In 1975, author Ronald McKie won the Miles Franklin Literary Award (Australia’s most prestigious annual literary prize) for the novel this film was based on.
It was a fine and sensitive study of a boy growing up in a Queensland town in World War I, of life at home with his grandmother, of school, first love, and tragedy.
In the book, the mango tree was important. Jamie climbed it, and found in its high branches a thinking place – a “confessional.”
The film, less fine and less sensitive than the book, keeps the title, The Mango Tree, but forgets the tree, focusing more on people than on symbolism.
Written and produced by Michael Pate, with Michael Lake as associate producer and Kevin Dobson as director, The Mango Tree was filmed around Bundaberg in Queensland – the author’s home town.
Brian Probyn, director of cinematography, captures the heat and the mood of that tropical city – the old houses high on stumps, the lush growth, the cane fields, the red earth- while Leslie Binns, the art director, and Pat Forster, costume designer, re-create the whole feeling of the period.
Music composed and conducted by Marc Wilkinson evokes this too.
Geraldine Fitzgerald, that distinguished Irish American actress, plays Grandma Carr, indomitable, proud, and compassionate as this elderly gentlewoman.
Only one thing is wrong – Miss Fitzgerald’s accent. Crisp and clear as her words are, they have the twang of America, not of Australia. It is impossible to believe that the Grandma of Miss Fitzgerald is a native of the Murrumbidgee.
Producer’s son Christopher Pate, as Carr, is not the most photogenic leading man, but he is fine and thoughtful as the lad growing into manhood.
Sir Robert Helpmann, as the drunken professor, is outstanding. Gerard Kennedy as Preacher Jones, Gloria Dawn as Pearl, Carol Burns as Maudie, and Gerry Duggan as Scanlon, the policeman, are skilled and in character.
Grandma Carr
Geraldine Fitzgerald Professor
Robert Helpmann Jamie Carr
Christopher Pate Preacher Jones
Gerard Kennedy Pearl
Gloria Dawn Maudie Plover
Carol Burns Angus McDonald
Barry Pierce Miss Pringle
Diane Craig Wilkenshaw
Ben Gabriel Laura Montague
Maggie Millar Scanlon
Gerry Duggan Somers
Terry McDermott Joe Speight
Jonathan Hardy Constable McHendry
Gary Day Stinker Hatch
Jonathan Atherton Tommy Smith
Tony Barry Dr Robards
Kurt Ludescher Captain Hinkler
Tony Bonner Miss Abernathy
Pamela Norman Spruiker
Ian Murdoch Mayor
Leo Wockner Adams
Roger Collins Jackie Winn
Frank Davies Matron
Betty Ross Jenkins
Maurice Hughes Mrs Plover
Joy Verity Mary Winter
Sallyanne Williams Miss Jones
Joan Blogg Williams
Wilson Irving Browning
Russell Sinclair Ken Davis
Tony Foley Reverend Kirkeby
Frank Geary Chow Hing
Ronney Yeung Eklund
Kevin Ballantyne Prentice
Charles Deane
Director
Kevin James Dobson
Video
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The film, less fine and less sensitive than the book, keeps the title, The Mango Tree, but forgets the tree, focusing more on people than on symbolism.
