Mick and Mrs: Hogan with partner and co-star Linda Kozlowski.

Kozlowski worked on the screenplay with Hogan, making sure he got the American parts right. “I would say things like, ‘I don’t think Sue would say that’,” she recalls, “and ‘An American woman doesn’t talk like that’. I would put my two cents in: he appreciates that, as an Aussie man, he doesn’t always get it right with Sue.”

As for Mick, however, Kozlowski recognises that Hogan is the true expert. “I think the character was born within him,” she says. “There’s a certain Australian easy-going thing that is definitely there. But Mick Dundee is more outgoing and Paul’s a little bit more reserved - and, thank goodness, more sophisticated. We don’t have any knives stuck in our walls or possums on our table.”

Having started production on Australia’s Gold Coast in mid-August, Crocodile Dundee in Los Angeles began shooting in California on September 18, using locations in Pasadena, Beverly Hills, Century City, Santa Monica, Venice and in the city’s consumer mecca, 2 Rodeo Plaza. The company also managed to shut down a stretch of the Glendale Freeway for a scene in which Mick and his son stop traffic in the belief that they are rescuing a dog. It took months of negotiations with the LAPD to get permission for the brief shutdown, during which they land three helicopters on the Freeway. But permission was almost refused at the last moment, when the Caltrans Authority stepped in, arguing that the shutdown would disturb the flow of traffic to and from Dodgers Stadium. Location manager David Thornsberry finally won the day by pointing out that, since the Dodgers had been doing so badly all season and didn’t stand a chance of reaching the play-offs, there weren’t enough fans heading for the Stadium to make much of a difference. Caltrans conceded defeat.

In addition to young Serge Cockburn - whose parents did a video of him, telling him it was a souvenir for his grandparents, then sent it to the casting office - the cast of the third outing includes such regulars as Alec Wilson, playing Mick’s mate Jacko. Newcomers include stand-up comedian Paul Rodriguez, who plays Mick’s new friend, Diego; Jere Burns as sleazy studio head Arnon Rothman; and Aida Turturro (Tony’s sister Janice from The Sopranos) as Sue’s street-wise assistant, Jean.

One performer sadly not notching up a hat-trick, however, is Charlie the water buffalo, who Mick memorably faced down in the first movie. Charlie spent the following 15 years enjoying the fruits of his celebrity, standing happily in the shade next to the Adelaide River Inn in McKinlay (the town used as a location for Walkabout Creek), allowing tourists to have their photos taken with him.

Charlie finally went to the great hunting grounds in the sky earlier this year. But McKinlay is not about to let him go just yet: thanks to the local taxidermist, Charlie is now back on his old spot. The only difference is that there’s no longer any chance he might move and blur your photograph.

Which is rather more than can be said for Mick Dundee.