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Bert Bailey gets to repeat his stage hit of more than a decade earlier -- he had been vetoed for the silent version -- based on Steele Rudd's stories.

It's a very old-fashioned movie, filled with rustic slapstick, village idiots, and melodramatic murders, with Bailey pausing occasionally to make a speech on the beauty and promise of Australia. Although it's a primitive piece as far as Hollywood film making was concerned -- at least among the majors -- you can understand why it was a hit in its native land It was, in fact, the first Australia sound picture to become a major hit, defined as making a lot of money. Bailey appeared in three more movies based loosely on Rudd's work.

One of the subtler pleasure of this movie is to see a kookaburra on a thorn tree sounding its call. Usually you only hear it in movies set in jungles.