Robbery Under Arms is a 1957 British crime film directed by Jack Lee and starring Peter Finch and Ronald Lewis.

[3][4] In 1865 Australia, the two Marston brothers, bold Dick and sensitive Jim, are drawn into a life of crime by their ex-convict father Ben and his friend, the famous cattle thief Captain Starlight.

Just as the brothers are about to leave to start a new life, Captain Starlight and his gang (including Ben Marston) arrive to rob the local bank.

Ealing Studios had planned to make the film after The Overlanders (1946) and Eureka Stockade (1949), and they hired William Lipscomb to do the script.

[7] In June 1949 Ealing announced Ralph Smart would direct the film after Bitter Springs at an estimated budget of £250,000 with John McCallum as a possible star.

However plans to make the film were hampered by the closing of Pagewood Studios and the issuance of a government regulation to cap the raising of finance.

[11] In February 1956 Michael Balcon, then head of Ealing, announced he would make a film of Robbery Under Arms as well as another movie set in Australia, The Shiralee.

In May 1956 it was announced the Rank organisation would make Robbery Under Arms directed by Jack Lee and Joe Janni with filming to begin in December.

[13][14] In June 1956 it was announced Finch - who was just about to leave England to make The Shiralee in Australia - would play the lead in Robbery Under Arms.

[15] Lee and Janni had a big hit with the Australian-themed A Town Like Alice (1956), starring Peter Finch and written by Lipscomb.

Janni declared "Robbery Under Arms will be prettty much an old team picture" reuniting much of the cast and crew from A Town Like Alice.

[22][23] During the making of the film, on-screen couple David McCallum and Jill Ireland fell in love off screen as well, and married in May.

The characterisation is paste-board; the acting (excepting, occasionally, David McCallum) shaky; and the treatment is never clearly romantic nor, on the other hand, naturalistic.

Its main problem is whether it does not follow a bit too soon after “The Shiralee,” which also starred Peter Finch and the wide, open Aussie spaces...