By Garry Maddox
When the outback epic Australia had a disappointing release in American cinemas 15 years ago, director Baz Luhrmann simmered over how it had been pitched to audiences there.
“I really had conflict with the way the film was marketed and sold,” the celebrated Australian director says from New York City. “They hid in the US all of the cattle stuff and just sold it as Australia’s Pearl Harbour. It was all about the war.”
“I realised I had 2.1 million feet of footage”: Baz Luhrmann.Credit: Brendon Thorne
It took watching streaming services when COVID-19 shut down the production of Elvis on the Gold Coast for Luhrmann to see a way of giving his most polarising film a new life – using footage that did not make the final cut, along with a new soundtrack, to turn Australia into a six-chapter miniseries called Faraway Downs that is streaming on Disney+.
“I realised I had 2.1 million feet of footage,” he says. “In the back of my mind, I probably thought that one day I might make an epic two-film version.
“But streaming had come along, and I just realised how, a bit like a Charles Dickens’ novel that was written in chapters, it really suited episodic storytelling.”
After Moulin Rouge! became a hit and a planned Alexander the Great film did not get off the ground, Luhrmann set out to tell a Stolen Generations story about an Indigenous boy (Brandon Walters) who was caught between cultures amid a sweeping romance between an English aristocrat (Nicole Kidman) and a rough drover (Hugh Jackman) as World War II came to the Top End.
It is still his most successful film in Europe and Australia, even bigger than The Great Gatsby and Elvis that he has made since, though less than a quarter of its worldwide box office of $US212 million came from the US.
Luhrmann calls Faraway Downs an experiment about the different way of telling a story for cinemas and streaming.
“What I liken it to is when a musician makes a song, and you go to a concert and they do a different treatment,” he says. “They do the rock ’n roll version of, say, a dance track.
“It doesn’t mean it’s a different tune or a different song. It’s just a different way of telling it.”
While Luhrmann will decide on a next project in the new year – the options include a theatre show in London and a documentary using never-previously-seen footage of Elvis Presley performing – he might make a different version of the film Elvis for streaming in future.
Baz Luhrmann and Catherine Martin at the opening of the Red Sea International Film Festival in Saudi Arabia on November 30.Credit: Getty
“I wouldn’t do it to Moulin Rouge or Romeo + Juliet but I’ve been thinking that Elvis would really suit this,” he says. “If I looked at it as a long-play episodic, I’d even radically look at the way I tell the story.”
While Faraway Downs did not involve any new filming, Kidman and Jackman revoiced poor quality dialogue from the Australia set, with the odd word changed. Luhrmann describes it as a joy working with Indigenous musicians Budjerah and Electric Fields on the new soundtrack.
Luhrmann decided on a different – and darker – ending for the miniseries.
“I felt that in the length of the movie, maybe it was just one tragic turn too many,” he says of the ending of Australia. “I feel this ending speaks to the larger theme.”
Having dramatised a Stolen Generations story, Luhrmann is clearly disappointed by the no vote in the Voice to parliament referendum.
“My position was to support what the majority of First Nations people wanted,” he says. “And I think it was pretty clear that that majority of First Nations people wanted a voice.
“I personally feel it was a missed opportunity for progress. [And] I don’t think we understand the level to which, even if you’re aware that you’re subjected to misinformation and manipulation by the net, just what can be pushed out there. It’s really just inaccurate information.”
After launching Faraway Downs in Sydney, London, Tokyo and New York, Luhrmann headed to Saudi Arabia to be jury president at the Red Sea International Film Festival this week.
He consulted with other filmmakers before deciding it was more important to attend, given that it focussed on films rather than glamorous celebrations, than have the festival cancelled.
“I just think that in a world where politics and certain military solutions are failing us, more than ever, the voices of storytellers need to be heard,” he says. “And a lot of the storytelling is coming not just from the Arab world but from Africa and Asia.
“So I just thought this is not really the right moment to run for the hills.”
Email Garry Maddox at gmaddox@smh.com.au and follow him on Twitter at @gmaddox.
Find out the next TV, streaming series and movies to add to your must-sees. Get The Watchlist delivered every Thursday.