DVD Review of Australia
Epic Love Story Starring Nicole Kidman and Hugh Jackman
© Cody Roy
Mar 11, 2009
With the exception of her Academy Award-winning performance as Virginia Woolf, Nicole Kidman nearly always plays the same character: haughty, icy woman of European descent (usually English) whose eventual romantic slumming results in dramatic change. It’s as though Tom Cruise might burst on the scene at any moment (with his horrible Irish accent) eager to box for her honor. And Hugh Jackman isn’t much better. In his movies, he typically plays the virile, semi-bestial guy; in short, he’s a low-key Wolverine in every role. One can almost hear those retractable claws deploy following every line he hisses. SNIKT!
Kidman and Jackman Down Under
These two trends make the trip to Australia as well. Directed and co-written by Baz Luhrmann (Moulin Rouge!), this film, set in Darwin, Australia, in 1939, is the story of Lady Sarah Ashley (Kidman), a snobbish, prissy Englishwoman. Suspecting her husband unfaithful, Sarah arrives in northern Australia only to find him murdered, supposedly by a savage Aborigine, which leaves her solely in charge of a cattle ranch known as Faraway Downs. She also learns her cattle are being stolen by Neil Fletcher (David Wenham), an employee of hers who really works for the corrupt cattle baron King Carney (Bryan Brown). She dismisses him, and of course, he vows revenge.
World War II Steps In
Meanwhile, World War II has begun, so Allied troops are in desperate need of beef. To ensure the success of Faraway Downs and undermine Carney’s monopoly, she decides to drive 2000 head of cattle to Darwin (home to an Allied naval port and airbase). Enlisting the help of dusty, local ruffian Drover (Jackman), his posse, and half-caste (half-white/half-Aborigine) orphan Nullah (Brandon Walters), whom she has basically adopted, Sarah manages to pull it off, but not before falling in love with Drover. An idyllic romance sparks and lasts for three years. The Japanese bombing of Darwin, however, changes everything.
Luhrmann’s Grandeur . . . Kidman and Jackman? Not So Much
Artistically, this film is absolutely beautiful. Its sprawling, sweeping vistas of the Australian Outback are breathtaking, and they make a valiant effort at sublimating everything else in the movie; however, the love story between Sarah and Drover is hardly epic. Their romance is plagued with clichés and caricatures. Sarah is the kind of prim and proper socialite who is mortified when her undergarments see the light of day, and she condescends to teach Drover the fox trot to the tune of The Wizard of Oz’s “Over the Rainbow.” And Jackman simply channels Crocodile Dundee. “That’s not a knife.” SNIKT!
Just Too Much
Luhrmann is at least partially culpable, though. As a co-writer, he is responsible for the three hours of sitting time the viewer must endure. It’s as though this painfully long film consists of two shorter, more manageable movies, and it should have been divided up that way (Luhrmann’s Kill Bill, Vols. 1 & 2) or even further into a TV mini-series (Luhrmann’s Lonesome Dove). As soon as one thinks it’s over with the culmination of the cattle drive and consummation of the romance, the Japanese attack Darwin, setting off another hour or so of melodrama. Less is more, Luhrmann.
Australia is apparently Luhrmann’s homage to his homeland, and visually, he does it justice. As an overall film experience, though, two bloated Hollywood dingoes ate his baby.
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