The Sick Stockrider

Screenings were often accompanied by a lecturer who would recite the poem.^[12]

The movie screened to thirty full houses in Victoria. It has been described as "solid and stagey with shaking canvas sets, an exaggerated alcoholic scene and a bull-goring sequence in which an actor tumble turns across an animal all too obviously at rest."^[13]

Contemporary reports said it was a box office success.^[14] However years later Table Talk wrote that "the film, though well made and essentially picturesque, had not sufficient of a story to grip the attention of an ordinary pint lire theatre attendance."^[15]

A contemporary review said that:

The views wore very life-like and distinct, and illustrated the stockrider reeling from lm saddle, and as his mate tended him beneath the trees, recalling the scenes of his past life 'wheeling through the wild scrub the cattle in the wood,' Yarding the cattle gave opportunity for a fine and animated bush scene, with exhibitions of buckjumping, and was followed by the exciting chase of the bush ranger, 'Starlight.' and his gang, by the troopers' and bush men, the Tjnsrl ranaer at bay, and the struggle in the watercourse.. The lights and shades, the tragedies and comedies of bush life, were followed by the death of the stock rider, with the sturdy bush children romping over his crave — altogether a very fine and vivid production, which elicited a round of applause.^[11]

Another review said:

The only drawback to it is that there is no connected 'story ' in the poem, only a series of incidents of bush life, so that the attention of the audience cannot be oarried to a culminating climax; but that the feature which does not apply to other films by the same company, where the dramatic interest is sustained throughout.^[16]

The Bulletin wrote that the title was:

A sure draw on the bills, but not the easiest of themes for picture treatment. George Bryant played the dying man, whilst Godfrey Cass did the friend who shook his pillows up. a bit. The incidents of the sick one's old colonial days were arranged for interpolation as the yarn proceeded. The death scene and the kiddies romping on the “grassy mound” of the deceased. were, easy things to finish up with. All the.pictures are as good as the best imported, indeed, the children, frisking about the grave is a fine photographic effort. .When the “Sick Stockrider” is shown—it has had two successful innings at Hoyt’s —the poem is recited by Roy Redgrave, ’ who gets his best effects when the Stockrider and his mate are on the screen, and Bryant’s lips seem to move in unison with the verse.^[17]

Harry Southwell also announced plans to film the poem but no movie resulted.^[18]

• The Sick Stockrider at IMDb
• The Sick Stockrider at National Film and Sound Archive
• Original text of The Sick Stockrider by Adam Lindsay Gordon
• The Sick Stockrider at AustLit