Narrator Leo McKern, who narrates this mostly Tasmania set TV special, previously had about four years earlier narrated the documentary 'The Last Tasmanian' (1978).
The film's opening prologue reads: ''This is the story of a modern adventurer in a timeless part of 20th. Century Australia, which for a few brief years he made his own. It is the story also of what followed in the local community, which faced a difficult choice - - - - - - develop the energy resources of this beautiful but fragile land, or forego development and suffer the economic, social and political consequences.''
Narrator Leo McKern commented: ''For a time John Hawkins made the superb rivers country, his very own. But inevitably pressure grew to develop the untouched, beautiful and fragile resource beyond this last frontier. Paradoxically, the pressure resulted from a desire to maintain the standard of living of a community which was just becoming aware of the existence of this marvellous region on its very doorstep. 'Hawkins' Rivers' is a film of breathtaking action amid great natural beauty. But above all it illustrates one of the great dilemmas of the latter part of our century.''