More recent viewings at home.:)
Australia (2008) . This big and crazily expensive 2 hr 45 minute epic that cost SGD200 million dollars to make got a lot of press attention in the months of production, and had two big names in the project: Nicole Kidman with her inimitable strut walk, and Hugh ‘Sexiest Man Alive’ Jackman.
Short version though: despite the talent, the movie’s flat and ordinary with opportunities wasted. It’s full of the story cliques you’ve seen before: a posh Lady aristocrat who’s tamed by Sexy Alpha Male (boring), this time in the form of a cattle drover and set in the Australian outback (OK unique) against the backdrop of a looming World War II (boring). The one interesting premise lies in the exploration of the Stolen Generations, or half-aboriginal children removed from their native families for about a century in Australia.
The film has two central relationships on the menu: between SAM and Lady aristocrat, and Lady aristocrat with one such exemplar of the half-aboriginal child. The latter relationship is the interesting one: unfortunately, the film glosses on the former instead with its big dramatic moments: there’s Jackman taking his shirt off for no apparent reason other than to make it worth the ticket price of the admission for women. You also get a normally unshaven and dirty Jackman appearing shaven and clean in a white tux in the obligatory dinner and dance sequence, and Jackman and Kidman in a gratuitous make out scene.
Worse still though is that the movie dramatically changes in style after the first hour: which looks, feels, and is shot like a comedic love story, complete with slapstick moments and over-acting. Then it suddenly switches into serious story mode with no more laughter but ponderous moments of big drama. You would be forgiven for thinking you saw two different movies: the jump is that jarring.
Which would had still be alright if there was an interesting story: but it wasn’t even then. There are no surprises as the story unfolds – you have seen it all before.
And no surprises = no suspense. OK; I chewed my teeth a little at the cattle scenes, but they also look CG. And sorry, CG cows are just less interesting than CG orcs and humans having it out on the Pelennor Fields.
Heck. Outside the Australian cast and the location, there wasn’t very many Australian things in the production. You certainly won’t learn much of the history, and the aboriginal components are left to a modicum of a half-mystic old aboriginal elder character.
And don’t even get me started on the soundtrack. It’s majestic oh yes; but spoiled by the pilfering of classical scores repeated ad nauseum: especially ‘Sheep may safely graze’ from Bach’s cantatas even though the show is about cows and not sheep. And the film’s final scene is played to the tune of Elgar’s Nimrod variation! I adore Elgar’s Enigma Variations, but when set to this scene it made me cringe. Talk about a complete mis-sync between sight and sound.
Funnily though, the long running length – panned by critics – was OK by me, as you get proportionately more screen moments of the gorgeous Australian outback.
So, on the overall…
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