Poor Baz Luhrmann can’t catch a break these days. He was competing with Oliver Stone to get an Alexander the Great project off the ground, and when Stone’s stunk, it sank Baz’s take on the subject. That was a number of years just wasted for the director. Now he’s gotten his act together to get started on a new epic – a film he has described as Australia’s Gone With The Wind (will he have racially insensitive roles for Aborigines?) – and it suddenly starts falling apart.
It’s too soon to get too pessimistic, though. The film was supposed to start in September but has been moved back to February because of its massive size, costs, logistics and the schedules of its stars. Russell Crowe and Nicole Kidman are starring in the film, but Crowe just signed on to the new Ridley Scott picture, American Gangster, which would make him unavailable for a September start.
Meanwhile, Fox is having problems with the projected 150 million dollar budget, which Luhrmann says he needs to recreate the Outback leading up to WWII. Not the steakhouse, mind you. Let’s all hope that Luhrmann, as unique a director as there is working today, gets his shot at this story.