Dear Cinema Pioneers,
We are very sad to inform you of the passing of our Victorian Branch member Rob Young, who passed away suddenly on March 5th aged 79, one day after his birthday
Rob was a well respected Gaffer in the Australian Film Industry, having started working in film lighting in 1970. One of his first features as Best Boy was on Peter Weir’s “The Cars That Ate Paris”. Rob progressed from working for existing companies such as Cambridge Films and FilmCore to outfitting his own lighting truck and worked as Gaffer on Features such as “The Getting of Wisdom”, “Money Movers”, “Breaker Morant”, “Puberty Blues”, The Man From Snowy River”, “The Odd Angry Shot”, Paul Mazursky’s “Tempest”, “Crackers”, “The Earthling”, “Father”, “Peterson”, “The Club”, “Street Hero”, “Malcolm”, “The Fringe Dwellers”, “Les Patterson Saves The World”, “Fortress”, and many more.
Rob also did a lot of TV work as well as the Theatrical work including shows such as “Winners”, “Snowy River: The McGregor Saga”, and “The Genie From Down Under 2”. Rob also worked on a large number of Film Ads for the big screen including one for Ansett that saw Bruce Beresford so taken by the work that he hired the entire crew from the Ad to work on “The Getting of Wisdom”.
Rob retired at the same time that “Charlotte’s Web” was being film in 2006 but was asked to help out just once more, and did so as 3rd Electrics.
Rob worked with the cream of the Industry’s DOP’s and was well loved and respected and loved his job immensely.In 2000 Rob had a heart attack and was told by the Doctors that if he behaved himself he could get another 20 years of living, and with this news, Rob took to retirement and together Rob and Sandy bought an off road caravan and started touring Australia’s outback where they joined a caravaning club and met a lot of new friends. It was these friends that kept Rob going on his regular outback adventures, eventually leading to Rob and 3 of these friends converting his Ford Ranger into an off road camper by building a box onto the back of the vehicle and together they often trundled off into the outback where not even off road caravans could travel.
After his retirement, this became his passion.Rob was a man of many talents, and after retirement, he kept himself busy. Apart from the off road camping with his mates, Rob and Sandy toured all over the country themselves, often visiting Tamworth for the Country Music Festival (he loved Country music as well as much more including Australia’s own ACDC), and he renovated a holiday home in Wye River as well as building his own things such as furniture. Rob was also a huge StKilda Football Club fan, being a member for many many years with reserved seats at Marvel Stadium, and would have loved the game over the past weekend.
The links to StKilda were not just as fans however with Sandy volunteering for the StKilda Heritage Museum. Rob’s membership for 2021 has been confirmed and he will be attending the matches in Spirit I am sure.Rob was the youngest of 6 siblings with Rene, Joyce, Joan, Alex and Les all deceased, leaving Rob the last of them to pass away. He had a wide extended family and was a loved brother-in-law of Linda, loved uncle to Helen, Wayne and Jerome, and although Rob and Sandy never had children, Rob has a son from a previous marriage living in Canada who keeps in touch.
Robert James Young was born March 4 1942 and passed away March 5th 2021 aged 79. His funeral was held on March 15th and at the funeral they played the song “Don’t Let the Old Man In” by Toby Keith from the Soundtrack of the Clint Eastwood film “The Mule”, the message being you are only as old as you feel and retirement doesn’t mean the end of your life. I think Rob very much lived by those words.
Our thoughts go out to his Wife Sandy, family, and friends.
VALE provided by: Derek ScreenOn behalf of the Victorian Branch Committee