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Baz Luhrmann is unfortunately succumbing to the supposed 'autuer' method of film making in that each project takes the best part of a decade to bring to the screen. Much has snowballed about this particular effort, being the first modern attempt at reimagining the old-school studio epics of the 1950s/60s. However, what appears onscreen is an incredibly shoddy, messy visual spectacular, misfiring in almost every direction.
The central pull of the old style epics was that they had stories that filled volumes, such as Biblical texts or sprawling legends; 'Australia's' concept feels like it's been adapted from a novel written by a teenager for under 14s. All of the characters have boring, unadventurous names, and even their images never shy away from cliché. The material is so wafer thin that it amounts to little more than an excuse to create an old-fashioned swooning melodrama, which is entirely opposite from a classic epic.
But it's clear from the start any serious intention is never present, with playful graphics and a non-diagetic voice-over delivering a post-modern twist on the bland proceedings. The opening 20 minutes are more akin to screwball farce in an exotic location, with lame and tedious attempts at physical humour. From there, the film languishes into a plodding torpor for the next 2 hours until the bombing of Darwin, as if the definiton of 'epic' is little more than lots of wide shots of pretty scenery.
Another stumble is the substituting of old-style dry humour with a light-touch more reminiscent of pulp adventure serials. David Wenham's villainy consists of little more than not blinking his bright blue eyes, since there's little else about him that seems evil. And in an age where everyone has to be a certain shade of grey his own wife dies because of the selfish idiocy of Nicole Kidman, so really his death makes him the only victim in the entire film. How does that work out?
Kidman is direly miscast as the misogynistic traveller stereotype. Insufferably screechy and ridiculous with her primness and racist Britishness, how anyone's attracted to her is a mystery. Willowy and limp-wristed she's a world away from the brass-balled iron maidens of the old-school epics. The rest of the film is filled out with mahogany no-names resurrecting tired clichés with no surprise or originality whatsoever, and the little kid is the most tiresome of all, switching from charming to infuriatingly overused in less than 10 minutes.
Luhrmann even seems to have lost his nerve, spending an excruciating amount of time on every detail and saturating the use of slow-motion to overemphasise nothing in particular. Where's his Tarantinoesque tinkering with form? Where's his fearless camp that contained acres more charm than the endless beige colours of his latest slushfest? Instead he's faded into the ranks of modern film makers who are so pompous with their ill-placed funds they think any old rubbish they string together is a genius work of art.
It's hard to credit a film where even the landscape cinematography is a recycled technique. If anything deserves to be applauded it's Hugh Jackman. Bronzed, buffed to the max and with a timeless ruggedness he's the one thing truly convincing and evocative of the classic epic, making for instant lady eye-candy. But even then couldn't he have been given a less childish name than simply 'the Drover'?
There's nothing epic about this epic, and is, sadly, more akin to the bloated, overblown white elephants of the 'Gone With The Wind' kind. A strict woman's picture, and an insult to anyone with even a basic knowledge of movies. Grow up, all of you.