AIATSIS Collection (1/2)

The Australian Institute of Aboriginal Studies (later AIATSIS – the Australian Institute of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Studies) was established as a statutory authority in 1964. The Institute quickly established a film unit to act as an archive of filmed material and also to record material of ethnographic and historic significance. Part of this work also involved the preparation of films for public release, and until the early 1990s, the AIAS Film Unit became responsible for some of the most significant works of ethnographic film then produced in Australia. This collection of some thirty significant documentary works will be progressively released by Ronin Films in association with AIATSIS, where possible in re-mastered form and with associated interviews with filmmakers.

For an excellent study of the AIATSIS films, see the monograph, "Bringing to Light" by Ian Bryson (published in 2002 by Aboriginal Studies Press, AIATSIS).

CAMELS & THE PITJANTJARA [from the AIATSIS Collection]

1969 (Classification Exempt - Ronin Recommends: PG) 45 min

A classic documentary from 1969 which records the Pitjantjara people's use of feral camels in central Australia, capturing and taming them, and using them as pack animals. more

AUD$34.95

price includes GST and postage

CASS - NO SAUCEPAN DIVER [from the AIATSIS Collection]

1982 (Classification Exempt - Ronin Recommends: G) 12 min

Cass is a part-Aboriginal, part-Malay, part-Scottish man who used to work as a diver in the pearling industry in Broome, Western Australia. A film by Wayne Barker, his grandson. more

AUD$25.00

price includes GST and postage

COLLUM CALLING CANBERRA [from the AIATSIS Collection]

1981 (Classification Exempt - Ronin Recommends: PG) 56 min

A cattle station's view of negotiating with a distant bureaucracy. more

AUD$34.95

price includes GST and postage

CONISTON MUSTER [from the AIATSIS Collection]

1972 (Classification Exempt - Ronin Recommends: PG) 28 min

A classic documentary about the annual muster on Coniston cattle station, north-west of Alice Springs, and its Aboriginal head stockman, Coniston Johnny, who narrates much of the film. more

AUD$34.95

price includes GST and postage

FAMILIAR PLACES [from the AIATSIS Collection]

1980 (Classification Exempt - Ronin Recommends: PG) 50 min

Mapping traditional clan country in north Queensland. more

AUD$34.95

price includes GST and postage

FULL CIRCLE [from the AIATSIS Collection]

1987 (Classification Exempt - Ronin Recommends: G) 20 min

A story of Aboriginal stockmen at Robinson River Station on traditional Garawa land, in the Northern Territory. more

AUD$34.95

price includes GST and postage

GOOD-BYE OLD MAN [from the AIATSIS Collection]

1977 (Classification Exempt - Ronin Recommends: G) 66 min

A Tiwi Island Bereavement Ceremony. more

AUD$34.95

price includes GST and postage

HOUSE-OPENING, THE [from the AIATSIS Collection]

1980 (Classification Exempt - Ronin Recommends: G) 42 min

"House-opening" ceremonies in a contemporary Aboriginal community combine elements of Aboriginal, Torres Strait and European cultures in dealing with death. A film by Judith MacDougall. more

AUD$34.95

price includes GST and postage

IT'S A LONG ROAD BACK [from the AIATSIS Collection]

1981 (Classification Exempt - Ronin Recommends: G) 13 min

The story of one woman's struggle to regain her Aboriginality more

AUD$25.00

price includes GST and postage

LINK-UP DIARY [from the AIATSIS Collection]

1987 (G) 87 min

On the road with Link-up, an organisation that re-unites Aboriginal families more

AUD$34.95

price includes GST and postage

LOCKHART FESTIVAL [from the AIATSIS Collection]

1974 (Classification Exempt - Ronin Recommends: G) 33 min

A classic documentary about an Aboriginal dance festival organised by the Lockhart River community in far north Queensland. more

AUD$34.95

price includes GST and postage

LURUGU [from the AIATSIS Collection]

1973 (Classification Exempt - Ronin Recommends: PG) 56 min

The revival of an initiation ceremony for young men on Mornington Island in north Queensland. more

AUD$34.95

price includes GST and postage

MACDOUGALL TAPES, THE

2017 (Classification Exempt - Ronin Recommends: G) 261 min

Extended conversations with David and Judith MacDougall about their years with the Film Unit of the Australian Institute of Aboriginal Studies, Canberra, 1975-1987. During this time, the MacDougalls made a series of eleven documentary films that were acknowledged world-wide as landmark achievements in ethnographic cinema. more

AUD$49.50

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MAKE IT RIGHT! [from the AIATSIS Collection]

1988 (G) 21 min

MAKE IT RIGHT! is a unique record of the landmark 1988 Barunga Festival of Aboriginal Sport and Culture at which Prime Minister Bob Hawke made commitments (unfulfilled) to negotiate a treaty with Aboriginal people. more

AUD$34.95

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MAKING A BARK CANOE [from the AIATSIS Collection]

1969 (Classification Exempt - Ronin Recommends: G) 16 min

Two men make a bark canoe in the swamps of coastal Arnhem Land – a process simply observed by filmmaker Roger Sandall. more

AUD$34.95

price includes GST and postage

MALBANGKA COUNTRY [from the AIATSIS Collection]

1975 (Classification Exempt - Ronin Recommends: G) 29 min

The Malbangka family leaves the social problems of Hermannsburg in central Australia to return to their own traditional land and set up their own independent settlement. more

AUD$34.95

price includes GST and postage

MOURNING FOR MANGATOPI [from the AIATSIS Collection]

1974 (Classification Exempt - Ronin Recommends: PG) 53 min

An elaborate Tiwi mourning ceremony, performed as an affirmation of traditional culture. more

AUD$34.95

price includes GST and postage

SOMETHING OF THE TIMES [from the AIATSIS Collection]

1985 (Classification Exempt - Ronin Recommends: G) 41 min

The story of Aboriginal and white buffalo hunters in the remote wetlands of the Northern Territory in the 1930s. more

AUD$34.95

price includes GST and postage

SONS OF NAMATJIRA [from the AIATSIS Collection]

1975 (Classification Exempt - Ronin Recommends: G) 47 min

A group of celebrated Aboriginal artists and their relationship with the outside world. more

AUD$34.95

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SPEAR IN THE STONE [from the AIATSIS Collection]

1983 (Classification Exempt - Ronin Recommends: G) 34 min

An age-old tradition of making spear-heads from special stones in Arnhem Land. more

AUD$34.95

price includes GST and postage