfaction of fixing the problems. I started as a news film cutter at Channel 10 and enjoy post production a lot. It's like giving your work a good paint job.
Can you tell us about your new book Adventures in the B Movie Trade?
Brian: Adventures in the B Movie Trade is about fifty years in the trenches of the film business, a personal journey and a portrait of an era now passed, written with a degree of humor, aimed at film fans, film schools, industry professionals and media studies enthusiasts. I am so lucky to have been able to play in the business/art hybrid that I love for over half a century. Like Bill and Ted, I’ve had many Excellent Adventures. So I’m sharing those adventures, successes, and many mistakes to amuse movie nerds worldwide, and perhaps be food for thought and lessons to learn for aspiring filmmakers. In telling my story, I ignored the advice I have given to many writers: cut to the chase. I occasionally pause along the way to muse on old technology, politics, social changes, movie stars, trailers, censorship, camera style, editing, music, visual effects, etc., a wide range of Cinema trivia that I find interesting in the hope that readers will too. My Id will occasionally surface. Perhaps it will offer some insight on the demons that drive directors, and this director in particular. Snack on what interests you.
(Click on book cover to buy)
Do you think the Australian government has been supportive of the Australian film industry?
Brian: Unquestionably government involvement put the Australian Film industry where it is today. Look at the impact Australia has made on the world entertainment industry, and it all sprang from government's decision in 1970 to become involved in creating a viable industry for films made by Australians, and a skill base that attracted international projects. It was a decision with long lasting cultural benefits that brought Australia closer to the rest of the world.
What is your favourite Australian film?
Brian: In what genre? In anti-war movies, is it Gallipoli or Breaker Morant? Too many favorites to name. But I do want to give a special shout out to Wake In Fright, a slow burn horror film about toxic masculinity.
You have had a very extensive career in the film industry, what has been one of your favourite projects to work on and why?
Brian: Again, it's hard to choose a favorite child. I have great memories from so many of my films but the following stand out as projects that turned out well and were the least stressful due to cast, crew, and producer harmony: BMX Bandits, Dead End Drive In, The Panther Pictures, Night of the Demons 2, Leprechaun 3 & 4, Happy Face Murders, Sahara, Seconds To Spare, Long Lost Son. I remember these for the positive vibe from everybody that really helped get the job done.
(Brian Trenchard-Smith and Tiger cub)
What was it like making Frog Dreaming and working with Henry Thomas? The film had a Spielbergian tone to it. What was it like to be part of an era of child adventure cinema alongside films such as The Goonies and Stand by Me?
Brian: I'm flattered by the company you choose for Frog Dreaming. It's certainly one of my better films. Working with child actors is always fun. Henry Thomas had good dramatic instincts. We got along well, and when I cast him again 14 years later for Happy Face Murders, he was still the same down to earth, decent human being he had been on Frog Dreaming. I like the Spielbergian tone and style of shooting action adventure. Empire of the Sun is my favorite of his.
(Henry Thomas and Brian Trenchard-Smith on set of Frog Dreaming)
In terms of merging Australiana with Kung Fu action how important was it for you to find the balance in The Man from Hong Kong?
Brian: I like genre hybrids. Kung Fu meets James Bond, with one time Bond George Lazenby as the villain was the concept. I wanted to reverse the traditional stereotype of the White Hero on a Mission in Asia, seducing local girls, besting local thugs. Instead let's have Chinese Dirty Harry do the same in Sydney. The Australiana came from the two cops Roger Ward and Hugh Keays Byrne, cleverly channeling 1970's Homicide, who constantly underestimate him due to subconscious racism.
Was Jimmy Wang Yu as outrageous in his controversial behaviour as the legend implies?
Brian: In my book I try to explain his behavior rather than complain about it. Wang Yu was a big name in Asian cinema, who had written, directed and starred in 8 successful films. His Australian director was a first timer who had been given three times the budget he had ever had. I suspect I reminded him of British policemen he had encountered in pre-handover Hong Kong. He did not share my views on genre satire. I ignored his scorn which diminished over time, accommodated him wherever possible, and avoided confrontation which was the best way to handle it. You have to serve your star even if he does not like you. Jimmy was an excellent athlete and a stunt performer with a ferocious screen presence. The Australian film reviewer Mike Harris referred to him as the Kung Fuhrer. I tried to make him look as good as possible, and re-voiced him to improve his English language performance. In the end I believe I think he liked what I did with the film.
(Still from Man From Hong Kong)
Do you think that Ozploitation cinema can ever return to its glory days?
Do you think Australian film makers should be trying to honour Ozploitation as a genre, or maintaining their own individuality without concerning themselves with ticking genre boxes?
Brian: Australian film makers should always express their personal take on any genre they assay. Our version of 70's/80's Exploitation Cinema was genre homage through an Australian lens: boisterous, sexist, anti-authoritarian, wide angle, with a sprinkling of goofy moments. I think Ozploitation served a useful purpose at the time to get Australian films seen overseas outside of the arthouse market, and into mainstream Cinema programming. Ozploitation deserves to be honored as uniquely Australian expressions of popular culture. There was a novelty to it. But now exploitation films particularly involving nudity are politically incorrect, unless they are dressed up with stars and a big studio label. Graphic violence, once the province of video nasties (like Turkey Shoot) is widely available across all platforms. Cultural attitudes evolve, then the marketplace catches up. Ozploitation has to be clever today, more satirical of its own drivers, have clear social or political subtext.
Why do you think that the Australian film establishment shy away from Ozploitation genre films?
Brian: Back in the day, the cultural cringe was no doubt a factor. Cultural snobbery still persists today. Some Arts bureaucrats prefer to associate themselves with what they perceive is the caviar of the motion picture menu rather than the popular meat pie.
The Arts/Cultural elite felt that government funds and tax benefits should not be going towards the manufacture of low brow entertainment. Rather, more high minded representations of Australian life past and present should be the recipients of such largesse. The Man From Hong Kong received such criticism, although it also received the widest international release of any Australian film of its day. FYI: It was for 4 years the all-time box office champion of Pakistan, beating previous record holders Cleopatra, Guns of Navarone, and Where Eagles Dare. That news rated a small paragraph buried deep in the Sydney Morning Herald. The Arts Cultural establishment regarded Ozpoitation as harmful to the national image Australia as a modern sophisticated society, which indeed we are. Perhaps we who contributed should remember Ozploitation fondly, a guilty pleasure from our larikin teenage days, where we stuck a middle finger up to conformity. I thought James Di Martino's The Faceless Man was an interesting recent Ozploitation homage.
What makes a good genre film or a good film in general in 2020? In a world where everything is so accessible in terms of camera equipment, sound equipment, we have a wave of independent film makers. What can they learn from the Ozploitation era and how can it be applied today?
Brian: It is still a challenge for indie film makers. Technology has been democratized but access to a mainstream outlet for your work is as hard as ever. There's a lot of well funded competition for eyeballs. Nonetheless indie films funded on fumes can still breakthrough. The key is a clever idea, a new twist on a genre, that captures the zeitgeist. Even in a crowded marketplace a fresh idea will make your work stand out.
What can film makers learn from the Ozploitation days? I don't know, it was a period of post-censorship transition in a stable marketplace where previously forbidden fruit was a saleable commodity. The transition film makers face today is the transition to a post-Covid business model in drama and documentary. All I can offer is that sometimes, when balancing one's creative wishes against market forces, a little hutzpah is needed to push though. Persistence wins. Those Ozploitation pictures were hard low budget films to make. What powered them was the spirit of the Oz film industry renaissance of the 1970's. At last, we had a film industry in Australia again. We were breaking new ground. The same spirit will apply today in the post-Covid world.
How does it feel to be such a huge part of an era that is lauded so heavily by an international cinema icon like Quentin Tarantino?
Brian: Quentin has been generous to me in print and in person. More importantly his contribution to Not Quite Hollywood eleven years ago brought an international spotlight back on the Australian Film Industry.
(Quentin Tarantino and Brian Trenchard-Smith)
What do you feel an international audience gets from Ozploitation that they can’t get anywhere else?
Brian: Genre tropes with that unique Aussie twist, primeval landscapes, cars as symbols of masculinity,
In your opinion why did so many Ozploitation classics depict such a bleak apocalyptic future?
Brian: Perhaps it's that anti-authoritarian streak in the national character. We're deeply cynical about government's ability to make a difference in people's lives. We create the worst-case scenario on screen as a warning. My most prescient film is Dead End Drive In.
(Still from Dead End Drive-in)
Was it refreshing working on films such as BMX Bandits that was more optimistic about youth and the future?
Brian: It was a joy to work with bright young sparks like Nicole Kidman, Angelo D' Angelo, and James Lurton. Their innate cheerfulness and joie de vivre made the hard work all the more enjoyable. Henry Thomas, Tamsin West and Rachel Friend in Frog Dreaming were similarly a delight. I love happy films. And happy TV like Flipper and Tarzan. I just don't get offered them very often.
(Still from BMX Bandits)
Do you think that China’s interest in Australian cinema will help revive a more quintessential looking Australian film (in regard to landscape etc.) as the Chinese market seems appreciative of....?
Brian: We should welcome China's interest. Australia is part of Asia and should pay attention to Asian movie tastes. That was my philosophy in 1974 when I created The Man From Hong Kong, Australia's first co-production with an Asian film company. A movie that features Chinese and Australian characters in a positive story utilizing Australia's spectacular desert and coastal landscapes could be a big profitable hit in both countries.
How did you approach moving into an American horror franchise such as Leprauchan 3 and 4 and Night of The Demons 2?
Brian: I grew up on Hammer horrors, Italian Gallo, and The Haunting by Robert Wise. I was ready to embrace American horror but give a comedic twist to the material. Luckily I teamed up with two producers Jeff Geoffray and Walter Josten who got my sensibility and gave me my head. Here's an extract from my book that Talkhouse published to offer insight:
(Still from Leprechaun 4)
What are you currently working on?
Brian: I like to think directors get better with age. Despite being a hundred years old in Hollywood years, I am attached as director to an earthquake movie, a satirical political thriller, and a haunted house whodunnit, all seeking finance in the post-Covid world to come. Who knows what dreams may come..? Like Richard Boone's Paladin, Have viewfinder - Will travel.