Baz Luhrmann: 3 Parts Busby Berkeley, 7 Parts P.T. Barnum

Rating: 10/10 (2 November 2009)

Moulin Rouge! {Dir. Baz Luhrmann, 2001}
****/****
While he may not be the next Kubrick, it hard to deny that director Baz Luhrmann is an exceedingly capable showman. He throws as many striking images on the screen as an audience can handle; sometimes at expense of story and character. Here, Luhrmann achieves what some may have thought impossible: constant cinematic exhilaration. While he has many weaknesses as a director, (namely his penchant toward melodrama and bombast) all of his cinematic traits meld together here to form a masterpiece that is essentially a glorious mish-mash of all aspects of 20-th century culture. Here you have the elements of classical opera, early stage melodrama, swooning love songs and the incessantly moving camera that seems to guide the MTV-generation through life put into a blender. While every inclination I have would regard this premise with hesitation, the result is positively intoxicating. A miracle of a movie!