Snapshots around ‘Madras’

Clip 1: Family portraits

1 min 16 sec

Taken from the home movie Snapshots around ‘Madras’ (c1926)

Original title classification not rated – this clip chosen to be G

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Please note: this clip is silent

Curator’s clip description

Members of the Gidney family sit or stand in the garden of their Mount Eliza home and pose for the camera. They smile, laugh, wave and talk in front of the camera.

Curator’s notes

The faces, features, clothes and gestures of the people in this clip are observed with the familiarity of a close relative. This makes them intimate portraits of private moments and gives them an informality and immediacy lacking in other types of actuality material.

This clip can be compared with Ballarat Beauty Competition (1911) where children at a beauty contest sit in a garden and pose for the camera. While the child contestants are also framed in portrait-like poses and prompted by off-screen comments, the footage lacks the intimacy of Gidney’s home movie.

Lauren Williams, curator

australian screen