Australian Story S30E08 - The Shoot Out – Race Around the World

Australian Story looks back at Race Around the World, the edgy 1997 documentary competition that launched John Safran and became one of the 90s unlikeliest TV hits.

Eight aspiring filmmakers were chosen from more than 1300 applicants to travel the world for 100 days making a four-minute documentary every 10 days. Although Safran was the breakout star, each of them went on to have a successful career in the film and television industry.

"We just thought, a bunch of young people going around the world making shit films – who's going to watch that?" says Olivia Rousset, the eventual winner of the series. 

But it struck a chord with viewers, who loved the rawness of the documentaries and the unvarnished opinions of the judges back in the studio. "It was a one of those weird TV dreams that actually came true," says the show's presenter, Richard Fidler.

Contestants, judges and producers share previously untold stories from behind the scenes of the show, which all agree was a health and safety nightmare.

"I got robbed, I got mugged, shook down, pepper sprayed," says contestant Scott Herford, who now has his own production company. "Everyone was pushed to their absolute breaking point."

"It was mad," says Safran, who famously streaked through Jerusalem, broke into Disneyland and asked voodoo priests to put a curse on his ex-girlfriend. "Not only could we have died, we could have died and they didn't know about it."

Armed with a new generation of digital camera – small, light, with a flip screen that made it easy to film yourself – the eight young filmmakers pioneered a style of visual storytelling that is now everywhere on social media sites such as YouTube, Instagram and TikTok.

"I don't know if we were the original influencers," says contestant Daniel Marsden, "but it was definitely a different style of filmmaking that no one had seen on tele before. It was pretty fresh."