The Coaster

The year is 1789. In the central Pacific Ocean the crew of Her Majesty’s Ship Bounty mutinied against their captain, William Bligh, and cast him adrift with 18 other men in an open boat, 150 kilometres from Tonga. In an extraordinary feat of seamanship and navigational skill, Bligh proceeded to pilot the packed longboat through the cannibal-infested Fiji islands and across to the Australian mainland, landing on Cape York after a dangerous entry through what is now Bligh Passage. After a brief stay, and fearful of the local Aboriginal people, he set sail again, arriving in Dutch Timor from where he and his men took a ship back to England.

Jessica Simmonds returns from overseas to find her retired professor father in a bitter public fight to save the historic Sydney waterfront houses on Angel Street. After her father's mysterious death, she joins forces with local residents and a union leader against corrupt forces. Based on the real life mysterious disappearance of Juanita Nielsen.

This film contains three short stories about life in Australia in the 1950's.

Above the tip of Cape York, beyond the northernmost point of the Australian continent, are the Torres Strait Islands. The economy here is based on home gardens and pearlshell fishing. The culture, with its basis in music, dancing and ceremony, provides a striking contrast to that of mainland Australia. This film, shot in the late 1960s, shows how strongly old traditions still affect Torres Strait Islander people, even though they also have most of the trappings of modern life.