Patricia Kennedy
A young woman who is determined to maintain her independence finds herself at odds with her family who wants her to tame her wild side and get married.
The Getting of Wisdom is based on the 1910 novel by Henry Handel Richardson (born Ethel Florence Lindesay Richardson). Her novel is thought to be an account of her own schooldays at the Presbyterian Ladies College in Melbourne. The film is about a young girl, Laura Tweedle-Rambotham who grew up in the outback, and at around the age of 14, is sent off by her poor mother who has scrimped and saved for her to go to a prestigious women’s private college in Melbourne, the Presbyterian Ladies College.
Clyde is a typical junior clerk in a public service office. He watches the budding friendship between two co-workers and he turns it into the permanent office joke. At the same time he plays out his own neurotic relationship with a bored and frustrated secretary. The cruel mass victimisation of the young lovers is carried to the annual office picnic. Office tensions are changed by the unfamiliar surroundings where the disappearance of the two lovers forces Clyde to re-examine his own shallow emotional development.
She has an incurable heart condition, her son's a shoplifter, her husband's an alcoholic, her daughter runs away from home...
Based on the highly acclaimed play by Michael Gurr, 'A Pair of Claws', it revolves around a couple who have been married for more than 30 years. Although there is a great mutual warmth between them, they are both aware that a gulf exists between them. Their son, Simon, is involved in a scandal and to preserve his career Simon must publicly denounce his father.
