Audiences Around the World Applaud ‘Australia’, Despite Media Trend
Here’s a story you aren’t reading in the Australian press, or anywhere else for that matter. We know media outlets visit our site for information, so perhaps this will give them something to rehash, or at the very least to think about. Australia has been released in Australia and America for 4/5 days now. Plenty of time for the critics to have their reviews printed. As with Baz opinions tend to be polarized, there’s been good, bad, and in between. So far it appears the good and in between outrank the bad, you can read the mix of reviews here.
Have you been to a screening yet? If you have, chances are the crowd were so impressed that they applauded at the end. In Australia this is not a common thing after a film, so it is amazing to witness; likewise we’re told the same is occurring all around American cinemas, already with nine separate instances mentioned on the IMDb message boards. When a complete stranger turns to you in the audience and says, “I feel like standing up and applauding,” and then proceeds to do so, this is a powerful film. Because of the subject nature, it may not be a film that will immediately attract cinemagoers in droves (no pun intended), but with such responses you can bet word of mouth will be the friend of this film and australiamovie.net intends to lead the way.
What’s quite disappointing is to see the Australian media’s willingness to re-report the few scathing reviews from our international neighbours. The Aussie press are not here to blindly praise the film; however nor should they report as though international opinions are gospel. As a small country we do tend to put a lot of stock in what the larger nations such as the UK and USA have to say, sometimes to a fault. We respect our older siblings and like to know what they think. However, if one critic from the UK publishes a scathing review over the film and Kidman’s acting, why is it then relevant for Australian media to publish an article …about this article?? Likewise with tales from The Age about the film supposedly ‘bombing’ in America; here’s an article which used current figures up to Friday when the film was only released on Wednesday. The article also failed to acknowledge that the film made twice the amount that Luhrmann’s previous Academy Award winning cult film, Moulin Rouge! made on its first day out, nor did it mention the box office went up by almost 100% on Friday and should bring in solid figures for the weekend. While this film will not likely take in massive numbers each day, it should do a long and steady haul to see it reap returns. Meanwhile no doubt we’ll continue to be fed a sensationalised and skewed portion of the truth, because it sells and it gets people talking. For as fast as some outlets were happy to put the film up on an unreachable pedestal, they have been just as eager to tear it down.
If you’ve reached this site before seeing the film, wanting to know if you should bother or not. Ask yourself, when was the last time you went to a film and people enjoyed it so much that they cheered and applauded? If you’re visiting our site because you enjoyed the film, then we encourage you to spread the word!
November 29th, 2008