Several years ago, I had the opportunity to go to Australia. Lest you think that this was a sexy vacay with a special someone or even a fun trip with friends, let me clarify — I was chaperoning 40 high school students with a group of fellow teachers. Still, Australia’s round-trip air fare alone is out of my immediate reach, so I seized the opportunity.
The 17-hour flight (Chicago to LA, LA to Sydney) was a true test of character. Much to the delight of myself and all fellow passengers, the kids did not sleep at all. As much as this frustrated me, around hour six, I decided to completely surrender to the experience. I became a high scorer on a video game whose name escapes me. I played “flashlight tag” and blatantly lied when confronted by the flight attendant about my participation. And I had meaningful conversations with a few students that I will always treasure. When we landed, the magic had already begun and was only enhanced by the breathtaking spectacle that is Australia.
I share this story because it is with a sense of stamina and suspension of previously held conceptions that one needs to approach the film Australia. Baz Luhrman’s film strives to be an epic, and he devotes 166 minutes of screen time to its evolution. If there is anything that Luhrman may suffer from it is not from lack of ambition. The film is at times a western, a war drama and a romance. Somehow, as dizzyingly complex as this may sound, it all comes together. And it all works.
Nicole Kidman stars as Lady Sarah Ashley, an English aristocrat who having tired of her husband’s obsession with his Australian cattle station and dalliances with other women, journeys to Australia to bring him home. Her plans abruptly change when her husband is tragically — and suspiciously — killed just prior to her arrival, and Australia cattle barons move in to take over “Faraway Downs,” her late husband’s cattle station. Sarah quickly ascertains the corrupt, unscrupulous nature of these cattle barons when she witnesses one of them, Neil Fletcher (David Wenham), abusing an Aboriginal boy, Nullah (Brandon Walters), who lives and works on her estate. She decides to fight for the land and reluctantly enlists the help of her late husband’s rough and tumble stockman, Drover (Hugh Jackman), to help her accomplish this goal.
Lady Sarah’s delicate English sensibilities are initially offended by the swaggering machismo that is Drover; but, of course, she succumbs to his charms. Their love story leads them across hundreds of miles to herd the cattle and reclaim Faraway Downs. Once accomplished, Drover and Sarah settle into a domestic situation with Sarah serving as a mother to the orphaned Nullah, who is somewhat disenfranchised from society because he is a “creamy,” a disparaging term used to denote that he has an Aboriginal mother and a white father. Their happily ever after is short-lived when Sarah tries to get Drover to stop “droving” and stay home with her. (Note: It is unwise to issue ultimatums in the Outback.) The characters’ lives thus become further complicated by the continued menacing presence of Neil Fletcher and the ultimate advent of WWII.
The Wizard of Oz is the film within the film Australia, that becomes the perfect vehicle to explore the themes of home, love, land and ultimate cultural acceptance. The characters’ struggles, particularly Nullah’s, are underscored by the song, “Somewhere Over the Rainbow,” which creates more than one somewhat corny moment in the film, but can be overlooked if one would just surrender to the magic of the experience.
I fear Australia may not find its footing with American audiences that may be scared away by the film’s length and the ebb and flow of the conflicts throughout the piece. However, Luhrman’s vision is both bold and dazzling, definitely in the vein of classic movie creations. I am confident that if one approaches Australia with the right mind-set — and maybe a bit of patience — then it becomes a worthwhile cinematic journey.