US moviegoers have opted not to subject themselves to Australia, Baz Luhrmann’s overlong outback romance, despite the director promoting it with reference to the “Stolen Generations” issue.
Australian Associated Press
Mr Luhrmann believes that racist government and church officials may have taken countless potential Australia viewers away from their families in order to prevent them from being immersed in Australia’s sweeping narrative, unsubtle allegory and overdone Wizard of Oz references.
Studio 20th Century Fox bet $197 million on the project, apparently believing that while Australians have little interest in 1930s Northern Territory history, American audiences would lap it up.
Already, studio executives are urging the director to recut the film in a bid to make it relevant to a modern audience, perhaps by setting the story in late 20th-century Venice Beach. And would it hurt to put in a couple of Madonna songs?
A simple test could have determined whether Australia was likely to play with an American audience: would Australians flock to see a film called Northern Territory?