To quote the great baseball poet Annie Savoy, “Oh my!”
When last we gazed upon Baz Luhrmann’s Australia, we were ostensibly supposed to be learning something about still photography; mostly, though, we were getting a tutorial in career resuscitation on 20th Century Fox’s dime. Compared against the studio’s combined filmography over the last decade, that was money unusually well spent.
Well, now the official, non-educational marketing push for Australia has bullroared to life, and the film looks absolutely grand. And, as is typically the case with Luhrmann, unbearably precious. Fortunately, epic scale goes a long way with me.
It’s nice to see that Luhrmann isn’t backing away from the Leone vibe given off by the aforementioned podcast; in fact, this time he’s unabashedly embraced it by dropping in a very familiar cue from The Good, The Bad and the Ugly. And just when you’re settling into the Morricone-enhanced widescreen majesty, up comes Patrick Doyle’s rousing “St. Crispan’s Day/Battle of Agincourt”, and it’s time to start killing Frenchmen by the bushel!
This is how you cut a trailer – by which I mean violence against the French is a terrific selling point. If the film is even half as invigorating as this 1:30 spot, there’s gonna be a lot of Oscars handed Luhrmann’s way next February. For now, expect Australia to not bomb even a little when it arrives stateside on November 14th.
(Thanks to readers Andrew Molinaro and Brendan Heldenfels for passing this along.)