The Woman and The Car (2018)
A Film by Kate Blackmore

Kate Blackmore looks at motherhood and mobility, film and feminism, through the prism of Margaret Dodd’s classic short THIS WOMAN IS NOT A CAR (1982).

Blackmore and Dodd are both Adelaide-born artists, making films a generation apart. Sitting in an FX Holden, Blackmore talks to Dodd, and her friends, about the context in which her film was made. Like many of her generation, Dodd yearned for a Holden. For suburban women in the 1960s, owning a car was a form of liberation not often realised. Shaped by her experiences, Dodd’s film is a nightmarish vision of a young mother trapped in suburbia. Dodd is best known for her ceramic Holdens, which also feature in the film.

The conversations between the two artists are intercut with footage of 70s Adelaide, interviews with Holden enthusiasts and ex-factory workers, and a car procession at Adelaide's last-remaining drive-in cinema.

Blackmore's film, THE WOMAN AND THE CAR is a close-up look at how Dodd, Adelaide and, more broadly, the Australian national identity have been influenced by the presence of the car. The recent closure of the Holden factory in Adelaide marks the end of an era for the ‘all-Australian’ vehicle – and adds an extra layer of poignancy when considering the resonances of Dodd’s work on the way we see ourselves.