Australia

*** Stars

When I first saw Australia three days ago, I left the theater feeling disappointed. I kept wondering how Baz Luhrmann was unable deliver a coherent narrative inside an almost three hour runtime. It jumps from a love story, to a sweeping epic, to a telling of mystical lands, to melodrama, and finally lands with a forty minute Pearl Harbor like action-extravaganza.

Whew.

With an A-list cast and such a fabulous production design, I expected Luhrmann, one of my favorite directors (mainly because of Romeo and Juliet) to give us the best movie of the year. On that line, he has failed. Miserably. But I don't think he's the one to blame. Australia, the version I saw, is not complete. After bad test screenings with its ending, Luhrmann went back and changed it. He has worked on this project for years, and although I understand that a release date is important, Luhrmann seemed to have been forced into releasing a movie he wasn't ready to release.

Three days after seeing Australia, I sit here at my computer writing my review. Those three days have given me time to reflect on the positive and negative aspects of the film. Even though the word disappointment lingered in my mind, I found that I was remembering more positive moments than negative.

What sticks out has to be the visuals. In Aristotle's elements of drama, visual spectacle ranks as the least important. While I tend to agree with this hierarchical order, Australia has to be one of the most beautifully shot films of the decade. Luhrmann is a natural when it comes to experimental camera movements. The auteur inside of him is begging to be heard.

The movie is set in 1939 after Hitler invades Poland. Nicole Kidman stars as Lady Sarah Ashley, a proper English woman from society's higher class who heads to Australia to protect her husband's property. After his death, she learns of a possible takeover plot towards her land. That's when she meets Drover (Hugh Jackman), the rugged frontiersman she falls for. For the rest of the film, the two are involved in the hysteria of World War II (The attack of Darwin, Australia right after Pearl Harbor), chases from bad guys who want Ashley's land, and a love story that hits melodrama on several occasions.

The best scene of the movie is one of the best scenes I have seen all year. There is a stampede sequence involving a 2,000 head of cattle that is almost worth the price of admission alone. This scene (close to ten minutes long) is blended by CGI and outer landscapes that distinguishes Baz Luhrmann as an old-fashioned visionary with a hint of technological genius.

However, from an overall standpoint, unless you're a fan of Baz or Hugh Jackman, many moviegoers will feel cheated and exhausted after an almost full three hours. To name an Eclectic Collective song I love, Australia is a "Beautiful Mess".