Essential Cult Cinema Mirroring the Impact of The Bells: Cult Guide

Dir: W.J. Lincoln

A Melbourne playboy, Oliver White, is murdered as he is driven home one night in a hansom cab. Investigating the crime encompasses all aspects of Melbourne society.

Dir: W.J. Lincoln

A visual fragment from the archive: The thematic resonance of The Luck of Roaring Camp perfectly mirrors the editorial trajectory of our deep dive.

The setting is California during the California Gold Rush. On the California goldfields, Will Gordin is falsely accused of murder and is about to be lynched when his girlfriend rides to the rescue.

Dir: W.J. Lincoln

Betty, aged four, goes to live with her bachelor uncle, Angus McDougall, after her father dies. Betty grows up happy and when she is eighteen Gilbert Baxter is in love with her. Western Moore seduces her and she promises to marry him. Moore is also seeing Nellie, the publican's daughter. She overhears Moore's plans for a big cattle raid and tells Gilbert Baxter who denounces Moore. Old Davy seizes his gun and shoots his former partner. Betty breaks up with Moore and falls for Baxter. The Widow O'Leary, marries McDougall.

Dir: W.J. Lincoln

A visual fragment from the archive: The thematic resonance of After Sundown perfectly mirrors the editorial trajectory of our deep dive.

The 1913 movie, 'Moondyne', one of the very first made using a sound stage in Melbourne, Australia, was adapted from the novel of the same name authored by John Boyle O'Reilly and published in 1880 by George Robertson in Sydney.. The novel was in turn was a reprint of the serialized, semi-autobiographical, story published in 'The Pilot' in Boston Mass. in 1878 entitled 'Moondyne Joe'. The plot centers around one Moondyne Joe, a character based on the real life Joseph Bolitho Jones who was a master escape artist from the jail at Fremantle, Western Australia when O'Reilly was himself held prisoner there. Moondyne was assisted in his final escape by local indigenous people with whom he then lived with for several years and who gave him the name Moondyne. During that time he was shown a gold deposit so huge that it made him extremely wealthy and he was able to return to England under a newly assumed identity as a Mr Wyville. Back in the land of his birth he builds a new life for himself and becomes well known for his humanitarian acts. The novel tackles many of the social justice issues of the time as they were discussed in Britain, Australia and America. The character Moondyne makes a brief appearance in the 2010 award winning screenplay, 'Cry of the Dreamer' which revolves around O'Reillys own arrest, imprisonment, transportation to Australia and his eventual escape on an American Whaler to the USA.

Dir: W.J. Lincoln

A fascinating piece of cinema that shares thematic elements.

Dir: W.J. Lincoln

A visual fragment from the archive: The thematic resonance of Moondyne perfectly mirrors the editorial trajectory of our deep dive.

A fascinating piece of cinema that shares thematic elements.

Dir: W.J. Lincoln

A fascinating piece of cinema that shares thematic elements.

Dir: W.J. Lincoln

A visual fragment from the archive: The thematic resonance of It Is Never Too Late to Mend perfectly mirrors the editorial trajectory of our deep dive.

Drama depicting the execution of Edith Cavell during World War I.

Dir: W.J. Lincoln

A fascinating piece of cinema that shares thematic elements.

Dir: W.J. Lincoln

A fascinating piece of cinema that shares thematic elements.