Only a few Efftee newsreels have survived and this one is a vivid record of Melbourne society at play in the 1930s, complete with a society party in South Yarra.

Patricia Blaydon (Shirley Ann Richards) has been invited by Lady Denvee (Bobbie Hunt) to ride with the local fox hunt.

Hubert Blaydon (Cecil Kellaway) answers the door to an English lawyer in a bowler hat. Mr Potter (Leslie Victor) has come from England to bestow an inheritance.

Lord Blaydon (Cecil Kellaway) has taken up residence in his English country estate.

George (George Wallace) leaps into song in the courtyard of Mrs McAllister’s dog kennel (and boarding house). Jean McAllister (Lois Green) whips off her skirt to join him, dancing in hotpants.

George (George Wallace) has to display the prize new gorilla to the zoo’s best patron, Mr Inchcape (Harold Meade), but the animal is sick, so George’s mate Henry (John Dobbie) dresses in a gorilla

Farmer Hoggett (James Cromwell) arrives home with his new pig, causing great excitement among Fly’s litter of puppies.

Babe (voiced by Christine Cavanaugh) is humiliated in his first attempt to control a pen of sheep. Fly (voiced by Miriam Margolyes) tells him that pigs are inferior, which he doesn’t believe.

German actor Hermann Speelmans (1906-1960) with a dog. From our Taussig collection of film stills.