Frontline-Series 3 (1997)

This review is sponsored by

BUY IT

General		Extras
Category	Comedy	None
Rating
Year Of Production	1997
Running Time	344:13
RSDL / Flipper	Dual Layered Dual Disc Set	Cast & Crew
Start Up	Menu
Region Coding	1,2,3,4,5,6	Directed By	Santo Cilauro Tom Gleisner Jane Kennedy Rob Sitch
Studio Distributor	Roadshow Home Entertainment	Starring	Rob Sitch Bruno Lawrence Kevin J. Wilson Steve Bisley Jane Kennedy Tiriel Mora Alison Whyte Santo Cilauro Anita Cerdic Trudy Hellier Linda Ross Genevieve Mooy Lynda Gibson
Case	Amaray-Transparent-S/C-Dual
RPI	$39.95	Music	Craig Harnath

    Hot on the heels of Series Two comes the third and final instalment of the hysterical satire Frontline, a television show that will alter the way you watch current affairs forever. Frontline  - Series One was released on DVD back in 2004, with Frontline  - Series Two released in March 2006 at the same time as this third series. Since not much has changed, much of the same detail from my review of Series Two is contained below with a quick summary of the differences from the first two series and a brief run down of each episode.

    Frontline is a satirical fly-on-the-wall account (with an almost documentary style which is further helped by the fact that it was shot on a domestic style camcorder) of the background workings of a commercial television current affairs programme. Frontline is the name of the program shown each weeknight on an unnamed commercial network. Think of a cross between A Current Affair and Today Tonight and you are pretty much on the money for the style of story that Frontline is after. You know the sort - miracle diets, dodgy repairmen, or complaints against Telstra are the staple for these lowest common denominator programmes. Frontline is hosted by former ABC journalist Mike Moore (Rob Sitch). Apparently Mike was the finance reporter for the 7:30 report in Perth before being poached by the commercial network. He thinks he's hard hitting and in the same league as someone like the ABC's heavyweights Tony Jones and Kerry O'Brien, but in reality he's pretty lightweight and not much more than a talking head. He spends a great deal of each episode trying to prove his journalistic worth and increase his standing in the hierarchy of Australian television, all without much success. It is amazing how little Mike does around the office and still manages to claim he is under the pump all of the time.

    Back for series three and handling all the on-air reporting duties are Brooke Vandenberg (Jane Kennedy) and Martin Di Stasio (Tiriel Mora). Brooke is still the highly ambitious and very b****y young professional who will let nothing get in her way as she scrambles to the very top of the television pile and the dream job of celebrity interviews on 60 Minutes. Marty is the archetypal journo. Heavy drinking, cynical, hard-bitten and extremely rough around the edges. A veteran who has done much and seen even more and really can't be bothered with all the shenanigans of those wannabes around him. But like Brooke, he has been known to bend a few rules and stretch the journalist's code of ethics to breaking point to secure the exclusive story.

    Just like the major cast change that occurred between Series One and Series Two, a new Executive Producer has taken the reigns for Series Three. I guess this revolving door of EPs pretty much mirrors real life, where the on-air talent is kept as stable as possible so as to not upset the picky viewers, while those behind the scenes are far more expendable. Out goes Series Two EP Sam Murphy (Kevin J Wilson) and in comes the delightfully over-the-top slime-ball and chauvinistic pig Graham Prowse (Steve Bisley). Whereas Prowsey's predecessors were obsessed with ratings, the slimy Prowse is far more interested in chasing the odd bit of skirt in the office. As before the real brains and effort behind each of the stories is program producer Emma Ward (Alison Whyte), who comes up with most of the ideas for the stories, does almost all the research, writes most of the copy and is also probably the only staff member with any hint of integrity. She still manages to do all of these duties with little thanks and beat off the advances of her lecherous boss.

    Frontline - Series Three continues to open the eyes of the unsuspecting viewing public to some of the more dubious and completely immoral practices of commercial tabloid television, all while raising many laughs. It again covers everything from the use of hidden cameras, the classic foot-in-the-door bullying style of interview, the crassness of cheque-book journalism, the need to consider ratings wins above everything else and some serious bending of the journalist's code of ethics. It also deal some more with the huge egos obviously present in commercial television and the inability of many television stars to stop thinking about anything apart from themselves.

    Just like Series One and Two, there are 13 episodes in Series Three. Here's a brief rundown of each:

Episode 1 - Dick On The Line (27:09)

    Mike Moore is still worried about being seen as a light weight and this time he has had enough. He decides to finally make a stand and demands some say in the editorial content of the show. With not enough room for both the host and the Executive Producer to decide on the stories it looks like it might be the end of one of them.

Episode 2 - My Generation (25:22)

    Always worried about what people think of him and the show, Mike is concerned Frontline is painting a negative picture of young people. He takes his concerns to new EP Graham Prowse, who decides that this exploiting of children in stories is too good an opportunity to pass up.

Episode 3 - The Shadow We Cast (26:00)

    A new Queensland MP makes a maiden speech in Federal Parliament and sets off a storm of controversy about immigration and Aboriginal welfare. Pauline Hanson mania was at its peak when this episode was filmed and somehow the team managed to convince the outspoken member for Oxley to appear on Frontline as herself. "Please Explain!".

Episode 4 - One Rule For One (25:40)

    Frontline runs a story on a dodgy builder and afterwards Mike starts receiving death threats. Convinced someone is out to get him, Mike has Prowsey arrange a bodyguard with disastrous results.

Episode 5 - A Hole In The Heart Part 1 (26:26)

    A media frenzy breaks out after Frontline runs a story about a boy from PNG who has been flown to Australia to have a heart operation. Meanwhile Brooke has some pretty serious news of her own.

Episode 6 - A Hole In The Heart Part 2 (26:11)

    In between saving kids with heart trouble, helping Brooke with her personal issues and worrying about the ratings, Mike must make time to attend a celebrity golf day with Aussie golfer Ian Baker-Finch.

Episode 7 - The Simple Life (26:31)

    Mike's status as a working class icon is again under threat when he is spotted bidding at an auction for a luxury house. His credibility is further dented when he makes the famous BRW magazine 'Rich List'.

Episode 8 - I Get The Big Names (26:53)

    Mike is convinced the only reason he gets the big name guests is because he is the king-pin of interviewers. But does Mike get the big names or do the big names get him?

Episode 9 - The Art Of The Interview (21:12)

    An aspiring executive producer picks Prowsey's brains on why Mike is such a good interviewer. With Marty and Emma, the team dissects what makes the perfect interviewer and show how Mike has a trick for every occasion.

Episode 10 - I Disease (25:23)

    Mike is working on a book about himself, which is further proof that modern journalism is little about reporting and more about self-promotion and the art of being a television stars.

Episode 11 - Addicted To Fame(29:54)

    Mike decides to reduce his public profile but finds it almost impossible to live without the publicity, while weatherman Geoffrey Salter finally gets a television show of his own.

Episode 12 - The Code (27:38)

    Elliot Rhodes, the Friday Night Funny Man, insults a friend of Mike's, so the host has him sacked. Meanwhile Marty is working on one of the most difficult stories of his career - one focused solely on Mike.

Episode 13 - Epitaph (29:54)

    Mike decides to leave his mark as a journalist so looks to tackle the weighty issue of Aboriginal health. Meanwhile Brooke is talking about weddings.

Video

    The video transfer for Series Three is pretty much exactly the same as that found on the first two series. Anyone who is familiar with either the original television broadcast on the ABC or the VHS tape version of this series will know exactly what to expect in terms of video quality. Again the answer is not much. But really that is part of the charm of this show. The highly variable video quality contributes to the overall style and mood of the show. In what co-creator and star Rob Sitch described as a possible world-first, the majority of each episode was recorded on a simple hand-held video camera (probably nothing more than a home style Hi8 or S-VHS), while the on-air segments of the actual Frontline show were shot using a higher resolution Betacam SP video camera.

    Just as it was with Series One and Two, the difference between the two is quite remarkable but allows the viewer to instantly switch between the professional controlled on-air environment and the slapdash chaos and almost fly-on-the-wall style that is the behind-the-scenes action. Grain is highly problematic for the majority of each episode, particularly the lower resolution video footage. This is in no way a mastering issue though, since it has always looked like this. Shadow detail suffers on the odd occasion, but again this is not a mastering fault, rather the use of poor lighting during filming. It was a pretty low budget production after all. Just as it was with the first two seasons, edge enhancement on the lower resolution shots is rife throughout, and is on a par with that found in Series Two. Overall the video transfer for these DVDs mirrors exactly how the show looked on television and is as good as can be expected.

    The original made-for-television aspect ratio of 1.33:1 has been maintained and this transfer is not enhanced for 16x9 televisions.

    Colours are fairly drab, but again this is exactly as expected.

    Compression artefacts are absent, but there are plenty of video artefacts present throughout many of the episodes.

    Series One was hampered by the lack of subtitles, but this was rectified for Series Two. Thankfully that continues here on Series Three with English for the Hearing Impaired subtitles present for all episodes. They are well placed on screen in a nice bright yellow typeface and are easily read.

    Both discs are dual layered with separate episodes spread across separate layers.

Video Ratings Summary

Sharpness
Shadow Detail
Colour
Grain/Pixelization
Film-To-Video Artefacts
Film Artefacts
Overall

Audio

    Just as was the case with Series Two and unlike Series One (which somewhat surprisingly featured a Dolby Digital 5.1 effort encoded at a bit rate of 448 Kb/s) Series Three contains a vanilla Dolby Digital 2.0 stereo track. This is a basic stereo track which manages to perform the task required of it with little fanfare.

    Dialogue levels are adequate with no obvious audio sync problems.

    The main Frontline theme plays at the beginning of each episode, over the end credits and also pops up during the episode whenever the 'real' Frontline show goes to air. It's a fairly dynamic tune with quite an authoritative feel to it.

    There is no surround channel or subwoofer use.

Audio Ratings Summary

Dialogue
Audio Sync
Clicks/Pops/Dropouts
Surround Channel Use
Subwoofer
Overall

    There are no extras on either disc in this set.

    Frontline has yet to be released in Region 1.

    Frontline - Series Three caps off the brilliant and biting satire that lifted the lid on the shenanigans of commercial current affairs. Watch all three series of this award-winning program and you will never, ever look at A Current Affair, Today Tonight, or the myriad of other current affairs shows that have long come and gone in the same way again.

     The video quality presented on this DVD of series three is exactly the same as when the series was first shown on television and is on a par with the VHS release. It at least benefits from the fact it will not wear out.

     The audio quality is average, with a Dolby Digital 2.0 soundtrack only.

     There are no extras.

Video
Audio
Extras
Plot
Overall