- Peter Butt
-
Peter Butt Born December 1, 1955
Sydney, New South Wales, AustraliaAwards Logie Award for Most Outstanding Documentary
2006 Who Killed Dr Bogle and Mrs Chandler?Peter Butt (born 1954) is an Australian, film producer, director, writer. He produces investigative documentaries for television about 20th century global and Australian history. Most of his films have been in conjunction with Film Australia and the Australian Broadcasting Corporation and SBS.
His films include[1]:
Movies
No Such a Place
No Such a Place (1981) was Butt's first work as a young director. No Such a Place chronicled the rise and fall of the Glen Davis shale-mining town and was selected to screen with Peter Weir’s Gallipoli in more than 60 cinemas around the country.
Out of Darkness
Out of Darkness (1983) explores the origins of the First Australians through archaeology. ABC
The Virgin Earth
The Virgin Earth (1984) looks at various scientific theories related to the origin of life on Earth. ABC
Life's Labour's Lost
Life's Labour's Lost (1985) asks whether there is a future for work in the robot age.ABC
China-The Long March
China-The Long March (1986) Follows stills photographer Leo Meier as he travels the route of the Long March for seven weeks to photograph the people and places of today’s China for a photographic exhibition commemorating the 50th anniversary of the Long March. The film tells the story of how, in 1934, the Communist Party undertook a massive military retreat circling to the north, eventually covering 8,000 km. It then regrouped, and The Red Army, under the command of Mao Zedong, finally defeated the Nationalist Party and took control of China.TCN9[2]
My Father, My Country
My Father, My Country (1988) In 1938 three Australian patrol officers – Jim Taylor, John Black and Pat Walsh – set off on an epic journey into the highlands of Papua New Guinea. Their purpose: to make contact with ‘stone age’ tribes who knew nothing of the outside world and explain to them that their lives were about to undergo incredible change. Fifty years later, Jim’s daughter Meg retraced her father’s steps and met people who remembered the day the patrol arrived. Meg’s observations are combined with excerpts from her father’s journal to provide a personal and poetic narrative about an extraordinary meeting of cultures.Film Australia, National Geographic and the BBC.[3][1]
The Liners
The Liners (1996-7) This high-rating four-part series charted the influence of the ocean liner on world history, received directing and editing nominations in the 1998 AFI Awards. ABC, Channel 4 in the UK and the Learning Channel in the US.
Lies, Spies and Olympics
Lies, Spies and Olympics (1999) (Film Australia) explores the impact both the Cold War and local politics had on the 1956 Melbourne Olympic Games. For three weeks in the spring of 1956, the XVI Olympiad stopped the nation. It was an opportunity for Australia to show the world what a young, ambitious country could achieve. Indeed, the Melbourne Olympic Games would become etched in Australian mythology as a watershed in its sporting, cultural and civic history. But beyond the myth is controversy - a saga of deceit, clashing egos and local and international politics that almost turned the Melbourne Games into a national disaster. Butt directed, wrote and edited. (Film Australia in association with Rob McAuley Productions).
Fortress Australia
Fortress Australia (2001) (Film Australia) Explores Australia's attempts to acquire atomic weapons during the 1950s and 1960s. Set against a backdrop of the cold war the film reveals the motives of the politicians, defence chiefs and scientists who aspired to protect their country with a nuclear arsenal. From uranium exploration and guided weapons research to A-bomb tests on Australian soil, the film reveals how Canberra aided both Britain and the United States in the hope of sharing their nuclear secrets. But fears of KGB infiltration of crucial political offices thwarted attempts to acquire weapons from Britain. In response, successive Australian governments pondered whether to go down the controversial path of producing home-grown nuclear weapons.
The Battleships
The Battleships (2000) A four-part history series about the development of the world's most powerful and controversial ships. (Rob McAuley Productions for Australian Broadcasting Corporation). Directed and written by Butt.
Silent Storm
Silent Storm (2004) (Film Australia) From 1957 to 1978, scientists secretly removed bone samples from over 21,000 dead Australians as they searched for evidence of the deadly poison, Strontium 90 - a by-product of nuclear testing. Silent Storm reveals the story behind this astonishing case of officially sanctioned 'body-snatching'. Set against a backdrop of the Cold War, the saga follows celebrated scientist, Hedley Marston, as he attempts to blow the whistle on radioactive contamination and challenge official claims that British atomic tests posed no threat to the Australian people. Marston's findings are not only disputed, he is targeted as 'a scientist of counter-espionage interest'. Silent Storm screened at many International Festivals and was nominated for four AFI awards. It was winner of Earth Vision Grand Prize (Best Film) at the Tokyo Global Environmental Film Festival and the International Gold Panda Awards for Documentary at the Sichuan TV Festival.[2]
The Airships
The Airships (2005) (Rob McAuley Productions) A three-part history series about the world's largest flying machines. (Rob McAuley Productions for Australian Broadcasting Corporation). Directed and written by Butt.
Who Killed Dr Bogle and Mrs Chandler?
Who Killed Dr Bogle and Mrs Chandler? (2006) (Film Australia) Re-examines the mysterious Bogle-Chandler case. When the half-naked bodies of brilliant physicist, Dr Gilbert Bogle, and his lover, Mrs Margaret Chandler, were found in bizarre circumstances on a Sydney riverbank in 1963, it set into play an unprecedented forensic investigation. Autopsies offered little clue as to how the couple died, only that there were signs of a rapidly acting poison. Despite assistance from the FBI and Scotland Yard, the poison was never identified. At the end of a long and controversial coronial inquest, no cause of death, killer or motive could be identified. In the ensuing years, scores of tabloid theories have been put forward, from LSD to Cold War assassinations. But in the minds of many, including the police, Margaret Chandler’s husband, Geoffrey, was the likely culprit. Four decades later, this explosive documentary reveals startling new scientific evidence - evidence so powerful the police gave filmmaker Peter Butt unprecedented access to their forensic records. It was the ABC's most watched documentary ever[4]: which won him an Australian Logie.[http://www.filmaust.com.au/BogleChandler/default.asp?content=boglechandler
The Prime Minister is Missing
"The Prime Minister is Missing" (2008) (Film Australia) With Australia at war in Vietnam in 1967, suddenly Prime Minister Harold Holt disappeared without a trace—an event unparalleled in the history of western democracy. The nation was in shock and disbelief at the shattering news, hoping for a miracle for the man who famously declared it was “all the way with LBJ”. Police led a ‘softly softly’ investigation and concluded accidental drowning. But at the height of Cold War paranoia, persistent doubts about his disappearance fuelled rumour and wild speculation. Why did Holt go into such violent surf that day? Had he chosen a bizarre way out of a difficult situation? Why were police withholding crucial facts? What had they overlooked? Holt himself left tantalising clues that challenged the official explanation. This is the story of the Prime Minister’s secret world in the months before he disappeared, a world of betrayal, blackmail, political treachery, a poisonous feud, mounting physical and mental strain, and near-death experiences. Reconstructed from eyewitness accounts, this dramatised documentary examines the political implications of the Prime Minister’s disappearance and reveals explosive new aspects of the case.[3]
Fortress Australia — about Australia's alleged attempts to acquire nuclear weapons — was subject to a complaint to the ABC's Independent Complaints Review Panel. The complaint was rejected although the panel did find that the documentary was not balanced.[5]
The complaint centred on the film’s central premise that the Australian Atomic Energy Commission had been involved in serious discussions with the Gorton government about manufacturing a home-grown nuclear arsenal. The film presented documents baring the AAEC letterhead and signature of the Chairman, Sir Philip Baxter, in which he advised the government the AAEC could produce up to thirty weapons a year.
In more recent times, The George Washington University’s National Security Archive has published documents accessed through Freedom of Information. They reveal that the US Secretary of State had discussions with Australian Prime Minister John Gorton over this very issue when Gorton opposed signing the Nuclear Non Proliferation Treaty.
In earlier years, Australia, a key U.S ally in the Pacific, had looked into the possibility of developing nuclear weapons and an interest in nuclear options persisted at the highest levels. During a visit to Australia for an ANZUS (Australia-New Zealand-U.S. pact) meeting, Rusk discussed the NPT with Liberal Party Prime Minister Gorton who had strong objections to the notion of "giving up the nuclear option for a period as long as twenty-five years when [Australia] cannot know how the situation will develop in the area." Gorton claimed to support the Treaty's purposes and the "idea of non-proliferation," but Rusk reported that he "sounded almost like DeGaulle in saying that Australia could not rely upon the United States for nuclear weapons under ANZUS in the event of nuclear blackmail or attack on Australia." Believing that some of the Australian objections involved "picayune problems," Rusk suggested that the United States had to send a special mission to Canberra to address the various "misunderstandings." Also, "Opposition to the NPT in Australia where the Atomic Energy Commission officials were confident in their ability to build a nuclear weapon "on short notice" . "The Impulse towards a Safer World" 40th Anniversary of the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty
References
<A>HREF="http://www.onf.ca/webextension/mobidocs/index.php?s=films&f=8&p=download"
- ^ Minibiography in press release for Silent Storm; Word document
- ^ http://australianscreen.com.au/titles/china-long-march/
- ^ http://dl.screenaustralia.gov.au/module/351/
- ^ Media Room: Who Killed Bogle and Chandler?; Word document
- ^ Independent Complaints Review Panel Decision: Documentary Film, Fortress Australia
Categories:- Living people
- 1954 births
- Australian film producers
- Australian film directors
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