Rachel Blakely film festival

Love Until ...

1995, DVD quality

Johnny's comments:

(1993?/1995?/1996?)

Hard to know when this Czech-filmed Australian movie was actually made. I've seen in one place that it was filmed in 1993 which sort of make sense to how the actors look a little younger than their later stuff. It is listed on IMDB in 1995 but I think that is incorrect as it's the only place I've seen it listed as such. Anyway, the end of the movie lists it as 1996 which is later than I was expecting but it's also near impossible to verify as it doesn't look like the movie had a cinema release and it was never properly classified by the Ratings Board although the DVD I have gives it an arbitrary MA 15+ rating (which I would suggest as probably being too high as while the movie has a few nude scenes, they are all fairly brief and there's no actual sex and apart from that the rest of the movie is fairly mild). No classification also suggests it didn't play in the local video market which is odd but seeing as the movie got no money from funding commissions, isn't unusual either. The DVD of the movie I had come from the bargain bin from about 2003 and is made by a low rent company but is actually not too bad considering. I did cap the movie back in the day and have only just revisited it which is a mistake.

Well, Love Until... is a fairly straightforward love story set in a small town in the Czech Republic and in Prague where Jan (Dino Marnika) runs a small restaurant/B&B in a village with his put upon wife Karla (Maureen O'Shaughnessy) and his brother and sister-in law. One day three Australian women (possibly sisters but it's never mentioned as such) Madeleine (Rachel Blakely), Suzie (Dee Smart) and Joanne (Collette Roberts) come to town and eat and drink at the restaurant and stay a while.

Jan falls for Madeleine, but she has to go back to Prague to work where she is managing a struggling hotel and close to losing her job. Before leaving, she makes Jan an offer to join her, and he thinks about it. After the death of a dear friend and his business about to go under, Jan decides to take up Madeleine's offer and works at the hotel as a cook. They fall for one another and while their love is going strong, Madeleine is close to losing her job, so Jan, after a makeover, decides to help her by finding out what the problem is. But there's always that lingering thought of what he left behind.

Pretty stock-standard stuff, but fairly enjoyable nonetheless. The plot never stretches itself and has a tidy if hasty ending which it probably doesn't deserve. Then again it's strange that Jan leaves his wife to go to Prague in the first place. That whole relationship is very odd, I couldn't work out why Karla stuck around like she did, as if she didn't realise her husband had run off with another woman. It is strange watching Australian actors in a movie set in the Czech Republic, at least the three women friends are playing actual Australians. All the main cast seems to be Australian and all the minor parts are Czech actors, it's quite weird at times.

There's some good nudity in the movie from three Australian actresses. It was Rachel Blakely's nude debut and she has 3/4 fairly brief nude scenes but they are fairly good. Dee Smart briefly shows her breasts as she takes her top off for a swim.

Funnily enough when I saw the name Collette Roberts, I wondered if that was the same person as well-known one-hit singing wonder Collette of Ring My Bell fame and sure enough, as soon as she appeared on screen, I knew it was she. She even gets an 'Introducing' credit. Can't believe I never put two-and-two together before now. I think it's the only movie she ever made.

Rachel Blakely film clip (collages below)

Maureen O'Shaughnessey film clip (collage below)

Dee Smart film clip (sample below)

One-Way Ticket

1997 TV movie, vhs quality

Johnny's comments:

This was a 1997 telemovie for Channel 9 based on a notorious Melbourne jailbreak which gripped the country for a week in March of 1993. It was pretty salacious and unsurprisingly the telemovie reflects that with a few sex/nude scenes, including a 'bathing beauty' scene which totally happened... I've only ever seen TV rips off VHS screenings so the quality is down, but this one isn't too bad and it doesn't have an annoying TV watermark I've seen from another copy that's floating around.

Rachel Blakely film clip (collages below)

Tribe

1999 mini-series, vhs quality

This is a two-part mini-series that aired on Channel 7 which probably had American backing as it stars Antonio Sabato Jr and Joanna Cassidy as well as a bunch of Australian actors. I remember watching this back in the day and remember it being pretty terrible.

Seeing it again, it all came flooding back how bad it was. Rachel is lumbered with a French accent and then finds a World War II Japanese soldier's lair and starts acting like a samurai, which is really something to watch in 2021. The main villain is played by Grievous from Fire, one of the most baffling stupid characters in TV history, which is absolutely hilarious. So many silly little things and a lot of padding to get it out to 3 hours.

It does have a couple of nude scenes. A fairly decent one from Rachel, longer than I remember and another from Joanna Cassidy. I found an American version of this mini-series and of course it cut out the nude scenes. I don't know why I was expecting anything else. It's just good to see these scenes once again.

I doubt we will see this in better quality, it wasn't popular back in the day and it's mostly forgotten. It was also made by Crawford Productions, who as I've mentioned in previous posts are notorious stingy with releasing their popular stuff let alone getting a DVD release of their lesser known productions.

Rachel Blakely film clip from episode 1 (sample below)

Joanna Cassidy film clip from episode 2 (sample below)