Australia (2008)

Genre

Adventure | Drama | Romance

Director

Baz Luhrmann

Country

Australia | USA | UK

Cast

Nicole Kidman, Hugh Jackman, David Wenham, Bryan Brown, Jack Thompson, David Gulpilil, Brandon Walters, David Ngoombujarra, Ben Mendelsohn, Essie Davis, Barry Otto, Kerry Walker, Sandy Gore, Ursula Yovich, Lillian Crombie, Yuen Wah, Angus Pilakui, Jacek Koman, Tony Barry, Ray Barrett, Max Cullen

Storyline

In northern Australia at the beginning of World War II,  an English aristocrat (Nicole Kidman) who inherits a sprawling ranch reluctantly pacts with a stock-man (Hugh Jackman) in order to protect her new property from a takeover plot. 

Opinion

I haven't seen a lot of stuff from Luhrmann so I did not have any particular expectation for this film. I was kinda expecting it to be good though, since it stars Nicole Kidman and Hugh Jackman. Was it good? No, it wasn't.

Beautiful to look at, "Australia" is a terrible, too long and unfocused film that tries to be too many things at the same time: an adventure, a slapstick comedy, a romantic drama and a commentary on racism and war.

The script is just all over the place. The storyline is utterly predictable and keeps on shifting from one thing to another and you are not even sure if you are watching the same film.

The film's storytelling has already been used over and over again in other adventure films of the past and honestly those movies were way more exciting and engaging than this one. And for some weird, inexplicable reason the whole story is told through the eyes of a 10-year-old speaking a bad English. You eventually get used to it, but it still makes no sense.

The most incredible thing is that in two and a half hours they didn't manage to develop the damn characters. They all are awful and stereotypical, not to mention the fact that the main characters, Kidman's Lady Sarah Ashley and Jackman's Drover, are basically Olive Oil and Popeye. To end in style the actors as well do their best to give awful performances.

Then there's Australia, that land that is so mysterious and fascinating, especially for someone like me who lives so far away from it, which has been beautifully captured. But one cannot watch a film for the photography only (yes, that half point is for the cinematography).