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Emoh Ruo
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Co-screenwriter David Poltorak – chiefly famous for his long association with certain TV game shows – called the finished product “spectacularly blah”, but this modestly stylish comedy of modern Australian manners, pretty much forgotten only a few years after its release, is worth a look. The title is “our home” spelt backwards. The story traces the heartaches and headaches of a fresh, young couple (played by Joy Smithers and Martin Sacks) with child. They are lured (by TV commercials) away from living in a caravan to investing their future in a home. Much of the social and media satire is sharp – give or take a few fluctuations in acting style – and Cameron Allan’s musical score, in particular, indicates a close familiarity with the best non-Australian work in this very specific ‘home improvement/relocation’ sub-genre. For students of Australian film – there may still be a few of them out there, after the desert of the mid-to-late ‘80s – Emoh Ruo constitutes, despite what you may have heard, a pleasant surprise. Denny Lawrence (born 1952) has enjoyed an extensive career in film, television and theatre as actor, director, teacher and writer, including ongoing collaboration with Bob Ellis [1942-2016] on Goodbye Paradise (1983), which has its fans. [Note: In 2025, it was included in a DVD boxset of Ozploitation Rarities (Volume 3) from the Australian company Umbrella.] Not much else pops out, finally, from Lawrence’s rap sheet, but involvement in the spectacular Kennedy Miller historic-cricket-recreation series Bodyline (1984) is surely his finest moment. © Adrian Martin 20 July 1990 |
