Baz Luhrmann’s ‘Australia’ Miniseries on Hulu – The Hollywood Reporter

Nicole Kidman and Hugh Jackman in ‘Faraway Downs’

Courtesy of Hulu

It’s a frequent grumble amongst TV critics that a few of the exhibits we’re made to observe may need been higher off as films — and certainly an equally frequent one amongst movie critics that some options may need labored higher as exhibits. In that gentle, Hulu’s Faraway Downs makes for an intriguing experiment.

The miniseries isn’t a brand new drama, precisely, however somewhat Baz Luhrmann‘s expanded tackle his personal 2008 epic Australia. It contains roughly an hour’s price of beforehand unused footage, as much as and together with a reworked ending. If the hope was that Faraway Downs would restore the fame of a movie that had acquired blended reactions upon launch, nonetheless, the collection sadly comes up brief. Principally, it serves to show {that a} change in format can solely accomplish a lot.

A lot of Faraway Downs’ six-episode season (with episodes working 25-50 minutes every, together with credit) faithfully retraces Australia’s plot. In 1939, with World Warfare II inching ever nearer, Girl Sarah Ashley (Nicole Kidman) flies from England to Australia meaning to promote her husband’s ranch. When she arrives to study that he’s just lately died, she resolves as an alternative to take over the reins of the enterprise herself. Alongside the way in which, she inevitably falls in love with the gruff drover (Hugh Jackman) chargeable for wrangling their cattle; with Nullah (Brandon Walters), the half-Aboriginal boy who lives on the property; with the surprising household she and Drover and Nullah kind collectively inside it; and finally with the unusual however stunning land she’s coming to see as dwelling.

What labored or didn’t work within the 165-minute movie nonetheless principally works or doesn’t work right here; those that both adored or despised the characteristic will not be prone to change their minds dramatically. A few of the added materials goes towards smoothing over particulars within the unique that have been by no means completely defined: Keep in mind when Sarah huffs, “I may present you a factor or two about horses,” after which Australia cuts straight to her having no thought tips on how to herd cattle? No? Properly, anyway, Faraway Downs inserts a couple of minutes of Sarah displaying off some fancy equestrian methods to show she does know lots about horses. It’s a smoother transition, however not precisely a revelatory change. Likewise, a few of the supporting characters, like military captain Dutton (Ben Mendelsohn) or Sarah’s kindly pal Catherine (Essie Davis), get an additional beat or two to clarify their motives or personalities — although probably not sufficient to show any of them into three-dimensional folks.

Probably the most vital deviation between the 2 storylines comes within the closing minutes. Luhrmann famously shot a number of endings for his epic, and Faraway Downs opts for a special, and higher, one than Australia received. Whereas each Australia and Faraway Downs are basically and proudly sentimental tales, Australia’s sugary remaining beats rendered it a fairy story. Faraway Downs reinforces the story as a melodrama, chopping the treacle with a welcome be aware of bitterness. Sadly, it additionally furnishes the Drover with an actual identify however nonetheless no rationalization as to why he’s chosen to withhold it — which has the mildly insane impact of suggesting it’s merely by no means occurred to any of his nearest and dearest to ask what it’s. Maybe in one other 15 years, Luhrmann can serve up one more model to proper that unsuitable.  

Notably, Faraway Downs fails to handle a criticism that’s dogged Australia since its launch: that it relegates its characters of shade, and notably its Aboriginal characters, to one-dimensional archetypes. Nullah, endearingly carried out although he’s by Walters, spent a lot of the movie as a vaguely magical sufferer to be saved by white heroes. His grandfather, King George (David Gulpilil), was flattened even additional right into a largely silent image, fable, landmark — however by no means an precise particular person with relatable ideas or emotions or motives. Not a lot of that has modified within the new model. Seemingly not a lot may, for the reason that undertaking includes no new footage. However these racial politics really feel, if something, even queasier in 2023, when Faraway Downs is being launched alongside the likes of, say, Martin Scorsese’s Killers of the Flower Moon — which made such a strenuous (if nonetheless imperfect) effort to heart the ache of the indigenous neighborhood and to refuse to let its white characters off the hook for his or her complicity and duplicity.

In the long run, the most important distinction between Australia and Faraway Downs may merely be the expertise. I watched Australia for the primary time at dwelling on a TV, however even from my lounge, it felt like a film film — a sprawling epic self-consciously modeled after cinematic classics like Gone With the Wind or Casablanca (or, sure, The Wizard of Oz, whose “Someplace Over the Rainbow” is not only a motif in Lurhmann’s story however an annoyingly persistent plot level). Each the movie’s strengths and weaknesses have been rooted in its cinematic nature. If there have been particulars that didn’t fully add up, it was straightforward sufficient to overlook about them amid the dazzling vistas and the relentless plotting. If Jackman or Kidman’s line readings generally verged on cartoonish, they spoke to an affection for the screwball rhythms of yore.

Luhrmann’s extravagance can work on TV (take into account his flawed however continuously exhilarating The Get Down), however the particular pressure that Australia represented doesn’t translate properly throughout media. Watching Faraway Downs within the late Peak TV period, it’s simpler to note how skinny the characters are, and the way missing in intimacy and nuance their relationships are. The scope that had felt sprawling for a film feels restricted for a present; even at near 4 hours, the brand new model has little room for curiosity in regards to the on a regular basis particulars of this work, and even much less for the characters who linger on the margins. Australia was lots formidable, but it surely was formidable in the way in which of an unlimited movie. Reworked as TV, it beneficial properties a couple of minutes and a few further particulars — however within the course of, it additionally loses a few of its grandeur.