average Australian people (Bert Bailey is there in his Dad part of On Our Selection fame), and the servicemen types are quite inadequate. The pictorial representation of factory development, of farm and pasture, and of the Allied Works Council projects, is good, but in all else Producer-Director Ken G. Hall has made a far too low assessment of the intelligence of his prospective audiences. However, a critic from the Hobart Mercury liked the film, writing that "Script is direct, forceful. Photography good. Worth seeing." The Adelaide News thought the film had good and bad points: It is undoubtedly comprehensive for a 3,000-ft. film. Producer-Director Ken G.Hall and commentator Tom Gurr have snapshotted Australia's war effort from a good many angles. They seem out of perspective at times. 'Tough! Of course it's tough.' booms the voice of Australia. No-it's not one of Damien Parer's sweaty heroes from "Road to Kokoda" speaking, but the ex manager of a cosmetics factory talking about his taxes. The emphasis throughout is on the home front, its trials, and Its achievements, the last' described with a complacency that's naive and perhaps ill judged in a film intended for export. Even so, as a home-front documentary the film has a good deal to commend it, except that the workers portrayed are an over-clean and actorish lot. Not enough footage is given to servicemen. Those who do appear are stock types. The Adelaide Mail reported that: Points in its favor... were its crisp photography, clear commentary, economical dove-tailing of sequences showing many aspects of war work, and its patient sincerity in trying to give industrial war workers a pride in their jobs. On the debit side were a naive boastfulness ('things we taught the Allied Nations'), emphasis on the amateur aspect of Australia's war work (plenty about factory operatives who used to make and sell cosmetics, but not a word about the sizeable heavy industries operating for years), too much home front, too little front line, and too many of those old familiar faces — like 'Dad' Bert Bailey — from screen and vaudeville. There seemed to be a feeling of 'Dad 'n' Dave' in types and dialogue right through the film.... Summary — 'South-West Pacific' good enough as a civilian morale booster, for home consumption, but definitely not for export. Arthur Fadden complaint The film was subsequently screened by Senator Ashley, after a speaking engagement in Brisbane,