Any opinions (Aussie or otherwise) on the upcoming film Australia?

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Andrew

At first, I didn't like the look of it. Naming a movie Australia seems incredibly tacky, and I expected it to over promise and under deliver. On the other hand, Baz Luhrmann is usually a great director, and Kidman and Jackman are among my favourite actors. Of the other cast members, Jack Thompson and Bryan Brown are two of the Australian actors who pop up all the time (we have a small number of actors who tend to get minor parts, usually playing much the same character, in every Aussie movie ever made).

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T W Hopper
Member, Presbyterian Reformed Church
Currently between churches since PRC closed here - attending Crossroads Christian Church.
Canberra, Australia.

Any other feedback?

Go see Changeling.

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Adam B., Wine Country, California, PCA

"I fear not to hold with Junius, de Politia Mosis cap. 6, that he who was punishable by death under that Judicial law, is punishable by death still; and he who was not punished by death then, is not to be punished by death now."

I saw it. I was not impressed. Plodding. Uninteresting.

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Bill Brown
Elder
Reformed Baptist
Maryland

Click to get: Board Rules -- Signature Requirements -- Suggestions?
Visit my BLOG Theology for the Rest of Us

It tried to be an Aussie "Gone with the Wind" but it failed ultimately, pretty people, pretty places, romantic era, poor plot, fatally executed and undermined by a self0loathing message for Austrlia's "Stolen Generation".

Ultimately this movie couldn't decide if it wanted to celebrate Australia or condemn it, it was schizophrenic.

I'm surprised the Aussie government agreed yo subsidize its bloated budget and help market it in hopes of bringing in tourism, I imagine the Australian tax payer is unamused.

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:detective:
Travis Speegle
Redeemer Presbyterian, PCA (Waco, Tx)
Pacific Cross Roads, PCA (Los Angeles, CA)


"When it comes to trustworthy theologians one can usually honor the rule of thumb that the deader the better."-Dr. John Hannah, DTS (of all places)

I'm not surprised the Australian government subsidised it. They subsidised the advertising for the movie, in order to have posters and TV ads with AUSTRALIA in large letters, with pictures of Kidman looking beautiful and tourist-friendly outback scenes. Whether or not the movie itself was any good was a secondary issue. Compared to some of their tourist industry advertising attempts it isn't actually too bad.

Yes but the tourism is going to be down at least in terms of American visitors due to economic reasons.

The movie bombed at the American box office, the American Studio (20th Century Fox owned by Rupert Murdoch who has dual citizenship) that made it even shrugged it off saying they didn't take a big hit because Canberra picked up the tab for 40% of the 150 million U.S dollar budget.

It was obvious the movie was made with gaining American attention in mind because of the prominant feature of American soldiers in Darwin and the Outback during world war 2, this addition really didn't drive the plot, it just permitted an American connection to exist to the film.

Murdoch had to give up his Australian citizenship, as he became a US citizen (in order to be allowed to be a media owner in the US) before Australia altered the law to allow someone in his situation to be a dual citizen. I'm not sure how much Australia financed the movie, I know the government financed much of the promotion. Almost all films made in Australia are made with large amounts of government money, many have money from both state and federal governments (eg, some money for making a movie with Australian actors and directors, more money for filming in a particular location.)

Yes, often they lure Hollywood movies over with the promise of pumping money into the local economies but when the government starts subsidizing half the budget and doesn't get the tourist influx banked upon one has to wonder the value of the policy.

Seems Hollywood makes out better than Australia.

In Australia the idea is mainly to try to tell local stories and use local actors and directors; most films made with Australian government money are small to medium budget and very culturally Australian (in a way that Australia wasn't.) It worked quite well for decades, from the 60s to mid-90s, at least in the sense that interesting Australian films were made, not that I as a libertarian support the use of taxpayers' money on subsidising movies. Most of those films you've probably never heard of.

Trying to get the occasional Hollywood blockbuster filmed here is a very recent trend, starting with the Matrix in about 1999. The advertising through film thing started by accident in the 1980s, when Crocadile Dundee was a surprise blockbuster hit, and then ads featuring Paul Hogan were unexpectedly extremely successful (Americans today still quote them at us on occasion.) Tourism Australia has been trying, and mostly failing, to repeat the formula ever since.

When I lived in Perth as a child i always had a kinship with the mythology of the Outback as it possesses much in common with the American West. Drovers are your Cowboys, Aborigines your Native American Indians, a vast untamed continent full of promise and beauty, rugged romanticized characters that are larger than life, "Australia" failed because it wasn't a properly structured nor exciting Western, had it been one it would've found a more relate-able American audience.

Dundee worked because the fish out of water concept was funny and original to have a Bushman loose in Manhattan, he also seemed to Americans like an Aussie John Wayne, the movie sought common ground and thus crossed over the Atlantic quite nicely; of course it was funded by a Hollywood studio which helped as well.

The modern trend is going to fleece Australian coffers if things don't improve, Warner Bros. was even considering filming a "Justice League" movie in Australia because the government would finance haf of the 400 million Us dollar budget!

If that thing fails at the box office heads will roll!

The film is pretty much completely ahistorical.

The real-life person Jackman's character was based on was a drover, married to an aboriginal woman, with a dozen kids. No one said boo.

There is not a single recorded case of a mixed-race child being removed from a white woman's care. Indeed, mixed-race children were being actively put into the care of white families and institutions, for varied and controversial reasons.

Local people were removed from the islands off the coast and brought to the safety of Darwin. In the film the evil racist authorities are shown putting the children in harm's way.

Some inaccuracies are just stupid. Drovers dancing outside Darwin pubs because the rains have come? Darwin is tropical. The rains have *always* come.

I could go on. Needless to say I am furious at the government for spending $40m on this rubbish. What is worse is that the majority of viewers will think that the film more or less reflects 'the sort of thing that went on back then'.

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Tas Stacey
Member, Evangelical Presbyterian Church of Australia
Tasmania, Australia

Ex Trans Profundum - From Across the Sea - a blog about religion and politics by a Tasmanian Calvinist.

A Hollywood film was less than historically accurate? Say it isn't so! It is disappointing that an Aussie director would write a film that revises his country's history for the worse and plays upon shallow stereotype driven characters and narrative to try and sell his country to American tourism.