(WIND HOWLS)
(BIRDS SQUAWK)
(THUNDER RUMBLES)
KENNETH: lt'd come any day, so they claimed -- the Linden meteor.
Our very own lump of celestial rock,
waiting to plummet through Baringa's skies
like the sodding Star of Bethlehem gone wrong
and squash us flat.
LOUISE: Later, it seemed fitting that Uncle Joe Stalin met his maker
at the year of the meteorite nights.
And no-one even saw the geezers in suits nosy-parkering.
We've had some problems in some of the other camps.
Black marketeering.
Homemade grog that'd kill a black dog.
(LAUGHS)
So, basically, under the circumstances,
the department, in all its wisdom,
thinks the only course of action left open to it is...
LOUISE: All we knew were the meteorite nights
and the change,
like the shifting of continental plates that they heralded.
And have you got terms of reference for this inquiry?
Oh, Batesy, come on.
This is the public service.
Show of interest.
No action.
Still, murders in whorehouses.
(CHUCKLES) Bit of a cock-up, old mate.
NINO: Hey, Giusepp!
Lady Bev.
Heads she come, tails she don't.
Oh, hey, best of three, huh?
(LAUGHS)
Shut up, Nino.
(VEHICLE APPROACHES)
(PEOPLE SHOUT)
(HANDBRAKE CLICKS)
Can I help you?
You must be the new bloke.
Bates. GH.
Colonel. Retired.
I've come to entertain your Balts for you.
Hey! The movie star lady!
Hey! Vegie man!
I'll be buggered.
It's Mary Poppins!
Ohh! Ohh!
BEV: Oh, you old bitch! You've done it again.
She's my mum. (CHEERING AND APPLAUSE)
Now, as we all know,
there's a bit of an imbalance in this joint.
Like 10 blokes to 1 sheila.
(LAUGHTER)
So if any of youse womanless fellas
feel a bit of the old lead in the you know whats,
use it constructively.
Write a letter home to the missus!
(LIVELY SOUNDTRACK MUSIC PLAYS)
(WOMEN LAUGH)
Truth or dare?
Erm, truth.
You'll be sorry.
Who's the lucky fella?
Oh, Mum!
How did you know?.
You mean it's a secret?
Struth!
It's the way you move, like you're cooking a soufflé
and you're scared it'll drop.
It's a chocolate soufflé.
(WOMAN CACKLES)
Bev. Truth or dare?
Pass.
Oh, alright.
Truth. (CLEARS THROAT)
Erm, who's the first person you ever kissed?
Oh. Um...
An orange.
(WOMEN LAUGH)
BEV: Yeah, I used to practise on an orange.
Um...
But my brother Huey caught me and, um,
said that a man's face was nothing like an orange skin
and, in any case, it didn't have a mouth.
So if I didn't practise on him,
he'd tell the whole school about my, uh, thing for valencias.
So, um, technically, it was Huey.
God, we went behind that shed at Hornsby
and the little bugger had a mouthful of cod-liver oil.
Ugh! God!
I came out in a rash every time a bloke came near me for years.
(WOMEN LAUGH)
Your turn.
Truth.
What do you want most in the world?
Um, not a husband. I had one of those.
Only one? You're not trying.
I suppose...
..I want a life of symmetry.
Where the rhythms of each day are in tune with the day before
and the year to come,
so I'm not striving for the life I could have had
if I'd caught this tram or walked into that coffee house.
Like yours.
Mine?
(LAUGHS) Mine's just hiding from the avalanche.
What avalanche?
That one. Fella that got you.
ADRIANNA: I know what you mean.
Life, really. WOMAN: Yep.
Love, sex, kids. Piles.
So, what's the answer, Cora?
Arthritis and bad teeth.
Avalanche takes one look at you, squeaks
and heads off for some other sucker.
Hmm.
(LAUGHS)
(DOG BARKS)
Mrs Stafford!
I have a large bone to pick with you.
A bone of a plurry dinosaur, to be exact.
Yours?
I've got the Fletcher Jones brigade crawling all over the camp.
Imagine what a field day they'd have with a...
..a...a coven of red-ruddy-raggers.
If they're not down by the morning, I'II...
CORA: Run me out of town?
(IMITATES SCARLETT O'HARA) "But, Rhett, where shall I go?
"What shall I do?"
(IMITATES SCARLETT O'HARA) "I know. I'll go back to Tara."
"Tara."
May the meteorite drop on my head, Bevvie. I've broken the rules.
Obviously, you've not heard the news.
Your precious Uncle Joe's had a stroke.
He won't last the week.
They're get-well cards.
I don't care! Get them down.
BATES: Uh, B.
Something else.
B, is it?
I've, um...
I've heard from the police about Joe Della Vergine.
They are going to press charges.
Collecting him in the morning, apparently.
Oh, well, um...
Thanks for letting me know, sir.
(SNIFFS)
Suppose you tell me who's been sleeping in your bed.
Not bloody Goldilocks, Cora.
Black, your type, yeah?
Black eyes and a mop of waves so thick,
you'd swear they'd been dipped in cocoa.
I read that in a "True Romance' comic.
Do you remember that man we made out of Aeroplane Jelly?
Joe-Joe the jelly-o.
Red and green and yelly-o.
Put the something in his belly-o.
God, I blew it, Cora.
I dropped my guard.
Got happy for five minutes.
Well, no more.
From now on, I'm a chip off the old block.
In-bloody-vincible.
The only trouble is
I keep seeing this little tribe of black-eyed kids
trotting off to kindy with salami in their lunch boxes.
And bringing 'em home.
All furry and ponging to high heaven.
(SNORES)
Bev! (CORA CHUCKLES)
GH Bates will blow a gasket.
Smoke.
Don't mind me, love.
I just wanted to look.
Cora, by the way.
Giusepp. J-Joe.
Yeah.
I know who you are.
Come back, won't you?
Else you'll drop us all in the poo.
(CREAKING)
Souvenir.
It's melted.
Yeah, I had a sudden overwhelming urge to hold it over the fire.
Turned brown and fizzed and went bluh, like a damp sherbet.
Bluh.
Story of our life, really.
Say, "Come back to me."
Is so easy.
Say it. I escape for you. I swim.
I bet you say that to all the girls. No.
I've been faithful to you much longer than anyone else.
For months.
Go on, say it. "Come back to me."
All those months.
Amazing.
What?
That you didn't rust.
Ah!
Uh! That'll mark, you bastard.
I know.
(DOOR OPENS)
(DOOR CLOSES) (GASPS)
(CAR DOOR CLOSES)
Ciao, Lady Bev.
(ENGINE STARTS)
Henry here tells me you're keen on promotion.
Fancy yourself running one of these joints.
I don't see why not, just because I'm a woman.
Hmm.
Now, this procuring the darkies for the whorehouse.
It wasn't strictly a... Den of ill repute? Knocking shop?
Place of lying under the sycamore?
Sorry?
The Bible, Cooper.
Involved a department vehicle, didn't it?
Yes. Driven by?
One of the migrants.
Giuseppe Della Vergine.
Bit of a skirt man, from all accounts.
Oh, jeez, I'd hate to be an eyetie.
All that Casanova stuff gets to 'em.
Can't appreciate the simple things in life anymore.
Good fag or a good fart.
How'd he get the keys?
Oh!
Alright there, Cooper?
It's my good eye, sir.
(US ACCENT) Pretty lethal weapon you got there, ma'am.
(DOOR CLOSES)
We suffragettes are going to mount an attack on parliament with them.
He got the keys from...?
My desk.
Repeat after me. Say on your knee, "Louisa, I love you. Marry me!"
Sì, sì. But what if she say no, huh?
You do it.
(ADRIANNA LAUGHS) Caught out. This is vandalism.
CORA: Used to do it years ago.
Send messages out to Walgett, Brewarrina.
Wait for them to go right round the country and come back again.
And did they? CORA: Once.
It said, "Come back to me." And it did.
In the hip pocket of the bloke that became Bev's old man.
There's a kind of symmetry in that, don't you think?
Still want my life?
BATES ON LOUDSPEAKER: Attention, please. Attention, please.
Ladies and gentlemen.
This afternoon, in Moscow, Joseph Stalin passed away.
(ALL CHEER)
He was 73 years old.
(CHEERING DROWNS OUT ANNOUNCEMENT)
Hallelujah!
(SHOUTS IN FOREIGN LANGUAGE)
(CORA SINGS) ♪ Then raise the scarlet standard high... ♪
Cora! Cora!
♪ Within its shade, we'll live and die... ♪
Cora, just give us the blasted film and we'll run it.
(GLASS SHATTERS) ♪ And traitors sneer
♪ We'll keep our red... ♪
(SIGHS)
I've had you, Cora. I've bloody had you!
Ow!
Shit!
I need a replacement film.
So I believe.
"Hygiene and the New Australian'. Should find that illuminating.
Look, about this morning. Only one error this morning, B.
You aimed your spear at the monkey, not the organ-grinder.
I'll lock up.
(DOOR OPENS AND CLOSES)
(TURNS OFF FAN)
(INHALES)
(CORA SINGS INDISTINCTLY)
Are you mad, woman?
(SLURS) If it isn't GH Bloke! Retired.
Madam, you're drunk.
It's what you do at a wake, drongo.
Drink! (LIQUID SLOSHES)
Bet you didn't know your B had card-carrying folks.
She was a champ, your B.
Won the egg-and-spoon race at the union barbie every year.
Beat the pants off the bloke that runs the Builders' Labourers.
He is a ratbag. You would not give him the time of day.
You wouldn't...
She's a bit of a dark horse, B.
That's what you're thinking, isn't it?
Go on, GH. Take the poker out of your bum for once.
Never know what little titbits you might get out of the old girl
if you humour her, eh?
(LAUGHS)
The, uh, egg-and-spoon race?
Yeah.
May the best man win.
Man's got to be blinking bananas.
On your marks.
Set, go.
And Cora is ahead.
She's got a long, healthy stride. Bit of a list on the inside, though.
And it's Joe!
He's hitting his straps now. It's Joe. It's Joe. It's gonna be Joe.
And he's over! (LAUGHS)
(LAUGHS)
What'd you call me?
You're pissed as a newt, GH.
You called me Joe.
That's all I need.
Had Joe on the brain.
Bev's old man was a Joe.
(SIGHS)
(SCOFFS)
Bit of a bugger getting my Joes mixed up, but.
Would you know my kid would take up with one?
Just to add to the confusion.
(BURPS) That's downright thoughtless, I would have thought.
Jeez, GH. You must have some vices.
You don't drink. You don't smoke. You don't do the other.
What kind of dickless wonder are you?
I resent that remark.
I got a...
..what you said.
Oh, yeah?
Retired?
Too good a memory.
That's my plurry vice.
I dream of a pair of red braces.
And a pair of ruddy...
..blinkin' sandshoes.
Yeah, that's got to be a vice.
(LAUGHS)
(BURPS)
Come here, GH.
You're wearing your heart on your nose, old son.
(LAUGHS)
What was it you said?
You said, "Bates...bloke...retired."
(LAUGHS)
CORA: No more truth.
From now on, dares!
(WOMAN LAUGHS)
If a certain fairy godmother -- maybe me --
had an inkling
that a certain young widow needed to, you might say,
get back on the bike...
(BOTH LAUGH)
..who'd you say would be the toughest nut in the camp?
Likewise.
LOUISE: My dad!
(BOTH LAUGH) Oh, no!
Oh, you don't mean...
ADRIANNA: Oh, you can't. But...
What if he says no?
What if he thinks I'm ugly?
What if he just doesn't?
Oh, my God. What if he can't?
Well, he must have, at least once.
From my vegie man.
LOUISE: Oh!
Extra-special dare for Bevvie.
ADRIANNA: Ooh!
Give that to GH Bates.
Ohhh!
You cow, Cora.
Double dare. LOUISE AND ADRIANNA: Ooh!
(ALL LAUGH)
(SINGS DRUNKENLY)
So, what's yours, fiend?
What's your dare?
(LAUGHS)
(SINGS) ♪ Ding dong dell
♪ Whore's in the well... ♪
LOUISE: The scientist who predicted our meteor
discovered later that the same cosmic gases and particles
and whatever that make up the stars
also make us.
(ALL SCREAM AND LAUGH)
Cora, come on.
CORA: Watch here.
Oh!
Jesus, Cora, you can't do that. It's legal tender.
Ooh! Ooh!
Cora! My soddin' soufflé's rising!
Yeah. That's a soccer boot alright.
How 'bout that?
LOUISE: They discovered that human beings -- us four,
and all our lost Joes,
and even the quickening lump in my belly --
are literally stardust.
It makes you think, don't it?
Black-eyed kid.
With salami in his lunch box.
You won't make it sound too Wild West in the report, will you?
Whorehouses and the like?
MAN: From the taxpayer's point of view,
that's exactly where you are, Batesy.
On the frontier.
Nose to nose with the Injuns.
Which argues for a more fluid application of the rules, surely.
Well, you know, as they say, when in Rosed...
..Rome...I should say.
When in Rome.
Few things gonna be changing in the rose garden, old son.
I...I thought it was just show of interest.
No action. Public service.
(SIGHS) We'll be in touch about Cooper's compo.
(DOOR CLOSES)
CORA: You are a pathetic bloody ditherer!
What are you?
Pathetic ruddy ditherer.
What are your intentions towards my daughter?
Those sweat-stained bureaucrats are threatening my camp.
So do something!
Imagine if Joe Stalin had been this dickless. Then where'd we be?
Well, 20 million of us would still be alive, for a start.
Conceded.
But it's a technical point.
But do what, woman?
She's all...
..hot and bothered over that blithering...
..black-haired garlic-muncher.
Who is? He isn't here. Is he?
And he's not coming back. And he's not worth the mud off her shoes.
Assuming you hadn't nicked 'em.
What?
An IM?
You're decent.
Kind.
Honest.
Maybe a bit light on for personality, but you could do a course. Hm?
Oh, dash, dash, dot, woman!
There are more important things at stake here
than a few butterflies in my plurry tummy.
Name two.
A Cold War. A Red Menace. A yellow peril.
A camp they're threatening to take away.
Life isn't one great big egg-and-spoon race, you know.
There's duty, responsibility, the...
..the...the...the greater good.
Where...where'd you get those?
In your drawer, where you'd hidden them.
One, two.
Two important matters at stake.
You got your glass slippers, GH.
Use them.
(KENNETH COUGHS)
(GROANS)
(MUTTERS) ..little sniff of this.
Eh?
Ah!
Christ!
Ah! Oh!
What are you doing? Scusi, Professore. I...
I no do before, ever.
But...sometimes Giuseppe,
he take bottle for to make wine.
(PANTS)
Yeah.
I always thought he just pissed in it.
(LAUGHS)
He make wine for courage. Dutch courage.
And tonight, I need.
Yeah, tonight I need for friend,
my friend, who is for to tell signorina he love her
and that he...he wish no more to be sneaking in her window and...
..taking of her advantage.
(SNIFFS)
(CORK CLATTERS)
Little, uh...
..sniff of eternity.
(SNIFFS)
But, uh...is, uh...
(PANTS)
Is your, um...
Is your friend not already married?
Oh, no. No, no, no, no, no.
Priest who marry us...
..um, marry him in Italia, is clown. Imbroglione.
And...and... and marriage is never...never...
..con...con...
..conflagrated.
Well, then, there's no impediment, is there?
There's no problem at all.
Look, uh, little bit of advice for your friend.
Tell him to bite-ay the bulleto.
Pronto.
Don't wait for a leap year.
Salute, Red Hat.
Salute, Professore.
(SINGS) ♪ Can't get away to marry her today
♪ My wife won't let me. ♪
Hey! (LAUGHS)
Oh, my God!
(LAUGHS)
(DOOR OPENS AND CLOSES)
(CLAPS AND RUBS HANDS)
(CLAPS HANDS)
Um, gonna be a few, uh...
..a few changes in the rose garden, B.
Yep.
Sabre-rattling, of course. They couldn't actually close us down.
I mean, the Balts gonna keep coming.
Where are they gonna put them? Hotel Australia?
Hardly. Still. Um...
We've been caught with our pants down.
And we've got to pull them up.
We've got to think of a plan B, B.
Look, I appreciate what you're trying to do. Really, I do.
But...
Please let me resign. Don't sack me.
Sack you? For...goodness sake, woman, I don't want to sack you.
I, uh...
I didn't want this job.
You know, I could have choked Harry Forsythe.
But I have become aware of how often...
..we expand, to fill a space.
And, uh, um... (CLEARS THROAT)
As far as I can see, a similar space has been recently vacated
for...for...
..for you.
Colonel... No, please, just let me continue.
The truth is I've got a grenade in my guts
and your finger's on the pin.
The fact is I...can't fight for Baringa on my own.
Haven't got the stomach for it.
But I thought...
..together...
Well, I, um...
I suppose that makes a change from where I normally tick the forms.
Somewhere between "young, single, living away from home"
and "middle age, living alone".
Some way to answer a proposal.
This is a proposal?
It looks that way.
Plurry tongue got behind the wheel and bingo.
Think of it more as a...
..an inter-office memo.
Please consider.
Yo.
Should, uh...
Should return these, I suppose.
You?
I couldn't work out...
Bates.
GH. Foot fetishist.
Retired.
"On behalf...
"..of her mother and myself...
"..I leave all my worldly goods
"to our daughter, Louise,
"and her progeny."
(LAUGHS)
"I leave in the care of one Red Hat.
"And may their...conflagration
"be everything that ours..."
Too short.
"..promised."
Hello.
Have you come to give me an 'aircut?
I came to get some Savlon for...
If you'd like one.
I always like it when you do it.
Even when it comes out all serrated like our mum's privet.
What a yellow-belly I was, Peg.
Making you wait.
For the leap year and all.
Hmm.
But we made up for it, didn't we?
Didn't we make up for it splendidly?
Didn't we conflagrate from the chandeliers?
Didn't we, Peg?
Oh, we did.
Splendidly.
CORA: Eenie meenie minie moe.
Catch an eyetie by the toe.
If he hollers, let him go.
G'day.
Come to talk me out of this, have you?
I think it's time.
I do.
See, Joe, I keep forgetting things.
Forgot my brekkie this morning.
40 years. A fantail, fag and a fingernail.
Can you see old Cora lying there like a good girl having her nappy changed?
No bloody fear.
My old man said the epitome...
He'd have said "epi-tome'.
..of polite behaviour was knowing when to go.
What about Beverly?
Bevvie?
She's not like me.
Never was.
She likes people too much.
She's beloved.
(THUNDER RUMBLES)
Hey.
Do they let you have any fun in that big Congress of Deputies up there?
(RAIN PATTERS)
Huey. My 21 st.
(SIGHS) You, Mum. My 16th birthday.
I remember.
What do you think?
Just for tonight.
And ask the girls.
We'll make a party of it. Don't be so bloody stupid!
This whole thing's wildly illegal.
But you're too damn selfish to realise that, aren't you?
And if you insist on going through with this lunacy,
the very least you can do is...
..take off those bloody bobby pins.
Come here, Bevvie.
No.
Do as your mother says or I'll take to you with a feather duster.
Did I tell you not to join the army?
Did I?
Or not to marry Len?
(SCOFFS)
You said marrying Len, it'd be like, um, marrying a Yorkshire pudding.
Only worse.
But I didn't tell you.
Did I tell you not to vote for Bob Menzies?
I only did it once.
Did I tell you not to handle the merchandise in this joint?
I wish you had.
Oh, no, Bevvie.
Think of what you'd have missed.
Wish you'd told me a whole lot of things, Cora.
What?
Life hurts?
I did.
Mum, I was always the one building cubbyhouses. Do you remember?
And there was always a room out the back for you.
Just waiting for you to stay still long enough to...
(BREATHES SHAKILY)
Look, it's too soon, Mum. I'm not ready for you to go.
But this is the best cubby I could manage.
(SOBS)
Are you very disappointed that I didn't turn out like you?
(LAUGHS)
Darling.
I didn't turn out like me.
CORA: I got vincible.
Cheer up, kids.
We're having a party.
(SIGHS)
(RECORD CRACKLES)
(SMOOTH BIG BAND MUSIC PLAYS)
(PATRIOTIC MUSIC)
(SOBS)
(PROJECTOR WHIRRS)
WOMAN IN FILM: Good morning. MAN IN FILM: Good morning.
I wanted to know if I can get some maps here.
Yes...
MAN: Sit down!
I've got an announcement to make.
I'm sorry, everyone. There won't be a feature tonight.
(PEOPLE GRUMBLE) The projectionist is...
..not with us.
There won't be any more movies.
MAN IN FILM: They apparently serve tea in this office.
And there's something else. Personal.
Youse have all heard about a bun in the oven.
Well, me, I've got a chocolate soufflé.
The other day, he kicked like he was training for the World Cup.
And I'm thinking this means he wants his dad.
(MOUTHS)
So I was wondering if you might be able to see youse way clear
to being a dad.
And I know it's not a leap year or nothing,
but when youse done that...
..if you'd like to maybe...
..get hitched.
Professor, don't shoot. We'll handle this like men.
Women. Confound you every time.
Huh?
Congratulations.
Son.
(APPLAUSE)
(CHEERING)
(SOBBING)
Shh.
Bev. Shh.
Joe is here.
Oh, come back to me.
Come back to me!
CORA: I'm trying already. Bevvie?
Hey, you.
I think I've changed my mind.
Oh, you contrary old bitch!
Ken! Wake up!
We need you.
Henry!
Come on, you stout, pickled old coot.
Throw up for Kenny. Come on.
(VOMITS) That's-a-girl.
Big spew for Kenny.
In-bloody-vincible.
(CORA VOMITS) KENNETH: There you go.
(CORA VOMITS) That's-a-girl.
"Big spew for Kenny."
I could have used you. How long have you known?
Dear heart, our walls are rice paper,
and there's a certain spark in the eye
that happened before the war as well, you know.
One thing, does my hair look serrated to you?
No more than usual.
It's just that, um, I had a peculiar, slightly ether-sodden dream.
Your mother was cutting my hair the way she used to.
You know, the trimmings.
No wonder it was such a mess if that's what you two got up to.
What? (LAUGHS)
What are you talking about?
Eh?
What do you mean?
You called me Henry.
It just slipped out.
GH.
She'll need care, you know.
She'll live to be 1,000.
And when she does croak, I'm gonna cook her on a spit.
Her prime cuts are marinated in Guinness.
You...you haven't said no.
Have you, B?
I can be patient. How long do you need?
A week.
You'll have your answer in a week.
(HORN HONKS)
Hey, mate!
Forgot your change.
You buy yourself limousine. Ciao.
Chow to you!
Don't look Chinese.
LOUISE: A fizzer alright, our meteor.
It took the sky to falling quite another way
for us to ask the question,
what were we waiting for that year in Bordertown?
BATES ON LOUDSPEAKER: Attention, please.
Attention, please. Attention.
Could all residents -- all residents --
please move to the administration area as soon as possible?
All residents to the administration area as soon as possible.
I have an important announcement to make about our future.
Residents to the administration building, please.
LOUISE: I started to think about how fragile it all is.
The choices we make and the moments we make them in
and the ones unmade that wither and die.
As fragile as a smoke ring or the dream of symmetry
or a pound note that says, "I love you, Nin, "
or "Rest in peace, "
or even "Come back to me. "
Fragile as the gases and particles we're all made of.
Fragile as stardust.