I'm not interested in Milk at all.

I love Baz and his ability to breathe fresh air into seemingly dead genres (Shakespeare, musicals) but Austrailia seems too straightfoward for me and for someone who completely dislikes Gone With The Wind, I just can't muster the excitement to get me to see this one.

How about a Punisher War Journal review next week, with Dominic West as Jigsaw, a nice tranisition of topics is written out for you.

Lack of enthusiasm for Milk? My enthusiasm is off the charts. Brolin + Penn + Van Sant = Victory!

They edited out Adam's original review of Milk. During the live broadcast, Adam was barely making any sense about Milk. Dave and Peter had to stop him, and the distanced themselves from his comments. I want to hear Adam's original review of Milk. It was comic gold!

I saw Australia and LOVED it. I'm going to see it again this weekend. I thought it felt like 2 movies too! O.O

Before we get too happy-go-luck about Australia, I want to point out some things I disliked about the film.

1. Two films in one is not a good thing. This isn't a "buy one, get one free" deal at Wal-Mart! If you're going to have an epic storyline, make it one cohesive unit. I'm sorry, but attaching Pearl Harbor to the end of City Slickers does not make a grand film.

2. The film was beautiful and light-hearted, which I don't normally mind. But I thought it clashed terribly with the more serious themes of the film: WWII and the forced assimilation of aboriginal children.

The child experiences some really terrible things in this film, yet seems to happy as ever to narrate joyfully what is depressingly sad story. Sure, this film isn't Rabbit Proof Fence, but at least have a bit more somber tone when touching on this historically ugly policy. The film tries to end that whole affair on a happy note by telling you the Australian government ended and apologized for their actions. But they didn't stop forced removal of children until 1973, over thirty years after the conclusion of this film, and they didn't apologize until February of this year! Happily ever after my ass!

3. The length of the film made the music that much more unbearable. I'm not talking about the score here, which was fantastic. What grated on me was the repetition of the "Somewhere Over the Rainbow" tune, which had only a tenuous relation to the film, and the kids magic song. The magic was cool, especially during the stampeding bull scene, but enough with the "mango mangooo" and the hand waving nonsense. Speaking of which, it is no wonder the kid drew people towards him during this song. I'd go too! Mangoes are freakin' delicious and were very hard to come by during WWII.

4. I bought the Bella/Edward love in Twilight more than the aristocrat/ruffian romance in Australia. Maybe it was the sudden affection from the recent widowed, or the gratuitous flexing while soaping down scene, but it all seemed forced. Why is their shoddy romance forgiven? Because the film is piggy-backing on classic films that also suffer from poor on-screen chemistry? I don't buy it.

5. Also all of the scenes that were not filmed on-site were blatantly obvious with the fact. I did not believe for a second they were camping out in the outback. The backdrop was painted, for stylistic effect, and it broke any chance of immersion. Give me a dingo at least Baz.

6. There were a few other poor plot moments scattered across the film. For example, why the people manning the cattle gates just lift it up again after Drover closed it? Why did they newspaper report seeing the dead bodies of the protagonists in the dessert? If it was a lie the villain perpetrated, why then did he seem surprised she showed up? Why did the Japanese land on a small island of the cost when they undoubtedly destroyed the radio tower? Were they sweeping the mission to be sure they killed every child they could find? When does that start making sense?

All in all, I thoroughly enjoyed this film and your discussion of it.

Great podcast as always. Thanks for the mention at the end. I saw Milk. It was moving, and a good film but nothing really wowed me.

Yeah, I noticed Adam's review was totally changed probably because he couldn't get what he wanted to say right and it ended up sounding more like a critique of Milk himself than the film.

Hi. Good news.