Did you know that the Sprite Club Bugeye SUS-600 is a film star?

During 1977 the South Australian Film Corporation were looking for a sports car for the lead actor to drive in a telemovie “The Sound of Love”.

The actor was a young John Jarrett (of Wolf Creek fame) and also starred Celia De Burgh, who also featured in numerous Australian film and TV series.

The plot of the film is a simple love story with a motor racing background.

When a tragic motor sport accident leaves Dave (John Jarratt) deaf, life becomes meaningless for the cynical, mechanically minded, sports-car driving young man.

Eileen (Celia de Burgh) is a small-time pickpocket, a drifter who cares little about the men that she sleeps with, but she is also afflicted by deafness which has left her alienated from the world.

The pair meet while in the care of specialist John Lewis (George Ogilvie) and a powerful love begins between them, a love that needs no words …

Things threaten to go wrong when the couple argue – David refuses to admit he’s deaf – and Eileen finds herself in a van with two ruffians ready to rape her.

But Dave arrives in his sports-car and saves her, and the relationship becomes even stronger … a love that will change them forever …

Filmed in the Adelaide suburbs, Willunga and the Adelaide International Raceway there are locations that are reasonably easy to recognise.

Through all of this the Blue Bugeye features in many of the scenes and adds a Spritely flavour to the movie. Although SUS-600 did need a repaint and a new clutch after being used for the filming!

While aimed at the telemovie sector, the film used to appear as the midday movie on Channel Nine or often in the late night movie sector. It then ended up as a VHS video and can be found for sale on the internet.

SUS-600 has been in the Sprite Club of SA since the early days of the Club, so when you see her next please acknowledge this aging film star and her addition to the Sprites that have featured on the Silver Screen……….or the TV and VHS player!