SYDNEY – TV chat show host Oprah Winfrey gushed, and Variety, the entertainment industry bible, gave it a ringing endorsement, but the film Australia faces an epic challenge if it is to deliver for the country’s tourism, film and business communities.
Even before next week’s international release, the sweeping romantic saga featuring Nicole Kidman, Hugh Jackman and newcomer Brandon Walters has already smashed one record. At a cost of Au$210 million (€104 million), it is Australia’s most expensive film.
Many are banking on it becoming an international box office hit that will boost the local film industry, just as the Lord of the Rings trilogy fuelled a surge in New Zealand’s film and tourism industries.
However, the film, hyped in a Au$100 million publicity campaign as an antipodean Gone with the Wind, has had mixed reviews on its native turf.
Australia’s tourism authority has higher hopes, however. Faced with a tourist downturn, Tourism Australia is spending Au$40 million on an international campaign tied to the film that will run in 22 countries. This will attempt to lure visitors with spectacular shots of Australia’s vast unspoilt landscapes and sweeping plains.
Matthew Hingerty, managing director of the Australian Tourism Export Council, admits, though, that the film is being “projected into extraordinary circumstances” when the global economy cools and thousands are out of jobs.
Winfrey’s effusive comments that Australia “literally swept me off my feet; you just don’t get to see movies like this any more” and Variety’s characterisation of the film as a “luxurious bumpy ride” in a “Rolls-Royce on a rocky country road” are likely to help.
But the mood in the film’s native country is more muted.
“Australia is not the masterpiece we hoped it might be,” said veteran film critic David Stratton. – (Financial Times service)