How Wonderful

1990, 55 Minutes

How Wonderful is a hilarious and really honest look at pregnancy, featuring a cast of well known Australian actors and actresses.

No matter what they tell you, no-one is really prepared for this big event. Thirty-one year old Kerry, a modern career woman, is having her first baby. She teeters between the public perception of the lucky event and her own entirely different and bizarre perceptions of the highs and lows of pregnancy.

As she tries to deal with the mental, emotional and physical changes associated with the momentous event, she begins to fantasise about her own capabilities as a mother, her misogynist obstetrician, overzealous relatives, and a husband in the midst of sympathy toothaches and training for his first marathon race.

“There I was on a hormonal roller coaster ride. My husband was training for his first marathon race, obsessed with the pain barrier and special performance formulas. Then the visions started to appear: The Greek chorus niggling at every turn, overzealous relatives, cows drinking tea and eating scones, the obstetrician on his back dangling from stirrups, the perfect mum - serene and impeccably groomed from the pages of a magazine, and a beached whale stranded on the sand. If this is how wonderful pregnancy is supposed to be, why didn’t we just go out and buy a dog!”

Everyone can relate to Kerry’s amazement and delight with her bulging body...and her trepidation at the daunting prospect of motherhood.

A Film Australia National Interest Program. © 2011 National Film and Sound Archive of Australia.