These short pieces are ostensibly tethered to close scene analyses, but the quality of analysis varies. Space restrictions demand that contributors avoid substantive commentary, but many too easily fall back into simple plot description, while others stray toward the literal (expansive natural space, it seems, signifies liberation for a character). Some, however, effectively bore into the stratum of meaning offered up by location. The contribution on the appearance of Waverley Cemetery in Phillip Noyce’s Newsfront (1978) is a model dissection of the way in which physical setting can silently shoulder a narrative load.

‘The contribution on the appearance of Waverley Cemetery in Phillip Noyce’s Newsfront (1978) is a model dissection of the way in which physical setting can silently shoulder a narrative load’

The series places high emphasis on the mating of text to image. Each entry is coupled with a sequence of screenshots from the film under analysis, along with a picture of the location in present day. But this visual component has an air of compromise. Even given the often poor condition of film materials, these screenshots are sometimes taken from a blurred source, or simply appear muddy in print. The bland present-day images are mostly of public domain provenance; some are ripped directly from Google Street View.

The itemisation of one city’s appearance in cinema does not necessarily make for an illuminating data set, a condition exacerbated here by the inconsistencies in the contributors’ response to the brief. But where there are deficiencies in content, the breadth of the series’ ambition – to share an audience of both sightseers and film historians – ensures some relief. When its interest as film analysis recedes, its usefulness as tour guide comes to the fore.