A 'careful little housewife': C.J. Dennis and masculinity in The Sentimental Bloke.

Abstract

Raymond Longford's 1919 silent version of The Sentimental Bloke and Frank Thring's 1932 talkie of the same name, are strikingly different films. One has been hailed as Australia's contribution to the classics of silent cinema, while the other has been regarded with some embarrassment. More importantly, their narratives are surprisingly different, as is their treatment of a range of issues. This paper examines the ways that the silent film was specifically appropriate for an immediate post-war audience, and the ways that the 1932 version contained features relevant for an audience that had just experienced the worst of the depression. As the film title suggests, each narrative is acutely concerned with issues of masculinity, and this paper focuses on the ways that the different representations of masculinity were appropriate for the different historical contexts.