Holloway mourns death of student - The Founder

The Founder | Monday 8 December 2008
E X T R A
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Film
Australia: truly a tour de force
Laura Stokes
Depicting Darwin on the brink of
World War 2, Baz Luhrmann’s Australia
has already been touted as the
new Gone with the Wind and as a
return to the golden age of cinema.
Epic in scope, it stars Nicole
Kidman, who impresses as Lady
Sarah Ashley, an English aristocrat
who journeys from her countryside
manor to the Australian outback to
join her husband, whose misdemeanours
have become common
knowledge. Intending to set things
straight, she arrives only to discover
that she is now a widow and that
the farm (Faraway Downs) and
its large cattle herd are now solely
in her control. Her plummy accent,
carved beauty and immaculate
dress sense mean that she is
radically different from her new
neighbours, and a poor obstacle for
those who wish to seize her land
from her. One whom she initially
falls foul of is a rugged handyman
known as the Drover (Hugh Jackman),
who can’t make head nor tale
of Ashley’s refined ways. Yet despite
their differences love soon blossoms
for the pair as they struggle to
defend both their newfound land
and family.
Falling just short of three hours
and packed full of all you would expect
from a Hollywood blockbuster,
Australia, thankfully, never appears
too pleased with itself. Luhrmann
is cautionary in this sense, letting
young Nullah, a mixed race child
‘adopted’ by Lady Ashley, tell the
story in the way he sees it. The
innocent narrative works perfectly
as a brilliant contrast to the often
barbaric scenes surrounding him.
It is also a joy to see the emergence
of a new Sarah, as she involves
herself more and more in the action
(unbeknown to her enemies, she is
a mean horse rider, giving her male
counterparts a run for their money).
It is also worth noting the new
style adopted by the revolutionary
Luhrmann. He has refrained
from the darting camera shots and
overall whirlwind effect of the all
singing, all dancing Moulin Rouge;
Australia’s romance scenes ,for
instance, are shown in a tender
way. Such fancy camera techniques
would seem redundant here: he lets
the lingering shots of the spectacular
scenery do the talking.
However, there are some brilliant
special effects, such as the stampede
scene and the 1942 bombing of
Darwin by the Japanese (a period of
history which I for one knew nothing
about). Kidman is also surprisingly
believable when coming to
terms with her new maternal duties
(which the Drover apparently ignores)and
her complete devotion to
the orphaned aborigine child is one
of many powerful aspects of the
epic. It is near impossible to predict
what will become of the lovers
throughout the film, guaranteeing
maximum audience attention until
the credits start rolling. Australia
is a true tour de force: if you can
sit through the three hour running
time, I guarantee that you will be
rewarded.
Che Part One: The Argentine
Liam McGuigan
In the whole world, Ernesto ‘Ché’
Guevara is perhaps the most known
unknown person there is. Those
who know him for the politics, as
a leading light in the 1959 Cuban
Revolution, are few compared to
the many who know him as the
fashion statement: the pop-art image
on the t-shirt.
It is with this special date in
mind, released just a day shy of
the revolution’s fiftieth anniversary,
that we are given the first in a
two-part biopic on the man behind
the picture. Che: The Argentine
gives the viewer Ché Guevara,
for the most part, in two separate
ways. On the one hand, Guevara
as national revolutionary in Cuba,
commanding and leading forces to
the eventual toppling of the Batista
dictatorship; on the other, Guevara
as international figurehead, talking
at the United Nations in 1964 on
behalf of Castro’s Cuba.
Director Steven Soderbergh, cred-
ited for cinematography in the film
under the alias Peter Andrews, handles
these two separate time frames
in a well-crafted manner. The
revolution is displayed in vibrant
colour, heightening the beauty of
the Cuban landscape whilst also
giving added shock to the deaths
encountered along the way. This is
in complete contrast to the monochrome
moments interspersed in
the film where Guevara, played by
Benicio Del Toro, is shown as UN
representative, yet both directions
visually hit the spot.
It’s when you get past the image
and the visuals, however, that
the film’s frailties begin to show.
Though Ché Guevara is played to
great effect by Del Toro who, like
Demián Bichir as Fidel Castro,
bears a striking resemblance to the
man visually, those who hope to
see the film in order to gain some
extra knowledge on the man will be
left short changed. The film instead
holds steady to set piece after set
piece of dialogue where Guevara
is little questioned and mostly accepted
in his words and actions. Bar
a few moments where you see Ché
going through day-to-day chores,
you’re still left unaware of deeper
issues surrounding the revolutionary:
what brought an Argentinean
(hence the film’s title) to Cuba, what
formed his political thinking and
how he met people like Fidel and
Raul Castro are all left unanswered.
Yet, in spite of this, what it does
choose to address, predominantly
the Cuban revolution itself, is handled
with a masterful combination
of suspense and visuals. The road
towards Santa Clara and the hidden
nature of guerrilla warfare make for
tense battle scenes where you’re not
sure when, or even if, fighting will
break out. The revolution’s eventual
arrival in the city blows this even
wider, giving way to stunning visual
moments in the film and a brilliant
final half-hour to the movie.
All of this, however, would be
left wanting had it not been for
Del Toro’s role as Ché Guevara. At
Cannes in 2008, Del Toro won the
Best Actor Award for his portrayal
of the man over the two parts and
it’s easy to see why; though the
script binds him to little insight but
many platitudes, the hard-nosed
leader who would kill or be killed
without hesitation shines throughout,
and it is on Del Toro’s part that
the energy of the film largely comes
from.
As a film in itself Che Part One:
The Argentine is hard to really pin
down. So much in the film gives
rise to it really being the fourand-a-half-hour
opus that it was
screened as at both the Cannes
and Toronto film festivals, yet as a
stand-alone movie you’d be hard
pressed not to call it a flawed masterpiece.
This is a real shame given
Del Toro as co-producer allegedly
spent seven years researching and
developing the idea. This first-half
of the biopic keeps Guevara where
he was in the common consciousness
beforehand: as merchandise
figure over Marxist fighter. Yet this
is not to take away Del Toro’s performance
of Ché, which is worth
the price of admission alone. With
Del Toro’s powerful performance
combined with the subject matter
of forthcoming Che Part Two:
Guerrilla, it promises to be a mustsee
conclusion to this ambitious
project.