David Stratton

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English and Australian film critic (1939–2025)

title: "David Stratton" type: doc version: 1 created: 2026-02-28 author: "Wikipedia contributors" status: active scope: public tags: ["1939-births", "2025-deaths", "20th-century-english-non-fiction-writers", "21st-century-english-memoirists", "20th-century-australian-non-fiction-writers", "21st-century-australian-non-fiction-writers", "australian-film-critics", "film-festival-directors", "australian-media-personalities", "australian-memoirists", "the-australian-journalists", "english-emigrants-to-australia", "people-educated-at-chafyn-grove-school", "journalists-from-sydney", "people-from-trowbridge", "members-of-the-order-of-australia", "commandeurs-of-the-ordre-des-arts-et-des-lettres", "variety-(magazine)-people", "longford-lyell-award-recipients"] description: "English and Australian film critic (1939–2025)" topic_path: "arts" source: "https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Stratton" license: "CC BY-SA 4.0" wikipedia_page_id: 0 wikipedia_revision_id: 0

::summary English and Australian film critic (1939–2025) ::

::data[format=table title="Infobox person"]

FieldValue
honorific_suffix
nameDavid Stratton
imageDavid Stratton.jpg
captionStratton in 2012
birth_date
birth_placeTrowbridge, Wiltshire, England
death_date
death_placeBlue Mountains,
New South Wales, Australia
citizenship
occupation
years_active1963–2023
known_for
spouseSusie Craig
children2
::

| honorific_suffix = | name = David Stratton | image = David Stratton.jpg | caption = Stratton in 2012 | birth_date = | birth_place = Trowbridge, Wiltshire, England | death_date = | death_place = Blue Mountains, New South Wales, Australia | employer = | citizenship = | occupation = | years_active = 1963–2023 | known_for = | spouse = Susie Craig | children = 2

David James Stratton (10 September 1939 – 14 August 2025) was an English and Australian film critic and historian. He also worked as a journalist and author, interviewer, educator and lecturer, television personality and producer. His career as a film critic, writer, and educator in Australia spanned 57 years, until his retirement in December 2023. Stratton's media career included presenting film review shows on television with Margaret Pomeranz for 28 years, writing film reviews for The Weekend Australian for over 30 years, and lecturing in film history for 35 years. He was widely regarded as a highly influential film critic in Australia.

Early life and education

David James Stratton was born in Trowbridge, Wiltshire, England, on 10 September 1939, a week after Britain declared war on Germany. His father, Wilfred, enlisted in the army and fought in Burma and his mother, Kathleen, volunteered with the Red Cross. Stratton was sent to Hampshire to see out the war years with his grandmother. An avid filmgoer, his grandmother regularly took Stratton to the local cinemas. When he was around six years old, his father returned from the war and the family moved back to Wiltshire. His younger brother, Roger, was born in 1947. Roger later said that David's relationship with his father was difficult because he did not know him until he was six.

Stratton attended Chafyn Grove School from 1948 to 1953 as a boarder, but never finished secondary school. After leaving school, he spent his time with local film societies and working in the family grocery business. Stratton was expected to take over the business which had been established in 1824 and run by five generations of Strattons. Stratton later described his relationship with his father as "fractious", as his father wanted him to take over the family business, and did not understand his son's interest in films.

Stratton saw his first foreign film in Bath in 1955, the Italian romantic comedy Bread, Love and Dreams. That was soon followed by Akira Kurosawa's Japanese epic adventure drama Seven Samurai showing in Birmingham. At the age of 19, he founded the Melksham and District Film Society.

Career

Sydney Film Festival

Stratton arrived in Australia in 1963 under the "Ten Pound Poms" migration scheme. The festival director at the time objected to the motion and quit in protest, leading Stratton to be appointed director in 1966.

Several years later, his father became too ill to run his business. With both brothers unable to take over, the business was sold. Stratton said he "carried that guilt around ever since". Around the same time, he was the subject of surveillance by the Australian Security Intelligence Organisation (ASIO) due to the festival showing Soviet films and his late-1960s visit to Russia. This information was not made public until January 2014. Stratton remained director of the Sydney Film Festival until 1983.

Television

Stratton worked for SBS from 1980, acting as their film consultant and introducing the SBS Cinema Classics on Sunday evenings and Movie of the Week for 24 weeks a year. It was at SBS that Stratton met Margaret Pomeranz, then a producer. onwards Stratton co-hosted the long-running SBS TV program The Movie Show with Pomeranz, who was also the show's original producer, after having to persuade her to join him on-air.

The pair moved to the ABC where they hosted the similarly formatted show, At the Movies, from 1 July 2004. In 2014, Stratton and Pomeranz decided to end the show. The final episode, broadcast on 9 December 2014, was watched by more than 700,000 viewers, making it one of the most-watched season finales in the network's history. Stratton later said that he regretted his decision to end the show, and lamented the lack of a champion on television to promote small independent films, such as Partho Sen-Gupta's thriller Slam.

Writing and teaching

Stratton had a review of 3 to Go published in Variety in 1971 and wrote regular reviews for them from 1984 to 2003, becoming their principal Australian reviewer. He also wrote reviews for The Weekend Australian for over 30 years and for TV Week from 1995. He also contributed articles to The Age, The Bulletin, The Sydney Morning Herald, Cinema Papers and International Film Guide. He lectured in film history at the University of Sydney's Centre for Continuing Education from around 1988 until December 2023, during which he covered around 840 films and showed 7,506 film clips. Many of his students re-enrolled year after year. Stratton retired from writing criticism and teaching in 2023.

Stratton authored six books, five of which were about films and the film industry.

Juries and other roles

Stratton and Pomeranz played an important role in challenging the often heavy-handed decisions of the Australian Classification Board throughout their career. One of his legacies is the part he played in bringing about the R18+ film classification.

Stratton was invited to sit on many international juries at film festivals, including Venice in 1994, ::figure[src="https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/4/4a/David_Stratton,_February_2019.jpg" caption="Stratton speaking at the Perth Festival Writers Week in 2019"] ::

Stratton acted as programming consultant to the London and Los Angeles festivals and contributed regularly to the International Film Guide, compiled and published in London. He and Pomeranz were patrons of the Adelaide Film Festival. On 14 March 2015, Stratton appeared in front of a sold-out crowd at a meeting with David Lynch on the opening weekend of the exhibition David Lynch: Between Two Worlds at the Gallery of Modern Art (GOMA) in Brisbane, Queensland. The one-hour conversation was Lynch's first and only public appearance in Australia.

In film and other television

The documentary film David Stratton: A Cinematic Life, written and directed by Sally Aitken, was released in 2017 and re-edited for television. It features interviews with Stratton about his life and with actors, directors and producers representing Australian cinema since the 1960s. A preliminary version of the film was first released at the 2016 Adelaide Film Festival as David Stratton's Stories of Australian Cinema, a "work in progress screening... a celebration of 110 years of Australian Cinema history and its creators". The title was later screened as a three-part series on ABC Television. The series was produced by Jo-anne McGowan of production company Stranger Than Fiction.

In 1993, Stratton made an uncredited cameo appearance in Paul Cox's "Touch Me", one of the short films featured in the series Erotic Tales. He appeared in several ABC programs, including The Chaser's War on Everything, Review with Myles Barlow, Good Game, Adam Hills in Gordon Street Tonight, Lawrence Leung's Choose Your Own Adventure, Dance Academy and The Bazura Project, often parodying himself.

Recognition and honours

Personal life

Stratton was twice married. His first marriage was at a young age. His second marriage was to Susie Craig, whom he met in 1979. He had a son and a daughter. He became an Australian citizen in the 1980s. In 1991, Stratton and his wife moved to the Blue Mountains in New South Wales. He had a collection of about 20,000 DVDs in his home.

In 2008, he released his autobiography called I Peed on Fellini, a reference to a drunken attempt to shake director Federico Fellini's hand while using a urinal. In 2017 he said that every single day he watched at least one film he had not seen before and that he had seen more than 25,000 films.

In his final years, giant cell arteritis caused Stratton to lose sight in one eye and have limited vision in the other. Steroids used to treat the disease made his bones weak and he fractured his back twice.

Taste and style

Stratton said that his favourite film was the 1952 American musical Singin' in the Rain: "I grew up on musicals and this is the best musical ever made." His favourite Australian film was Newsfront, directed by Phillip Noyce. He was also a great fan of French New Wave films, including the directors François Truffaut, Jean-Luc Godard, Claude Chabrol and Jacques Demy. He particularly disliked shaky handheld cinematography and American action blockbusters.

Two articles which analysed their reviews at SBS and ABC showed that Stratton was generally a slightly harsher critic than Pomeranz. According to Ozflicks website, run by Peter Morrow, both critics gave five stars to: Evil Angels (1988), Return Home (1990), The Piano (1993), Lantana (2001), and Samson and Delilah (2009).

They disagreed particularly on Romper Stomper (Stratton refusing to rate it because of the racist violence in the film), The Castle (1997), Last Train to Freo (2006), Human Touch (2004), and Kenny (2006), with Stratton awarding fewer stars than Pomeranz on all but Human Touch. The director of Romper Stomper, Geoffrey Wright, later threw a glass of wine at Stratton at the Venice Film Festival.

Death and legacy

Stratton died on 14 August 2025 at a hospital in the Blue Mountains, near where he had been living. He was 85. His family invited everyone "to celebrate David's remarkable life and legacy by watching their favourite movie, or David's favourite movie of all time—Singin' In the Rain". A public memorial service was being planned after a private funeral.

The Prime Minister of Australia, Anthony Albanese, posted a personal tribute to Stratton on X, saying "All of us who tuned in to At the Movies respected him for his deep knowledge and for the gentle and generous way he passed it on."

Publications

References

References

  1. Burgmann, M.. (2014). "Dirty Secrets: Our ASIO files". NewSouth Publishing.
  2. King, Jennifer. (14 August 2025). "David Stratton, legendary film critic who championed Australian and international cinema – obituary". The Guardian.
  3. Cain, Sian. (14 August 2025). "David Stratton, esteemed Australian film critic, dies aged 85".
  4. Wilson, Jake. (27 August 2007). "A Critic Unbuttons: I Peed On Fellini: Recollections of a Life in Film by David Stratton".
  5. Purcell, Charles. (1 June 2019). "David Stratton on changing up the Sydney Film Festival's retrospective".
  6. Stratton, D.. (2008). "I Peed on Fellini: Recollections of a Life in Film". William Heinemann.
  7. FitzSimons, Peter. (7 December 2024). "David Stratton's top 10 lost movie gems, and the Aussie classics you haven't seen".
  8. (2017). "David Stratton: A Cinematic Life".
  9. Cowan, Jane. (7 April 2004). "David Stratton". [[Australian Broadcasting Corporation]].
  10. "David Stratton". Random House Australia.
  11. "David Stratton".
  12. Groves, Don. (November 22, 2025). "David Stratton, Variety film critic, author and tv host honoured".
  13. Quinn, Karl. (7 March 2017). "David Stratton reveals his greatest regret in lively doco A Cinematic Life".
  14. Fenely, Rick. (4 January 2014). "David Stratton oblivious he's been cast as a spy". [[The Sydney Morning Herald]].
  15. Evershed, Nick. (16 September 2014). "At the Movies: Margaret and David's most divisive films revealed".
  16. Thurling, Jan. (2011). "Celebrating 25 years in 2011".
  17. (16 September 2014). "Margaret Pomeranz and David Stratton roll end credits on 28-year film review partnership; ''At The Movies'' will not return to ABC in 2015". [[ABC News (Australia)]].
  18. Sharma, Yashee. (14 August 2025). "Beloved film critic David Stratton dies aged 85".
  19. Maras, Steven. (14 August 2025). "David Stratton was always 'doing it for the audience'. In this, he had a huge impact on Australian film".
  20. (August 17, 2025). "Aussie Variety film critic David Stratton ankles scene".
  21. "1995: October 14–20".
  22. Slatter, Sean. (14 August 2025). "Vale David Stratton, beloved Australian film critic and writer".
  23. "A History of World Cinema Course with David Stratton".
  24. Hennessy, Kate. (22 December 2023). "David Stratton's closing credits: 'I've done the best I could'".
  25. link. (23 May 2012 by Andrew L. Urban, ''Urban Cinefile'' (3 July 2003))
  26. [http://www.theage.com.au/articles/2003/07/04/1057179156219.html "Film board chief on the defensive over banned movie"] by Suzanne Carbone, ''[[The Age]]'' (5 July 2003)
  27. (2014). "David Stratton". [[Australian Broadcasting Corporation]].
  28. (18 September 2015). "Queensland Art Gallery Board of Trustees Annual Report 2014–15". Queensland Art Gallery.
  29. Caldwell, Thomas. (26 April 2015). "Living Inside a Dream: The Art and Films of David Lynch".
  30. Cerabona, Ron. (18 February 2017). "Film critic David Stratton gets his own movie at last". [[The Sydney Morning Herald]].
  31. (2 October 2018). "David Stratton's Stories of Australian Cinema".
  32. "David Stratton's Stories Of Australian Cinema".
  33. "David Stratton: A Cinematic Life".
  34. Foundas, Scott. (10 December 2014). "Australia's Siskel & Ebert Sign Off After 28 Years of Savvy Sparring".
  35. Knox, David. (14 August 2025). "Vale: David Stratton".
  36. "David James Stratton – Centenary Medal". Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet.
  37. (7 June 2006). "David Stratton to receive honorary doctorate". [[University of Sydney.
  38. Curtin, Jennie. (26 January 2015). "David Stratton's 50-year service to film honoured".
  39. (28 April 2010). "The great honorary doctorates list".
  40. Cuthbertson, Debbie. (16 August 2011). "Exhibit marks 25 years of Margaret and David". ABC News.
  41. [https://honours.pmc.gov.au/honours/awards/1150917 David James Stratton – Member of the Order of Australia], Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet, 26 January 2015
  42. Deare, Steven. (13 April 2016). "Five stars! Highest honour for movie critics".
  43. (10 June 2022). "Autumn graduation season commences: Honorary Doctorates for alumna Margaret Pomeranz AM and more". [[Macquarie University]].
  44. "Patrons and Board".
  45. Swift, Brendan. (4 September 2024). "David Stratton AM named 2024 National Cinema Pioneer of the Year".
  46. (6 June 2025). "ICYMI: David and Margaret honoured with Walk of Fame star, Talking Heads release first music video for Psycho Killer".
  47. Schmidt, Lucinda. (5 March 2008). "Profile: David Stratton".
  48. "David Stratton". [[BFI]].
  49. Douglas, Tim. (14 August 2025). "Tributes flow for legendary film critic David Stratton who died aged 85". [[The Australian]].
  50. Bailey, Michael. (14 August 2025). "Champion of Australian film David Stratton dies aged 85".
  51. (13 September 2016). "What Margaret and David say about 500 Oz Movies".
  52. (14 August 2025). "Remembering David Stratton: His 10 favourite films".
  53. Gallagher, Alex. (14 August 2025). "Australian film critic and former SBS presenter David Stratton dies aged 85".
  54. Irvine, Sam. (13 August 2025). "Australia news headlines from Thursday 14th August 2025: Film critic David Stratton dies aged 85".
  55. Thorpe, Andrew. (14 August 2025). "David Stratton, film critic and host of At the Movies alongside Margaret Pomeranz, dies aged 85".
  56. Vagg, Stephen. (15 August 2025). "David Stratton: A Personal Tribute".

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