This live-action adaptation of Australia’s most iconic (and longest-running) comic strip chronicles the episodic misadventures of its titular character – a mischievous but good-hearted carrot-topped schoolboy and local “larrikin”.
Ginger (Paul Daniel) divides his time between trying to win the heart of his prissy and pert classmate, Minnie Peters (Shelley Armsworth), outsmarting his wealthy romantic rival, Eddie Coogan (Daniel Cumerford), evading the wrath of the terrifying neighbourhood bully, Tiger Kelly (Drew Forsythe), and dodging his strict schoolmaster, Mr Floggswell (Ross Higgins), all while trying to squeeze in some quality time for fishing.
The plot is episodic and wandering, involving a missing monkey, a runaway horse, jewel thieves and a circus.
Garry (Norman Gunston) McDonald plays Ginger’s long-suffering father with an impressive degree of earnest, old-fashioned, I’ll-strap-you-son concern, but the script fails to realise the tremendous comic possibilities of McDonald in this role.
The movie is set in a highly stylised small Australian town in the 1940s (location filming took place in the Southern Highlands of New South Wales, around the historic towns of Bowral and Mittagong). where little girls wear spotless frocks, ribbons. and patent leather shoes, while ruffian freckled boys meet their school sweethearts at a comic-strip milk-bar run by an Italian with a tomato accent and a black moustache.
Like the old comics from which it draws its inspiration, the film is heavily visual, gaudy with costumes, with fat mums in polka-dots and bullies in baggy suits.
Ginger Meggs did not perform well at the domestic box office, failing to recoup the AUD$1.3 million budget.
Most of the child actors in the film (many of them locally cast) did not subsequently pursue theatrical careers.
Daniel Cumerford (who played Eddie Coogan) was tragically killed in 1987, aged just 19, when he was struck by a train while trying to cross railway tracks at Rockdale in Sydney
Ginger Meggs Paul Daniel Mr John Meggs
Garry McDonald Mrs Sarah Meggs
Coral Kelly Dudley Meggs
Rowan Hillard Minnie Peters
Shelley Armsworth Benny
Mark Spain Ocker
Adrian McLeod Raggsy
Mark Kounnas Darkie
Kristian Harper Eddie Coogan
Daniel Cumerford Joey
Darren Flynn Sammy
David Manning Jacky
Andrew Heard Tiger Kelly
Drew Forsythe Polly
Miranda Latimer Biddie
Monique Benet Aggie
Bernadette Hockings Millie
Sharon Ford Mr Floggswell
Ross Higgins Mr Crackett
Terry Camilleri Miss Leach
Gwen Plumb Miss Sharp
Marie Lloyd Cuthbert Fitzcloon
Christopher Norton Master Wentworth
James Wingrove Hookey
Justin Ridley Presenter
Adam Bowen Walter Fotheringay
Willie Fennell Constable Brady
John Wood Mrs Peters
Sue Collie Mr Mullins
Howard Vernon Mr Wentworth
John Clayton Mr Polly
Ron Ratcliff Mrs Polly
Lisa Peers Joe
Bruno Baldoni Joe’s Daughter
Kym Shaw Captain Hook
Hugh Keays-Byrne Mr Fox
Harold Hopkins Mrs Fox
Eva Sitta Alex
Scott Grayland Alex’s Mother
Candy Raymond The Monkey
Tony The Dog
Mike
Ginger (Paul Daniel) divides his time between trying to win the heart of his prissy and pert classmate, Minnie Peters (Shelley Armsworth), outsmarting his wealthy romantic rival, Eddie Coogan (Daniel Cumerford), evading the wrath of the terrifying neighbourhood bully, Tiger Kelly (Drew Forsythe), and dodging his strict schoolmaster, Mr Floggswell (Ross Higgins), all while trying to squeeze in some quality time for fishing.
Garry (Norman Gunston) McDonald plays Ginger’s long-suffering father with an impressive degree of earnest, old-fashioned, I’ll-strap-you-son concern, but the script fails to realise the tremendous comic possibilities of McDonald in this role.
Like the old comics from which it draws its inspiration, the film is heavily visual, gaudy with costumes, with fat mums in polka-dots and bullies in baggy suits.
