Bill and Joan Collins. Credit:Penny Stephens But the shadow of one man loomed large, bespectacled Bill Collins. Collins's uniform was a large pair of dark-rimmed glasses, a jacket and tie, and an intimate set adorned with movie posters from the golden age of cinema he loved so much. Collins talked about the films he presented – from Scarface to Star Wars, from Gone With the Wind to Young Frankenstein – with the kind of wide-eyed enthusiasm you find in a child let loose in a lolly shop. He spoke emotionally, and passionately, and personally. He had the theatrical delivery of an actor, but in truth he was simply a fan, drawn into the magic of the movie house, hypnotised by the flickering light of the projector.

"Our hearts are broken by the loss of our dear Bill, he will never be forgotten," his wife Joan said in a statement. "How fortunate we were to have him in our lives." Loading Joan thanked the public for their support of her husband. "Bill's love of film was encouraged by you, his audience, and his love of sharing his passion, which increased over the five decades that he presented on every Australian television," she said. "Bill was always thrilled when he realised the joy and happiness he gave to his viewers," Joan added. "He never took them for granted, always wanting to please. Darling Bill, you will be loved and missed always." Collins famously filmed his introductions in a single take, repeating them from the start only if there was a verbal fumble.

Bill Collins was inducted into the TV Week Logie Hall of Fame in 2009. Credit:Penny Stephens At the tapings I attended over the years, watching from the shadows behind the camera, a new monologue was often different to the one before it. He pencilled a few notes to himself, but almost everything he said came from his memory. And his heart. And when Collins fumbled a word, which required he start again, it was sometimes followed by a few more slightly colourful words. The outtakes, if anyone dared to try and find them, would surely be a riot. Collins first appeared on television in 1963, presenting a series of film appreciation segments on the ABC program Roundabout; perhaps unsurprisingly before that he was a school teacher and college lecturer. It was telling that he presented movies not from the comfort of an armchair, but from behind a desk. Even as a television entertainer, there was a part of Collins that could not shake off the manner of a school headmaster.

Across five decades he worked for the ABC, and the Seven, Nine and 10 networks, introducing classic and contemporary Hollywood films for television audiences. Loading Between 1995 and 2018, Collins worked for Foxtel, as the face of the platform's classic cinema channel, Fox Classics. He retired last year. Foxtel's executive director of television Brian Walsh knew Collins during their shared tenure at the 10 Network in the 1980s and then, a decade later, at Foxtel. "Bill's love of and passion for quality motion pictures made him formidable and a national treasure," Walsh said. "He inspired generations of Australians with his extraordinary knowledge, intellect and enthusiasm.

"Uniquely, Bill never read from script, nor used an autocue or teleprompter, which is commonplace in television; he spoke to his audiences from informed and detailed research and, of course, from the heart," Walsh said. "In that, he was a one-off," Walsh added. "There never has been, nor will never there ever be, another like him." Bill Collins and Jack Nicholson in 1976 for an interview promoting Nicholson's film One Flew Over the Cuckoos Nest. Credit:Sydney Morning Herald Mr Walsh said it was "an honour for all of us who worked alongside him and learnt so much from his rich catalogue of film knowledge. He will be deeply missed but his legacy will be there for generations who follow. Bill will forever be the one and only Mr Movies". In addition to his work on television, Collins authored three books, presented radio programs and was for many years a newspaper columnist.

In 1987 he was awarded the Order of Australia Medal for his services to film and television, and in 2009 he was inducted into the TV Week Logie Hall of Fame. Away from the screen, he was married to Joan Collins, and was tickled pink when, during a press tour by the Hollywood legend of the same name, he managed to take them both to dinner. Collins with James Bond star Roger Moore. I encountered Collins for the first time as a 19-year-old reporter tasked with interviewing the legendary "Mr Movies" who had taught me, as a teenage kid watching TV, to appreciate the art of cinema. He was a grand, giant of a man and I was terrified of him, though I later discovered I need not have been. He lumbered into the room like a bear, but he spoke, both conversationally and about the art of cinema, with great delicacy.

Quite simply, he loved movies. And he loved people who loved movies. Illustration: Matt Golding Credit: To be called upon to write the obituary of one's heroes is always tough, but it goes with the gig; to be called upon to write the obituary for someone you know, and whose presence, authority and wisdom has influenced you personally, is tougher, and leaves you with a heavy heart. Collins took care with young reporters, where he encountered them. He nurtured in us a great passion for film. And, with a wry smile and an arched eyebrow, offered only the mildest disapproval when some of us declared a greater passion for television itself. Perhaps he didn't think too much of the physically smaller of the two mediums, though to be fair he lived mostly in an era where television's fullest narrative potential was yet to be realised.

And where a young boy, sitting in a darkened cinema, could be properly transported to a fantasy land of infinite wonder by flickering images created by the peculiar art of pouring light through celluloid film. The other Bill, William Shakespeare, who was not a film critic but really should have been, once wrote: "If we shadows have offended, think but this, and all is mended, that you have but slumbered here, while these visions did appear." Wherever they both are, I imagine the two namesakes are watching a movie. But not until our Bill has had a few words to say at the start. Bill and Joan shared a love for books and animals, so in lieu of flowers, they have asked fans to consider a donation to Dymocks Children’s Charities or Monika’s Doggie Rescue.