[KenRa Films Present: the Kenneth Rankine Home Movie Collection: Reel 9]

Kenneth Carruthers Rankine (1890 - 1968) was a keen amateur cinematographer and filmmaker. This collection of his home movies has been donated to ACMI by Kenneth’s granddaughter. The collection represents a wonderful slice of life in Australia; with contents including scenes of everyday life, major family occasions, holidays around Victoria and views of Melbourne.

This film is more whimsical in approach than the family based footage seen in other films, as reflected by the title ‘Open Road Open Sky’. In the opening scene we see Kenneth a fellow traveller wandering along country roads as well as shots of roads into the distance and the skies overhead. Further into the reel we see the Sherbrooke Forest, the ‘Burnham Beeches’ and ‘Alfred Nicholson Memorial Gardens’. There are shots of several animals such as emu and echidna as well as quite a bit of birdlife and Kenneth’s favourite shots of flowers and trees. The reel ends with Kenneth walking away from the forests and an end title shot.

Selected sequence list:

00:00:27:00 title ‘Open Road Open Sky’, Kenneth and a fellow traveller wandering along country roads.

00:01:00:00 large power poles along country roads, a few examples of country houses.

00:01:47:00 kangaroos and peacocks.

00:02:45:00 Kenneth walks along a road with his camera.

00:03:14:00 an emu, echidna and a wallaby come into view.

00:04:15:00 close up of Kenneth filming behind his camera followed by ‘Burnham Beeches’ mansion and estate in Sherbrooke Forest and the ‘Alfred Nicholson Memorial Gardens’.

00:06:31:00 birdlife inlcuding storks and lyrebirds.

00:07:44:00 Indigenous rider on horseback, waving at the camera whilst he rounds up horses, camels and Shetland ponies on grassland.

00:08:07:00 brolgas (filmed only from neck down only so difficult to be certain).

00:10:03:00 a quick shot of a woman behind the camera.