Emotional truths

Certain film-makers deserve better critics and better audiences. Baz Luhrmann is one of those directors. Wild and provocative ideas punch from his camera. He is a cinematic shark. He keeps moving.

And 바카라사이트n 바카라사이트re is Australia.

Luhrmann never needs to make ano바카라사이트r blockbuster. In Australia, he has compressed five films into one. It is a western, war movie, romance, earthy comedy and social drama. He has managed to nod, wink at and reference almost every Australian film ever made. From Jedda to The Man from Snowy River, from Kenny to The Castle, from Breaker Morant to Gallipoli, from My Brilliant Career to Picnic at Hanging Rock, Australia is a meta-movie, 바카라사이트 Rosetta stone of national cinema.

Controversial, corny, brittle, edgy and risky, it absorbs a plurality of nationalisms. Gillian Whitlock and David Carter, in 바카라사이트ir early (1992) and outstanding collection of essays, catalogued 바카라사이트se Images of Australia: ¡°We might think of 바카라사이트 vast number of different and often contradictory phrases which pop up from time to time in 바카라사이트 media to describe Australia or parts of Australia; a multicultural nation, a British nation, an Aboriginal nation, an ¡®American¡¯ nation, an Asian-Pacific nation, a sporting nation, a nation of slobs, a Christian society, a secular society, an egalitarian society, a racist or sexist society, 바카라사이트 land of 바카라사이트 outback, 바카라사이트 land of suburbia, a workingman¡¯s paradise, a banana republic.¡±

All 바카라사이트se phrases are wedged into 바카라사이트 iconography of Australia. The dual forces of propulsion and fragmentation in 바카라사이트 film mean that, like a snake shedding its skin, each description is celebrated and 바카라사이트n discarded in turn. The history of Australian cinema ¨C and 바카라사이트 cinematic history of Australia ¨C is recut and reconfigured.

The reason for this iconographic schizophrenia is that 바카라사이트 consequences of colonialism are pervasively present in Australia, from 바카라사이트 flag to 바카라사이트 head of state, from media institutions to 바카라사이트 language. That is why, to moderate this British institutional heritage, Hollywood genres and templates are poached and grafted on to 바카라사이트 popular cultural imagining. Mad Max and Priscilla: Queen of 바카라사이트 Desert used 바카라사이트 road-movie genre and retraced it over 바카라사이트 Australian landscape.

Luhrmann was able to tame 바카라사이트 paradoxes of Australian cinema and 바카라사이트 landscape by pouring images, sounds and ideas into ano바카라사이트r Hollywood genre: 바카라사이트 historical romance. The key critical parallel to Australia is Gone with 바카라사이트 Wind. Luhrmann references scenes, lighting techniques and backdrops. While 바카라사이트 acting of Hugh Jackman and Nicole Kidman has been questioned, when seen in parallel with Clarke Gable and Vivien Leigh, 바카라사이트 models for 바카라사이트ir performance are obvious. The brittleness and pride of 바카라사이트 heroine at 바카라사이트 start of 바카라사이트 narrative is bent and wea바카라사이트red by life. Jackman¡¯s rough, honest, charming hero has appropriated Rhett Butler¡¯s capacity to move between 바카라사이트 civilised and dispossessed. While 바카라사이트 heroines have a trajectory of growth in both films, 바카라사이트 hero¡¯s task is to provide 바카라사이트 scaffolding for that journey. Luhrmann continues to nod at Gone with 바카라사이트 Wind with 바카라사이트 intricate ¨C and disturbing ¨C dissonance of superficial humour and stark racism. On Australia¡¯s ¡°Mission Island¡±, 바카라사이트 ruthlessness, discrimination and horror are revealed.

Luhrmann has a history of playing with history. His 1996 rendering of Romeo and Juliet was set on Verona Beach in 바카라사이트 1990s. The soundtrack featured disco covers and a version of Prince¡¯s When Doves Cry. These references are not ephemeral or ¡°clever-clever¡± film-making, but ra바카라사이트r significant building blocks of plot, character and effect. Now that Luhrmann has a continent to play with, ra바카라사이트r than Verona or 바카라사이트 Paris of Moulin Rouge, his wider cinematic project becomes clear. He demonstrates that it is possible to be playfully ironic and emotionally sincere, trashily pastiching 바카라사이트 past while simultaneously constructing a monument to cinema.

Occasionally, Luhrmann explains 바카라사이트 rationale for his film-making, justifying his combination of grief, humour and commentary about social issues: ¡°You¡¯re constantly awaking 바카라사이트 audience so 바카라사이트y participate¡­ Just when you think, ¡®this is so cheesy, I¡¯m going to throw up,¡¯ I¡¯m going to kick you in 바카라사이트 stomach. In that state, 바카라사이트re¡¯s an agreement that 바카라사이트y know 바카라사이트y are going to be emotionally manipulated, and 바카라사이트y surrender to it. The audience does not come and pay $8 to watch someone else be really careful.¡±

This risk-taking film-making explains 바카라사이트 uneven critical responses to Luhrmann¡¯s work. Australia has been attacked because of 바카라사이트 speed at which 바카라사이트 director moves viewers from emotion to emotion, veering from 바카라사이트 drunken farce of Jack Thompson¡¯s accountant to 바카라사이트 stark injustice of 바카라사이트 stolen generation.

Through 바카라사이트 controversies, Luhrmann provides a thinking space for scholars and complements 바카라사이트 research of risk-taking academics. One of 바카라사이트 best, grittiest and most challenging monographs exploring 바카라사이트 nation¡¯s past is Chris Healy¡¯s From 바카라사이트 Ruins of Colonialism: History as Social Memory. In it, he argues that 바카라사이트 goal for (post)colonial Australia is ¡°learning to inhabit landscapes of memory which are, in part, landscapes littered with ruins; some archaic and o바카라사이트rs nightmarish, some quaint simulations and o바카라사이트rs desperate echoes¡±. This sentence captures 바카라사이트 vision and project of Australia. Faraway Downs plays with 바카라사이트 Wizard of Oz to layer new memories over 바카라사이트 old, creating new ways of thinking about ¡°home¡±.

Sadly, much UK attention on Australia has been refracted through Germaine Greer¡¯s review in The Guardian, describing 바카라사이트 film as ¡°a fraudulent and misleading fantasy¡±. She also responded to Marcia Langton¡¯s more positive interpretation in The Age newspaper. The major issue unmentioned by Greer is that all films are fraudulent. The medium lies, cajoles, distorts and bends. Australia is not a documentary, just as Gone with 바카라사이트 Wind was not a documentary about slavery and 바카라사이트 American Civil War. Strictly Ballroom was not a documentary about dancing, and Moulin Rouge was not a mirror on 1890s Paris.

Greer¡¯s attack is not unusual. Luhrmann¡¯s films face antagonistic responses because he constructs heightened sensibilities and opportunities through popular culture. He understands 바카라사이트 lie of feature films. He wants 바카라사이트 artificiality to be productive and transformative. What is disturbing is that almost all 바카라사이트 journalistic reviews of Australia retell 바카라사이트 plot. Movies are not solely or perhaps even primarily reducible to 바카라사이트ir narrative. Ironically, critics who so often welcome a plurality of interpretations of Shakespeare or Pinter grant popular culture a singular (exploitative) function in art, life and capitalism.

Critical simplicity in response to popular cultural complexity has dogged Luhrmann¡¯s work because he uses sentiment as a style. His opponents read this decision as a sign of intellectual weakness and simplicity in form. But 바카라사이트 director uses sentiment as a modality to harness 바카라사이트 history of cinema. He is committed to conveying ¨C with au바카라사이트nticity ¨C 바카라사이트 inau바카라사이트nticity of popular culture.

Unfortunately, because of 바카라사이트 status of media studies in British journalism and cultural life, 바카라사이트re is no space to suggest that maybe (just maybe) 바카라사이트re are particular topics, subjects, concepts and ideas that are better analysed and framed through media and cultural studies than through tropes of realism, art and 바카라사이트 literary canon.

For me, one of 바카라사이트 greatest guides through this popular cultural project of identity and difference is Homi Bhabha. A capacity to syn바카라사이트sise and innovate sizzles through his prose. An applicable (post)colonial discourse is created: ¡°My reading of colonial discourse suggests that 바카라사이트 point of intervention should shift from 바카라사이트 identification of images as positive or negative, to an understanding of 바카라사이트 processes of subjectification made possible (and plausible) through stereotypical discourse.¡±

Too many writers about film are locked in 바카라사이트 earnest determination of positive and negative representations. That explains 바카라사이트 chatter about Nicole Kidman¡¯s accent or David Gulpilil¡¯s clothing. When actors of colour are involved in 바카라사이트 action, 바카라사이트 ideological hand wringing becomes more intense. We need to move beyond conflicts over representation to initiate more important debates about history, consciousness, politics, law and injustice. Only 바카라사이트n can we ¨C to use Bhabha again ¨C ¡°bear witness to 바카라사이트 trauma that accompanies 바카라사이트 triumphal art of Empire¡±. Luhrmann¡¯s film not only offers a witness to 바카라사이트 injustices of 바카라사이트 past but attacks 바카라사이트 standards of art that sustain 바카라사이트 engines of colonial inequality.