Caught on Screen - by James Findlay (Hardcover)

Book Synopsis

From innocent criminals to radical revolutionaries, feisty feminists to manly pioneers, egalitarian settlers to violent invaders, Caught on Screen shows how over successive generations the shape-shifting convict emerged on screen as a potent historical symbol.

Convicts loom large in Australian history. As transported criminals and the first European settlers, they have shackled the nation to a curious and contested origin story. Historians were largely silent on their exploits until the second half of the twentieth century, but before then a tradition of convict representation on screen appeared with the rise of cinema, taking hold of the popular imagination. From silent films to more recent television series, screen culture has elevated the convict experience to become a key historical narrative through which filmmakers and audiences have repeatedly reframed and challenged an understanding of Australia's colonial past. Caught on Screen traverses this history of convict representation for the first time.

Through detailed archival research into their production and reception, the book explores engaging case studies produced in Australia and internationally, including the work of Douglas Sirk, Alfred Hitchcock and Jennifer Kent. It illuminates the fact that the convict as historical symbol is one that intersected with, and helped to direct, major debates about nationalism, the legacies of colonisation, Aboriginal dispossession and the origins and character of Australian society.

Review Quotes

"While not all Australians have convict ancestry, we have all inherited vivid stories of the convict experience through our television and cinema screens. Why do we keep telling these stories, and what do they mean? James Findlay's marvellous book is a fascinating history of the ways that our screen culture has imagined the convict, from silent films to reality TV and beyond." --Michelle Arrow, Professor of Modern History, Macquarie University, Australia

"Australia has a rich cinematic history, and Findlay has shown us that we have so much more to learn. Caught on Screen offers a fresh perspective on how moving images have sustained and even shaped national identity through representations of convict history." --Marnie Hughes-Warrington, Distinguished Professor, Adelaide University, Australia

"Innocent, heroic or horrific, successive cinematic portrayals have shaped Australia's engagement with its convict past. In this remarkable book, James Findlay unwinds those celluloid layers to reveal the power of film as historical device." --Hamish Maxwell-Stewart, Professor of Heritage and Digital Humanities, University of New England, Australia

"Drawing on case studies from the silent film era to 21st-century reality TV, Caught on Screen examines the evolving and often contradictory representations of the convict amidst political, literary and academic debates about Australian nationhood and cultural identity. James Findlay highlights the enduring global fascination with this cinematically malleable and emblematic figure of Australian history and popular culture, as well as the role film and television play in shaping public memory of colonization in Australia. Thoroughly researched and engagingly written, Caught on Screen is a must-read for students, scholars and curious viewers alike." --Julie Anne Taddeo, Research Professor of History, University of Maryland, USA

"Findlay does an admirable job of drawing out his major themes, in the process demonstrating the convergence and divergence of film and written historiography, and the value of attending to both." --Annabel Cooper, Australian Historical Studies

About the Author

James Findlay is Lecturer in Australian history at the University of Sydney, Australia. He has a research focus on historical film and television studies, convict history, Australian popular culture, and public history. He has held the Australian Film Institute Research Collection Fellowship and before becoming a historian worked extensively in film and television production, mostly in the field of documentary.