Baz Luhrmann.
The Aussie king of camp. The Man from Showy River.
I don’t
like Baz Luhrmann’s films.
His woeful
adaptation of The Great Gatsby marks the first time I ever left a cinema
actually angry at having wasted my time and money on a particular film.
Romeo + Juliet was the first time a specific adaptation choice (the whole
‘Sword-branded guns’ thing) actively annoyed me. Australia was the first time I
discovered how much test screenings can interfere with the creative process in
rather peculiar ways (i.e. The Drover was originally meant to die, but test audiences
didn’t want to see that happen to Hugh Jackman, so… that changed).
Yeah, he’s
responsible for a lot of personal milestones, and none of them positive. The
man’s insistence on absolute bombast constantly gets between him and whatever
the hell point he thinks he’s making in his films, and even as someone who
enjoys the patently ridiculous, Baz keeps testing my patience in just how loud
he plays every aspect of his films.
But even
with all of that in mind, one thing I have always maintained, alongside my
utter contempt for the bulk of the man’s filmography (Australia and The Great
Gatsby are easily on the shortlist for worst films I’ve ever seen, period), is
that he is talented. He knows how to put a film together, he’s a
properly unique voice in Australian cinema, and for as much as I personally
can’t stand his work, I can at least understand why others would. Hell,
I’ll even give him credit for Strictly Ballroom, which is a genuinely good film
and something of a mission statement for Baz’s entire career to follow: Play to
the crowds, don’t worry about the committees. It’s just that, with everything since
Strictly Ballroom, that talent has been squandered on increasingly misguided
and frequently exasperating storytelling decisions.
Suffice to
say, I wasn’t really looking forward to his latest release. I may be growing
more and more comfortable with lengthier films, but considering how much I just
can’t with this guy to begin with, sitting down for a near-three hour
presentation is one of those moments when this job of mine actually feels like work.
Or, at least, that’s what I was expecting. In what is raring to be the biggest
surprise of 2022 (pleasant ones, at least), this is the first Baz Luhrmann film
I’ve genuinely enjoyed since Strictly Ballroom.
