The Last valley is a 1-hour documentary film shot in East Gippsland Victoria and screened on ABC TV in 2005. It follows the story of loggers and conservationists thrown into conflict as the timber resource of the region runs out and the ...See moreThe Last valley is a 1-hour documentary film shot in East Gippsland Victoria and screened on ABC TV in 2005. It follows the story of loggers and conservationists thrown into conflict as the timber resource of the region runs out and the remaining old-growth forests are targeted by government forest managers. The films shows the incompetence of the government managers, a corrupt logging industry and the manipulation and exploitation of forestry politics and workers jobs by a self-interested logging union. The film was nominated as 1 of 5 best Australian documentaries of 2005. It was directed by Peter Vaughan, Producers, Russell Hawkins and Toby Patten, Executive Producers, Michael McManon and Tony Ayers, Editor Jane Usher, Script Writer Rosie Jones and P Vaughan. Music and sound design Jamie Saxe. During production of the film, Peter Rutherford, the General Manager of the government logging agency Forestry Victoria, made attempts to stop its completion by initiating a series of malicious criminal charges against the Director. At the trial the government suddenly withdrew all charges after the judge criticised the political nature of the prosecution. The judge also levelled serious criticism against the Forestry Victoria, General Manager, Peter Rutherford, for initiating what he described as a malicious prosecution, and an abuse of authority. Vaughan's outstanding legal team consisted of barrister Klaus Mueller, and solicitor Vanessa Bleyer. Rutherford was later overlooked for the role of managing the new government logging agency VicForests, a decision attributed to the progressive Environment Minister John Thwaits. After his fall from grace, Rutherford found a job working for a Japanese wood-chip mill at Eden NSW, where he became infamous for posting vicious, self-narrated, hate-videos, focusing upon local female conservationists opposed to the clear-fell logging of the Southern Forests by agents for the chip-mill - The Last Valley was one of Australia's last publicly funded independent investigative environmental documentaries, before political interference within SBS and ABC dumbed-down the production of documentary into cooking and lifestyle content. Written by
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