[Tibor Zoltan Koller Home Movies: Reel 1]

Tibor Zoltan Koller (1920-1975) was an amateur filmmaker who made home movies in Australia and overseas from the 1940s to the early 1970s. Born in Budapest, Hungary, Tibor lived in Melbourne, Victoria with his family. His wife Merna Koller was a frequent collaborator on these films, showing a shared interest in filmmaking.

Tibor captured suburban family life in Melbourne, including family celebrations, urban scenes and regional holidays. Tibor was actively engaged in the lapidary society of Australia. Several of his films show opal fields and gemstone artisans at work, as well as the 1969 ‘Gemboree’ in Beechworth, Victoria, a national festival organised by the lapidary clubs of Australia. Tibor also travelled to Idar-Oberstein in Germany, historically known as a gemstone town, and to Japan.

The Tibor Zoltan Koller Home Movie Collection has been donated to ACMI by the filmmaker’s daughter Vicki Koller. The films were made on Standard 8mm and Super 8mm film.

This film is entitled ‘Daddy wouldn’t buy me a Bow-Bow’ and is credited to Tibor and Merna Koller. It is staged as a narrative film, following a teenage girl, presumably the couple’s daughter, visiting a kennel to buy a puppy and bringing it home.

This film was made on Super 8mm film.

Selected highlights list:
00:00:02:00 title card ‘Daddy wouldn’t buy me a Bow-Bow’ followed by ‘Produced by Tibor & Merna Koller 1968’
00:00:29:00 calendar indicating the date 28 November 1968
00:00:36:00 footage of a teenage girl sleeping, interspersed with footage of puppies, indicating she is dreaming
00:01:37:00 the newspaper boy arrives on a bicycle
00:02:15:00 sign ‘Victorian Animal Aid Trust’
00:02:31:00 girl patting puppies through a diamond wire fence
00:04:39:00 girl and puppy playing in the front yard of their house
00:04:51:00 giving the dog a bath in the laundry sink
00:06:00:00 having a nap in the sun together
00:06:11:00 title card ‘The End, Daddy DID buy me a Bow-Bow’