[Blue Heelers Download Movie Free
Julieann Rohde
Blue Heelers is an Australian police drama series that was produced by Southern Star Group and ran for twelve years on the Seven Network, from 1994 to 2006. Although based around the policing of the town, the series generally depicted the everyday lives and relationships of the residents of Mount Thomas, a fictional small town in Victoria.
The series was one of the highest-rated and most-awarded programs in the history of Australian television, having won 25 Logie awards, and having equal standing with The Don Lane Show as the most awarded show in the history of the Logies (with five wins). It is also noted for its two main stars Lisa McCune, a four-time recipient of the Gold Logie, and John Wood, who also won Gold.
Blue Heelers was first aired on 10 September 1993[citation needed], with the episode "A Woman's Place". The last episode, episode #510 titled "One More Day" aired on 4 June 2006. The series was produced by Southern Star Group for the Seven Network. During its 13-season run it won a total of 32 awards and was nominated for a further 50.[1] This included 25 Logie Awards, five of which were the Gold Logie, the most coveted television award in Australia.[2]
As well as everyday policing matters, the series deals with many controversial and "touchy" subjects. The series was the first to examine the stressful world of young police officers who are "thrown into the deep end where they are left to sink or swim".[3]
Blue Heelers, however, was Australia's most popular television drama while it lasted. The series drew more than 2.5 million viewers every week at its peak.[2] Along with the long-running Crawford Productions series Homicide, Blue Heelers holds the Australian record for most episodes produced of a weekly prime-time drama. It was also nearly the longest-running series,[4][5] but Homicide lasted one calendar month longer and, due to five feature-length episodes, had more time on air.
The series launched the careers of many Australian actors, such as Lisa McCune, Grant Bowler, Ditch Davey, Rachel Gordon, Tasma Walton, Charlie Clausen and Jane Allsop. While many of these actors are still best known for their work on Blue Heelers, some have gone on to bigger roles. Many other actors of today also appeared in guest roles, including Hugh Jackman, Charles 'Bud' Tingwell, Peter O'Brien, John Howard and Robert Rabiah.
John Wood, alongside Julie Nihill remained the only actors with Blue Heelers to remain during its entire 12-year run, portraying Senior Sergeant Tom Croydon and publican Chris Riley respectively.
The series primarily focuses on the daily lives of police officers working at a police station in the fictional small town of Mount Thomas in the Australian state of Victoria. Each episode is presented from the perspective of the officers. This was a specific technique that creator Hal McElroy chose to employ.[7]
The police officers, commonly referred to as "Heelers", are always active sorting out the town's many problems. These problems range from trivial complaints such as land and fencing disputes to more serious offences, such as homicides and assaults. The small town is also faced with many other significant occurrences including bank robberies, escaped criminals, police shootings, kidnappings and the acts of deluded criminals. Of these, one of the more significant events is the bombing of the police station during the show's eleventh season.
Whenever overwhelmed, the Heelers call on the assistance of the police in the larger town of St Davids, home of the resident police inspector Russell Falcon-Price. An antagonist in the series, Falcon-Price often tries to terminate the employment of the Mount Thomas sergeant or to close the entire station, which in reality would be almost entirely out of his control.
Along with their police work, aspects of the Heelers' personal lives are regularly featured, notably the relationship between Maggie and PJ, which ends with Maggie's death in one of the most watched moments on Australian television.
On average, 42 episodes of Blue Heelers were broadcast per year on Australian television, with each episode comprising fifty scenes. One episode was made every week. The scripts were written to a formula which allowed one day for rehearsal, two days on location and two days in the studio.[22] Episodes were shot eight to ten weeks ahead of their scheduled broadcast date.[23] There were 16 episodes in various stages of production at any one time (from the conception of new storylines to post-production). In addition, there were always seven complete episodes waiting to go to air.[22] Apart from the regular cast members, the show employed 4,300 guest actors annually, plus 30 extras every week. A total of 150 people were involved in some way with the show's production each week, including cast members, crew, wardrobe, publicists and writers.[22]
During the early development of Blue Heelers two completely different pilots were shot: one depicting the story from the perspective of a police officer and the other from the perspective of a criminal. When these were presented to the Seven Network, the network committed to 13 episodes of the first pilot. The pilot went on to become the official first episode of Blue Heelers, telling the story of a new cop in town, Maggie Doyle, and her beginnings in Mount Thomas. Hal McElroy chose to discard the second pilot, realising it was a fatal mistake to be "with the criminals as they plotted the crime". He also conceived his rule that the producers of the show "couldn't have a camera in a room unless there was a copper there as well" (a rule shared by long-running UK Police drama The Bill). Hence, the basis of the show being from a police officer's perspective became a firm reality.[7] (The only bending of this rule was with scenes featuring publican Chris; as she was billed with the main cast, she was given the same on-screen "rules" as the officers. In early episodes, before she worked at the station, this "rule" also applied to Wayne Patterson's wife Roz).
He had been posted to Yass (in New South Wales) and he really loved it up there because the routine was so simple and straightforward-most often you knew the victim and sometimes you knew the culprit, and someone in charge would give them a clip behind the ear and say 'wash the police car' or 'sweep the yard' and 'don't ever do it again', rather than sending a juvenile to jail.
I loved it, and I said 'Hey this is great'. But all the writers said, 'No it's boring, we want that gritty, inner-city police stuff'. (We had Boys in Blue set up in Leichhardt in Sydney.) And I still remember the moment I was driving home up River Road and I thought, 'Then we can have two shows'. I said to this copper 'What are you called in the country? What is your nickname?' And he said they call highway patrol 'tyre biters' and coppers 'blue heelers'. And I thought 'That's the title!' So I rang [scriptwriter] Tony Morphett and said 'Let's do a show about young cops in the country. It's called Blue Heelers.
By creating the programme, McElroy and Morphett hoped to close the gap between to police and the public. They hoped to show the human side of the policing and that, like other citizens, police officers have feelings, regrets, aspirations and fears.[3] They also hoped that the show would act as a tribute to the courage of police officers, who risk their lives everyday, never knowing if they would return home at the end of the day.[24]
Only about half of the footage for each episode was shot on location.[23] Most of the scenes, including scenes in the police station and pub, were filmed at the Seven Network studios in Melbourne.[23][26] Much of the filming on location was carried out in towns such as Williamstown,[26] and the more established parts of Werribee.[27] The scenes of the outside of the Mount Thomas police station were actually filmed at the old, disused Williamstown police station, which was then a private residence. Scenes at Mount Thomas High School were filmed at Williamstown High School. The town of Castlemaine was most often used as the backdrop for Mount Thomas, seen in almost every episode.[28][29] Although the Blue Heelers' pilot was shot in Castlemaine, the cast and crew very rarely returned there to shoot further episodes;[23] images of Castlemaine were usually just establishing shots. Chris Riley's fictional Imperial Hotel, for example, was actually the real Imperial Hotel in Castlemaine.[28][29] Mount Thomas' fictional Commercial Hotel was filmed at the Willy Tavern in Williamstown.[26] The second Mount Thomas police station, adopted during the programme's reform of 2004, was filmed at Newport Railway workshops. The Mount Thomas Hospital was filmed at the Werribee Mercy Hospital.[30] Sunbury railway station was commonly used as the Mount Thomas railway station.Hobson's Bay, and Wyndham, Victoria were also locations used in Blue Heelers.
After low ratings in 2003 and 2004, the producers and executives of Blue Heelers realised that there were apparent problems which could potentially lead to the series' downfall. In 2004, Blue Heelers lost the top ratings spot to McLeod's Daughters.[31] During 2003 and 2004, Australian television drama was also at its "lowest point in a decade" and many popular shows were cancelled.[32] As the show remained basically unchanged from its debut ten years earlier, the production team decided that a revamp was in order.
At the beginning of season 11, the revamp began with new, more modern opening credits, using an electric guitar, rather than an acoustic. Later in that season, a live episode, "Reasonable Doubt", was broadcast in hope of offering a short-term ratings boost and encourage more long-term viewers. Although an immediate success, the live episode did not bring about a sustained increase in ratings.[31] Producers also hoped that a shift in direction, a change of mood and setting, and the addition of four cast members would cement Blue Heelers' long-term future.[31] They also wanted the show to remain relevant and more accurately reflect today's modern world:[33]
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