Body Surfer

1989 Mini-Series, VHS quality

Johnny's comments:

This 1989 mini-series is based on the novel by Robert Drewe (The Shark Net) and follows newly divorced David Lang (Peter Kowitz), who is moving on with his life and decides to retreat to what made him happy as a child, being at the beach. There he meets Lydia (Joy Smithers) who also has a fondness for the beach and begins a relationship with her which goes well enough that he introduces her to his 3 children, who seem receptive of her. But then he slowly but surely starts to lose his mind and having vivid dreams involving thrill killers. He moves on from Lydia and has an affair with Anthea (Linda Cropper) and he becomes obsessed with her travelling husband and whether or not Anthea is sleeping around. The focus of part 2 is more on David's adult son Paul (Felix Nobis) as he tries to become an artist with David coming in and out of the story.

Bodysurfer starts off well-enough, a pretty standard story about a man going through a mid-life crisis but then it turns into a very depressing story to the point where it's almost apocalyptic in feel. I'd be surprised if this mini-series found an audience because it's tough going, particularly part 2.

Anyway, there's quite a bit of nudity in the mini-series, most of which is in part 1. Joy Smithers' character has a penchant for topless sunbathing which we see in two separate scenes including a quite lengthy one where she's hanging out with David's family. David has a bit of an issue with this but more in that it gives him a boner because it reminds him of a girl he used to see at the beach in his youth (see the Nana Coburn videos below). There's one further scene which is a dream sequence where David is kissing Lydia in a car when a bunch of thrill killers arrive and force the both of them to strip. We don't really see much from Joy as she covers up for the most part but there's a bit of side-boob at one point. Smithers has had nude scenes in at least 3 other productions: an episode of All Saints, the 1985 comedy Emoh Ruo (a fairly decent scene also featuring Di Smith naked) and the 1993 talkfest Sex Is A Four Letter Word.

Linda Cropper has four nude scenes, mostly side-boob but sometimes a little more although it's only very brief looks at her nipples. The clearest look is in the fourth scene where in a dream sequence she is having sex with her husband and both are mocking David as they do (this guy has some fucked up dreams). Cropper has had nude scenes in the 1997 teen rape drama Blackrock, a few scenes in the 1995 ABC immigrant drama Bordertown and sort of nude in an episode of Offspring. I get the feeling there's some further nudity from Linda in some other productions as there's a fair bit of her credits that I haven't seen. If you know of anything else, feel free to tell me and I'll see if I can find it.

There also a brief scene when David has lost his mind and he goes to the beach and sees women topless sunbathing, who in his manic state he confuses for Lydia and we see a couple of unknown women's breasts.

In part 2, there's an early scene with Ruth Caro and Jo Poivedin and found in bed together by David's son Paul. We briefly see Ruth's breasts as she puts on a shirt to follow him.

We also see two nude scenes from Kim Antonio Hayes, one where she walks up to Paul only wearing bikini bottoms as she's doing some topless sunbathing and then a little while later when she's having sex with Paul before her boyfriend tracks her down and attacks Paul.

Various women film clips (see IDs below)

Joy Smithers

Linda Cropper

Kim Antonios Hayes

Ruth Caro