On April 8th 1998, war broke out on the Australian waterfront between Patrick Stevedores and the Maritime Union of Australia when Patrick dismissed its entire unionised workforce. It was a war that would change a nation.
Bastard Boys is an Australian four-part miniseries that aired on the ABC over two nights in May 2007, telling the true story of the 1998 Waterfront Dispute
. The series was written by Susan Smith and directed by Raymond Quint, and stars Colin Friels as MUA national secretary John Coombs, Daniel Frederiksen as Union Leader Greg Combet, Geoff Morrell as Patrick Stevedores Managing Director Chris Corrigan, Anthony Hayes as State MUA rep Sean McSwain, Justin Smith as lawyer Josh Bornstein, Rhys Muldoon as QC Julian Burnside, and Jack Thompson and Dan Wyllie as dockworkers Tony and Brendan Tully.
Bastard Boys provides examples of:
- Accidental Misnaming: Julian Burnside addresses Greg as Geoff several times, without being corrected.
- Composite Character: Most of the dockside workers were composites based on interviews with actual MUA members.
- Crusading Lawyer: Josh Bornstein approaches the MUA and offers to help them pro bono, out of his own disgust about what's happening on the docks.
- How We Got Here: The first episode opens on the aforementioned dismissal in April 1998, before cutting back to November 1997 and the start of John Coombes involvement.
- It Will Never Catch On: Greg and John are unimpressed by Josh approaching Julian Burnside QC, considering him a corporate lawyer who's never touched industrial relations law (and Julian himself confirms he hasn't looked at the relevant legislation). By 2007, Burnside had become a respected human rights lawyer.
- Mysterious Informant: The first episode has John receiving an anonymous phone call warning him about the plan to replace the unionised workforce.
- Rotating Protagonist: The four episodes focus on different perspectives of the conflict: "Greg's War", "Josh's War", "Sean's War" and finally "Chris's War".
- Stock Footage: Contemporary politicians such as John Howard, Kim Beazley and Peter Reith appear in archive footage.
- Title Drop: In the opening interview scenes, Chris Corrigan tells a story about a Hungarian refugee, who employed a lot of child labour and forced them to work in his market garden at 3am in winter. "He used to say, 'Work a little harder, bastard boys!' Never forget it."
- Villain Protagonist: Chris Corrigan is the focus of the final episode. While the most visible antagonist up to that point, he's presented somewhat sympathetically due to the pressure he's under from the likes of John Howard and Peter Reith, as well as having genuine financial issues and legitimate complaints about the Union.
- "Where Are They Now?" Epilogue: The final scenes take place a year after the dismissal, with captions revealing what happened next for Julian, Josh, John, Greg, Chris, the Howard government, the Maritime Union and Patrick Stevedores.
- Worthy Opponent: Chris Corrigan describes John Coombes as such.
