Indonesia Calling: Joris Ivens in Australia

In 1946, Joris Ivens made the 22-minute film in Australia. In the process, he not only created a fertile breeding ground for Australian film culture, but he also ruined his relationship with the Dutch government. The previous year, he had given up his position as film commissioner for the Dutch East Indies, as he could no longer accept the Dutch colonial role. When the Dutch army left Sydney Harbor intending to retake control of their colony, activists from Indonesia, Australia, India and China sought to prevent them. Ivens' film is about this blockade. uses interviews and lots of archive footage to sketch the role Ivens and his own film played in the origins of independent Australian film culture. It also provides us with an impression of the developing relationship between Australia and Indonesia, in which Ivens's film apparently played a considerable role.