Ned Kelly | |
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Theatrical release poster
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Directed by | Tony Richardson |
Produced by | Neil Hartley |
Written by |
Ian Jones Tony Richardson Alex Buzo (Uncredited) |
Starring |
Mick Jagger Mark McManus |
Music by | Shel Silverstein |
Cinematography | Gerry Fisher |
Edited by | Charles Rees |
Production
company |
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Distributed by | United Artists |
Release date
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7 October 1970 28 July 1970 (Aust) |
Running time
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106 minutes |
Country | United Kingdom Australia |
Language | English |
Budget | A$2,500,000 |
Box office | $808,000 (Australia) |
Ned Kelly is a 1970 British-Australian biographical (and part musical) film. It was the seventh Australian feature film version of the story of 19th-century Australian bushranger Ned Kelly. It is notable for being the first Kelly film to be shot in colour.
The film was directed by Tony Richardson, and starred Mick Jagger in the title role. Scottish-born actor Mark McManus played the part of Kelly's friend Joe Byrne. It was a British production, but was filmed entirely in Australia, shot mostly around Braidwood in southern New South Wales, with a largely Australian supporting cast.
Ned Kelly is forced by police persecution to become a bushranger. He robs several banks and is eventually captured after the Siege of Glenrowan. He is hanged in Melbourne.
In the early 1960s, Karel Reisz and Albert Finney announced plans to make a film about Ned Kelly from a screenplay by David Storey. Finney and Reisz flew to Australia in October 1962 and spent ten weeks picking locations and doing research. The movie was meant to be Finney's next project after Tom Jones (1963) with filming to start in March 1963. The British arm of Columbia Pictures agreed to put up the entire budget. However, British labour union regulations required a mostly British crew, and the cost of putting them up in Australia put the budget beyond what Columbia were willing to pay. (Tom Jones had yet to be released.) Italy and Spain were looked at as alternatives but the project was eventually abandoned. Finney and Reisz went on to make Night Must Fall (1964) instead.