Come On Bro - It's The Wars!!

Nestled in the rolling green hills and meadows of the Latrobe Valley in Victoria, Australia lies a great big hole in the ground. It's an open cut mine that, for the better part of almost a century, has been the site and source of Australia's largest deposits of brown coal. This brown coal has been dug up by massive dredges and fed into huge boilers at the nearby Yallourn Power Station - the result of which is electricity. The electricity from this particular station powers a lot of homes in Victoria and further on up the eastern seaboard of Australia.

It's a dirty job but somebody's gotta do it.

During the halcyon days of the Victorian power industry, a town was conceived and built near the Yallourn Power Station. The Yallourn township was provided to the workers that toiled in the massive power station. It was a fully realized town even before it was built with facilities that were the envy of the district. Beautiful tree lined streets, comfortable housing, a fully functioning shopping precinct, a hospital, school, police station, pub...Yallourn had it all. And for decades, Yallourn functioned as a bustling hamlet. It truly was a beautiful town. However there was always this catch...

The town was built on the proviso that one day, the administrators of the (government owned) State Electricity Commission (SEC), might decide that they needed to access the rich coal seam that lay underneath the township. And that day did come. Somewhere in the mid 1960's there was something akin to a mini revolt by the towns folk against the SEC and for years they protested against their town being dismantled at the whim of some faceless bureaucrat/s. Money was raised, campaigns were hatched, people joined in to fight for their township

"Come on bro - It's the Wars!"

When I was born into this battle in the mid 1970's, it was already pretty much a given that the man had won over the workers. But even then, there was a hell of a lot of life in the old girl...the town I mean...even though, it was clear that she was a dame in decline.  

 Yallourn township circa 1970's. My first home.

Yallourn's facilities were still pretty much the gold standard even then (or at least - that's how I remember them through my rose colored glasses). In particular, the cinema - or 'theater' as it was lovingly referred to - remains lodged in my mind as perhaps thee grandest of the grand old dames of Yallourn's architecture.

Built in the 1930's and overlooking the township's beautiful central gardens, the Yallourn Theater was one of the most vibrant social and entertainment centers of the township. Featuring two pretty decent screens, red leather seating and a plush foyer and concession stand, the theater put on some of the greatest movies of the 20th century beginning with "Gone With The Wind" in 1939 (and as a nice bookend ending it's life with the same film in 1979). I've heard many stories from fellow ex-Yallourn residents as to what films they saw there over the years. They are recalled with such affection as are many of the experiences of Yallourn are. The swords and sandals epics of the 1950's - "Ben Hur", "Spartacus". Classics from the 1960's such as "Dr. Zhivago" and "Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid". I can remember my Dad and his mate and next door neighbor Rob Martin recalling how they ran home in the night after seeing the 1973 stunner "The Exorcist" - so shit scared they were. I think it happened to them again a couple of years later when they took themselves off to see "Jaws" in '75.

Yallourn's cinema, 1975.

For me, I had the pleasure and I guess the rare privilege of seeing a movie there. It was only one movie but it was a film that was to have a profound effect on me that continues until this very day.

I can still remember the very first time I saw Star Wars.

There are certain events in a man's life that fall into the category of things one must do and taking your son to his first movie experience counts very much among those very important events. Towards the end of 1977, my Dad took me to the Yallourn Theater to see the George Lucas blockbuster that had by the end of that year, become a phenomenon around the world. I can't remember exactly what month it was when we saw it - hell I was only like three and a half years old! - however November definitely comes to mind. It was warming up by that stage - almost summer - and the nights were balmy but comfortable. The air conditioned cinema was a real treat for it's air conditioning alone. I don't know if I actually grasped the concept of what a movie actually was back then. I can only compare myself to my son (who is now four years old as I write this). He has the whole concept down pat already - I think he was two when we popped the lid on his first DVD. For me, I think the whole thing was just one big WOW! moment - as in 'I don't know what I'm actually doing right now - but WOW! Just WOW!

The cinema, circa 1941.

Dad's cinematic tastes are quite varied although in the years since Star Wars he hasn't totally connected with the space fantasy/sci-fi genre in the way that I have. Dad was schooled in the classic political thrillers like "Three Days of The Condor", "The Marathon Man", "The Conversation" - all films that I like very much. But Star Wars was different for him I think in that it was truly an 'event film'. Everyone was talking about it - even the rough and tough coal miners that worked the Cut nearby and the power station workers. There was something about Star Wars that crossed boundaries and became accessible to everyone.

My memories of my first viewing are kinda clear but they are fractured - if you can understand that. I recall them as fleeting vignettes of movement, color and place. There are three memories that stand out from that evening in the first instance. First and foremost was the foyer of the cinema. It's lighting was subdued but the old school flashing Hollywood styled lights I can remember. The carpet in that foyer was deep red, very plush, the kind you could sink up to your knees in. At least that's how I remember it. I'm going to take a punt here and say that I had my first taste popcorn. And I think Dad was a choc top fan - spearmint - but I'll have to confirm that.

The cinema itself. Well - that was simply the most amazingly awesome room I had ever been in up to that point. It was vast, cavernous and the screen - oh my god - that screen. Thee biggest TV I had ever seen. I was just gobsmacked by it. The seats were dark red - very plush material, the kind that were really low set and you kinda disappeared into them.

Cinema interior.

 
A celluloid love affair begins, November 1977.

And then there was the film. What can a 35 year old man channeling a (nearly) 4 year old say 32 years after the fact?...?? Oh my freaking god!!!??? I can clearly remember the ubiquitous Star Wars logo erupting onto the screen against the twinkling star field behind and though I can picture the opening crawl - I couldn't have read it at that tender age. The almost universal memory shared by Star Wars fans world wide is the one where they saw that Star Destroyer pass overhead for the very first time. And I can clearly remember that. I think I might have been jumping up and down in my seat - so blown away was I at this brilliant piece of imagery which I will argue black and blue remains one of the most kick arse cinema moments of all time!

Things that  make you go - WHOOOOOO!!!

The first appearance of Darth Vader when he boards the crippled blockade runner is definitely there as well though beyond that my memories of him just aren't there. It's strange,  given that he is undoubtedly one of the most iconic cinema villains ever conceived. But hey - remember the age thing right? Now the other significant memory I consistently recall from the movie is a scene that isn't actually in the movie that I have seen a times since those heady days of 1977. And I don't know whether this has implanted itself in my mind because I saw a picture in some sort of promotional material around that time or whether it was in fact in that original print I saw on screen. There is a scene just after Ben "Obi Wan" babillion Kenobi appears for the first time, having scared the Sand People away from a subdued Luke Skywalker. They have a conversation about Artoo then Luke is reminded by Artoo that C-3PO still lies at the bottom of the ravine he was knocked into. You know the one - it's the "Where am I? I must have taken a bad step" scene. Just after that both Obi Wan and Luke help 3PO - who is missing one robotic arm - to his feet. I always associate my Yallourn experience with seeing Obi Wan, Luke and 3PO standing and stepping down from where he has fallen - in the film. I've only ever seen it as a still since then. But I stand to be corrected that in the 1977 print that I saw, I definitely remember seeing 3PO Ben and Luke standing together just after they help the stricken and one armed droid to his feet. In all versions I have seen since, there is a wipe transition that crawls up the screen as they lift 3PO to his feet - a transition used to hide the fact the the film makers were using just a torso of 3PO at that point - before the movie moves to Ben Kenobi's dwelling.

The last scene that I can recall with clarity from my first ever Star Wars experience was the scene of the Millennium Falcon knifing through space from right of screen to left, just after they escape from the Death Star. It was a brief scene, a beautiful, peaceful moment of visual pleasure just watching that beautiful "piece of junk" in full flight before the four TIE fighters rocket in after them and we bare witness to Luke and Han have a semi "pissing competition" as they blast their pursuers away with the Falcon's dorsal and ventral quad canons.

For me, there was only one 'Falcon'.

And that's kinda it really...

Dad tells me often that I wouldn't shut up through large chunks of the movie and I was babbling away excitedly, something I was renowned for back then. But I guess I can put it down to the excitement of my first movie experience. And I mean what an experience it was. I went on to live and breathe Star Wars throughout most of my youth and adolescence - taking a break from it during those dark years between '86 and '95 - and now as a supposedly responsible adult, I can happily declare that I'm still the biggest kid on the block - with the coolest Star Wars collection going round.

Come on Bro - It's The Wars!

The inevitability of Yallourn's destruction was without question. By the early 1970's the SEC had begun the process of dismantling the town, moving houses out on trucks in pieces so that they could be rebuilt elsewhere. The lure of the rich brown coal seam underneath the town ship was just too overpowering. The irony of that is that today the State Electricity Commission itself is now extinct - having passed into private/foreign hands in the mid 90's by a government hell bent on privatizing anything it could get it's hands on.

You can still find many examples of Yallourn's architecture still in existence today around the Latrobe Valley. By the mid 1970's Yallourn early spirit had been pretty much decimated and though their were still many people living and working there, the writing was on the wall. My family had moved by late '77 and we were actually living at Yallourn North (a kind of satellite town) by that time. And today, although the vista of the township is gone, I have discovered just recently that the land upon which my first was situated is actually still there - it hasn't been swallowed by the buckets of the dredge. In places evidence of the town's streets still exist, the tree that lined certain streets still stand.

The screen that opened the door onto that galaxy far, far away is bulldozed.

Following the final film presentation at the Yallourn Theater - Gone With The Wind - the cinema was demolished in 1979. A 40 year old cinematic era was ground to dust. The Yallourn Theater lives on in a comprehensive collection of stories, photographs and images that are shared by former residents of Yallourn among whom I count myself. I cherish that first movie experience with my father. Because in a small way it influenced the person who I am today. I love story telling, I love the escapism of cinema and I love the toys! I can't allow myself to give up on them, as much as my serioso would like me to I am sure. Fortunately, my love of all things Star Wars lives on...and my son is now getting in the action too.

My serioso doesn't really approve but - to quote the character of Chaz Bottler in Kyle Newman's 2008 love letter to Star Wars fans (aka Fanboys)...

Come On Bro - It's The Wars!

DFA.