Dawn!

{{Infobox film

| name = Dawn!

| image = Dawn! 1979 Movie Poster.jpg

| caption = Original release poster

| director = Ken Hannam

| producer = Joy Cavill

| writer = Joy Cavill

| starring = Bronwyn Mackay-Payne
Ron Haddrick
Bunny Brooke
Tom Richards
Ivar Kants

| music = Michael Carlos

| cinematography = Russell Boyd

| editing = Max Lemon

| studio = South Australian Film Corporation

| distributor = Hoyts Distribution (Australia)

| released = {{film date|df=yes|1979|3|8|USA|1979|3|19|Australia}}

| runtime = 109 minutes

| country = Australia

| language = English

| budget = $641,000David Stratton, The Last New Wave: The Australian Film Revival, Angus & Robertson, 1980 pp. 111–113

}}

Dawn! is a 1979 Australian sports biopic about the three-time Olympic gold medallist swimmer Dawn Fraser, who served as technical adviser for the production. It starred Bronwyn Mackay Payne and Bunney Brooke, and was written by Joy Cavill and directed by Ken Hannam. The film was entered into the 11th Moscow International Film Festival.{{cite web|url=http://www.moscowfilmfestival.ru/miff34/eng/archives/?year=1979 |title=11th Moscow International Film Festival (1979) |accessdate=2013-01-18 |work=MIFF |url-status=dead |archiveurl=https://web.archive.org/web/20140403102012/http://www.moscowfilmfestival.ru/miff34/eng/archives/?year=1979 |archivedate=3 April 2014 }}

Plot

The film deals with Dawn Fraser's rise to fame as a champion Olympic swimmer, her anti-authoritarian clashes with Australian Swimming officials, her triumphs, marriage and eventual divorce.

Cast

Bronwyn Mackay-Payne as Dawn Fraser
Ron Haddrick as Pop
Bunney Brooke as Mum
Tom Richardsas Harry
John Diedrich as Gary
Gabrielle Hartley as Kate
Ivar Kants as Len
David Cameron as Joe
Kevin Wilson as Bippy
Kevin Manser as Official
John Clayton as Syd
Lyndall Barbour as Edie
Deborah Kennedy
Bob Baines as 12th Policeman

Production

The film was produced by Joy Cavill who had previously made a documentary, The Dawn Fraser Story (1964).

In the 1970s Cavill wrote a script based on Fraser's life and showed it to Jill Robb and John Morris of the South Australian Film Corporation. They agrees to put up $250,000 and raise the balance of the money in exchange for 50% of the profits.

The lead, Bronwyn Mackay-Payne, was cast after a search that involved interviewing 1,200 girls and screen testing ten. Mackay-Payne had never acted before.{{cite news |url=http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article110850780 |title=LIFE STYLE. |newspaper=The Canberra Times |date=17 June 1977 |accessdate=20 December 2014 |page=9 |via=National Library of Australia}}

Shooting began on 19 September 1977 and went for ten weeks, with studio work in Adelaide and location shooting in Balmain, Sydney, Melbourne Olympic Stadium, and Tokyo.