Real Steel calls upon Hugh Jackman's ability to tame and train robots, but this isn't his first time at the robo-dome. He first conquered a borg named Nicole Kidman in Baz Luhrmann's failed epic Australia. Ha! Now, now, that's the first and last Nicole Kidman joke you'll hear from me because 1) Nicole Kidman is awesome, 2) Rabbit Hole is under-appreciated, and 3) BORGS ARE VINDICTIVE. Let's reinspect the joys of this looooong movie without ever caring about the story!
Director Baz Luhrmann began Australia, a gargantuan WWII-set melodrama, with one humble goal: to make an Aussie Gone with the Wind. Seems reasonable enough! After all, Hugh Jackman has the chiseled good looks of Olivia de Havilland. But bad news: Turns out you need more than neat colors, symmetrical actors, and Out of Africa khakis for a great epic. At 165 minutes, Australia summons neither the charisma nor intrigue to justify its grandeur, even if everyone onscreen is dapper, sweet and even a little funny. Like all Bad Movies We Love, Australia does give us five lovable qualities, and we've ranked them for you riled marsupials.
5. Scenes and scenes of scenery!
Imagine a perfect world where National Geographic photoshopped all its mountains, streams, and wildlife to make them resemble Abercrombie catalog backdrops. Are you clapping yet? Luhrmann understands that nature is supposed to look a little Botoxed, so the continuous shots of the glorious outback dribbling with Vaseline never get old. Check out the marvel: It's all going swimmingly until that hilarious shot of Hugh and Nicole under the waterfall. Nick and Jessica, anybody?
Part of Luhrmann's Gone with the Wind fetish is fitting Kidman's haughty character with the most gorgeous, yet character-appropriate garments in the hemisphere. You can imagine the amount of perfectly tailored pencil skirts this entails (lots), and the darling hats she dons (which are, again, darling). They're like lux originals of all the cheap dignitary shit Madonna wears in Shanghai Surprise. Shanghai Surpassed, Madge!
Forgive me, but nothing about Wolverine is hot. The claws are contrived, the grit is manufactured, and his muscles look like roid-y cysts. He looks mutant, frankly! In Australia, Hugh's physique is still otherworldly, but it's mostly just 'STRALIAN. Nobody embodies "strapping" like Jackman, and I'm pleased to say he shows off his tautness like an overconfident high school wrestler whose Muscle Milk diet is finally kicking in. He even drenches himself with buckets of water at times! What a feeling! He doesn't stay shirtless for the movie's whole duration, but Baz Luhrmann probably justifies that snafu on the Blu-ray commentary.
2. Australian-rules tonsil hockey
Once you get past the film's jaw-breakingly hilarious dialogue (which includes Hugh's line, "I mix with dingos, not duchesses," and kid actor Brandon Walters's plea, "Let's get them no-good cheeky bull in the big bloody metal ship!"), you're left with a winsome movie that leads up to one gnarly makeout. Hugh and Nicole come on slow in this seminal smooch, with Kidman emanating a crosseyed, awestruck vibe throughout. Compelling. Hugh inches in with assurance and stoic lip paralysis, but he eventually warms to sucking face with the girl like a human being. Put this user-generated clip on mute and see the succulent lip duel at once.
1. The reaction shot of Nicole Kidman's career
When it comes to Nicole Kidman's best moments on the big screen, save your arguments for To Die For and The Hours; in Australia, she gathers together so much comedy in one reaction shot that I can't believe it's in this alarmingly self-serious movie. Early in the film, her character remarks on a herd of kangaroos running alongside her car. She's delighted! She cheers! She slips into a Cate Blanchett-in-The Aviator accent! And then... well, just watch it. It'll redefine your appreciation of stupid sight gags and give you a sense of the silliness behind within those Eyes Wide Shut.