Australia - The Film

Well, it's a long time since I posted anything on here - not since we returned from Australia. I've been full of good intentions but it seems that the more time you've got the more difficult it is to fit things in! After I've read The Guardian it's time to go to the gym, by the time I get home it's time for lunch, then there are DVDs to watch and novels to read and before you know where you are it's time to cook the dinner.

So I thought I'd get back to it by writing about the film Australia starring Nicole Kidman and Hugh Jackman which we went to see just before Christmas. This is not a good film. It's not as bad as Mama Mia! but it's not far off. It's a long sprawling film that's a succession of cinematic cliches. The first half is a 1950s Western. Nicole Kidman is a widowed English aristocrat who needs to drive a herd of cattle to Darwen. She persuades Drover (Hugh Jackman) to help but since they are short of cowboys they have to pick in an Aborigine boy and an alcoholic accountant. In addition, they have to cope with the henchmen of an evil cattle baron who do all they can to stop them, including a stampede which is halted by the aborigine boy on his own on the edge of precipice! When they successfully arrive in Darwen there is a ball at which Hugh Jackman appears transformed from a rough and ready bearded cattle drover into a clean-shaven white tuxedo-clad romantic lead. The second part becomes a war film as the Japanese attack Darwen from the air (which never happened) and includes the wrong identification of a corpse (as Nicole Kidman). It all ends relatively happily!

I would not recommend it, and if it is representative of Baz Lurhmann's work I won't be seeking out any more of his films.