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Sunday Night: Oct 18

This weekend, a major story on the controversial Reclaim Australia group.

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This weekend Sunday Night features a major story on the controversial Reclaim Australia group, as Alex Cullen spends time in their inner sanctum.

Inside Reclaim Australia
They say they’re proud Australians who want to protect their Australian way of life. Opponents say they’re a bunch of dangerous extremists dividing Australia, inflaming hatred and fear of Islam and intimidating those who follow that faith. Reclaim Australia has been making a lot of noise but very little is known about how this provocative movement came to be, its internal operations and precisely who is in charge. For the first time Sunday Night goes inside Reclaim Australia to meet the trio of suburban novices who started the movement and the hard-core campaigners who joined in and ramped up the rhetoric and the intensity of its campaigns. Sunday Night reveals the three were brought together by a shared belief that the Lindt Café siege in Sydney was an act of Islamic extremism and despite the fact that they had no experience in activism, protest or political organisation they decided to make their voices heard. They tell Sunday Night’s Alex Cullen they were stunned by the numbers of like-minded people who swarmed to their on-line rallying site. Those supporters would soon include some of the most hard-line, organised and active anti-Islam agitators in the country. It begs the question: who was ultimately in charge? The novice mums and dads who started the ball rolling or the battle-hardened extremists who packed in as the movement gained momentum. This is a startling, eye-opening insight into a corner of Australian society that is deeply confronted by multiculturalism and Australia’s Islamic community. Are they minority fringe-dwellers or are their concerns shared more broadly? Sunday Night viewers will have a chance to have their say after viewing this exclusive, inside story.

How Do You Mend a Broked Heart?
The legendary Barry Gibb, the last surviving member of the stellar super-trio the Bee Gees takes us on an emotional journey down memory lane this week. Sunday Night’s Rahni Sadler accompanies Barry on an intensely personal tour through Redcliffe, the little beachside town north of Brisbane where he and his brothers Robin and Maurice shared an idyllic though sometimes rebellious childhood. It’s a bittersweet experience. Barry is still wrestling with the loss of his beloved younger twin brothers Maurice and Robin, who were integral to the sound and world-wide success of the Bee Gees. Over five decades the trio sold more than 200 million records. They wrote and recorded 70 chart hits for themselves and other superstars – including 19 number ones. Despite the epic success, Barry admits in this deeply intimate tour of his formative years that the boys were never happier than when they kicking around their sunny Queensland home making mischief and dreaming of making it big in music. The story continues Sunday Night’s candid relationship with Barry that began back in 2012. Our cameras capture the moment Barry sets foot in his childhood house for the first time since he left Redcliffe all those years ago, and follow him to the local Speedway track where the brothers first performed and to the town jetty where a life and career-defining decision was made all those years ago. And of course it’s a trip with an excellent soundtrack.

Half the Man
Sunday Night first met Australia’s most obese man, Andre Nasr, last year. At the time he was Australia’s heaviest man – weighing in at a massive 468 kilos. He had been admitted to hospital with a life-threatening infection and many of the health issues that accompany morbid obesity and his prospect of living for much longer were extremely grim. Andre knew he had a life-or-death decision to make and in a desperate bid for survival he contacted obesity specialist Dr Nic Kormas and pleaded for help. Dr Kormas agreed to take on his case, but perhaps more importantly, Andre decided to tackle his life-long habit of massive overeating head-on. Fourteen months later Andre is finally out of hospital and is almost half the man he was before. In an extraordinary display of determination, and with the right people by his side, Andre has move from moribund, bed-ridden giant to being back on his feet, working out at his home gym and avoiding the foods that took him to the brink. He’s aiming to stay the course and he’s set new challenges to hit his ultimate weight goal. His new lease on life has come at a cost. He has severed ties with his mum and dad because he believes that is one of the best chances he has at achieving his goals. Andre reveals all to Dr John Darcy on Sunday Night.

Sunday at 7pm on Seven.

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