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Famously, The Melbourne Cup, a film about the 1896 Melbourne Cup won by Newhaven, has been acclaimed as the main feature of Australia’s first locally produced cinema program, successfully screened at Melbourne’s Princess Theatre on November 19 of that year.
Racing on film developed down the decades from there, and by the 1930s the sport formed a popular part of newsreels shown on raceday evenings at picture shows in Melbourne and surrounds.
Fans elsewhere had to wait many days for the Melbourne Cup replay — until, that is, 1933, when Fox Movietone News set itself the bold assignment of showing Sydney evening cinemagoers footage of the Cup on the same day.
The plan was to have a half-dozen fast cars follow the race on the infield as well as cameramen stationed around the course.
Thence the film was sped to an awaiting charter flight with technicians ready to prepare the finished product on the three-hour flight from Essendon airport.
Couriers were waiting at Mascot to transport the cans to the projection room at the Regent Cinema in George Street.
In a bonus for Sydney viewers who ventured out to the pictures that night, it was a ripper Melbourne Cup, with a brave (and injured) Hall Mark completing the Derby/Cup double (as Newhaven had done 37 years earlier), and the margins a head and a head.
Woonona Beach (NSW)