£500 Reward

A "five-act" drama about a couple who travel from the Rocky Mountains to Seattle then wind up shipwrecked en route to Queensland.{{cite news |url=http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article15812041 |title=Advertising. |newspaper=The Sydney Morning Herald |date=22 November 1918 |access-date=5 January 2012 |page=3 |via=National Library of Australia}} The heroine Irene is kidnapped by a ship captain and winds up wrecked on the Queensland coast. She is rescued by the hero.

• Claude Flemming as Jack
• John Faulkner as Captain Wolff Forrest
• Renée Adorée as Irene
• Barry Lupino
• Lorna Ambler
• David Edelsten

The film was written, produced, directed and financed by Claude Flemming. It was reported to be the first feature film to include footage of Mount Kosciuszko, which stood in for Canada.{{cite news |url=http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article15808703 |title=Amusements. Local Photo-Play—"£500 Reward.". |newspaper=The Sydney Morning Herald |date=29 October 1918 |access-date=5 January 2012 |page=8 |via=National Library of Australia}} Scenes were also shot at Bermagui, on board an American sailing ship visiting Sydney, and at Rushcutters Bay studio.{{cite news |url=http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article263631215 |title=Production of Moving Pictures – In America and Australia. |newspaper=Australian Town and Country Journal |volume=XCVIII |issue=2555 |location=New South Wales, Australia |date=18 December 1918 |access-date=21 November 2023 |page=21 |via=National Library of Australia}}{{cite news |url=http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article123139592 |title=Elsie Ferguson at Hoyts |newspaper=Sunday Times |issue=1713 |location=New South Wales, Australia |date=17 November 1918 |accessdate=20 April 2024 |page=22 |via=National Library of Australia}}

The cast included Renée Adorée, who was then a dancer touring Australia on the Tivoli circuit with an act called "The Magneys", and subsequently went on to star in The Big Parade (1925).{{cite news |url=http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article128376848 |title=It All Began With a Feature Movie on the Kelly Gang. |newspaper=The News |location=Adelaide |date=16 November 1946 |access-date=20 February 2014 |page=2 |via=National Library of Australia}}

John Faulkner and Claude Flemming reputedly clashed during the film over interpretation.Trader Faulkner, "John Faulkner", Cinema Papers, January 1978 p 213

The film ran for two weeks in a cinema in Sydney. Flemming then had to go overseas to London and by the time he came back he was unable to locate a copy of the negative and the movie was thought to be lost until a copy was found in a basement in 1938.

During the 1920s Flemming tried to re-register the film under a different, more saleable title, but was refused six times by the New South Wales censorship board. The other titles he attempted to use were, The Lure of a Woman, Primal Passion, When Men Desire, The Auction of Virtue, The Reckless Lover, and A Romance of Two Worlds.Andrew Pike and Ross Cooper, Australian Film 1900–1977: A Guide to Feature Film Production, Melbourne: Oxford University Press, 1998, 84.

{{reflist}}

• {{IMDb title|id=0134272}}
• [http://colsearch.nfsa.gov.au/nfsa/search/display/display.w3p;adv=;group=;groupequals=;holdingType=;page=0;parentid=;query=500%20reward;querytype=;rec=0;resCount=10 £500 Reward] at National Film and Sound Archive

{{DEFAULTSORT:500 pound Redward}}

Category:1918 films

Category:Silent Australian drama films

Category:Australian black-and-white films

Category:Australian silent feature films

Category:1910s rediscovered films

Category:1918 drama films

Category:1910s melodrama films

Category:Rediscovered Australian films

Category:Films directed by Claude Flemming

Category:1910s English-language films

Category:English-language drama films