Not So Spectacular! Not So Spectacular!

Rating: 6/10 (16 July 2001)

This is one of those infuriating movies - like Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon - that are very good where they're good, and very bad where they're bad. It could have been a masterpiece (and hence, Oscar material) but alas!
I'll tell you where Moulin Rouge hit the bull's eye, and where it missed the barn by a mile. First, the hits:
1. The film began well. Much of the first half of the film is corny, but so what? Corniness by itself doesn't make a movie bad, and in this case, it worked, thanks in large part to Baz Luhrmann's directing.
2. By far my favourite part of the movie is the scene in Satine's bedroom (called The Elephant) where she mistakes Christian the penniless writer (Ewan) for the wealthy Duke (Richard Roxburgh). Nicole Kidman as Satine EXCELS here, especially in her orgasmic throes (you'll know what I mean when you see it).
3. The supporting cast was by and large very good, especially the Bohemian revolutionaries a.k.a. Ewan's fellow-actors in the play, Spectacular! Spectacular!
4. The set was lush and the costumes were opulent, something you would expect to see in a Tim Burton movie.
5. The pacing was excellent.
So far we've been talking about the first half of the movie, for most of the merits of the movie seem to be found there.
Now the misses.
1. From the point where Christian the writer meets Satine the courtesan on the roof-top of The Elephant, the movie inexplicably goes downhill. From that point on, the songs lose their punch and the plot just meanders along. In one word, you're liable to be bored stiff, as I was.
2. The movie is about Satine's desire to act in a play written by Christian called Spectacular! Spectacular! Yet when the play is finally staged near the end of the movie, we only catch snippets of it. I know the director didn't mean to make a musical, but having built up such incredible expectations among the movie-goers, we should at least have had the chance to watch a major portion of the play. I certainly would have edited out much of the draggy singing that cluttered the second half of the movie, and shown more of the play.
3. Similarly, we didn't see enough of the can can. Since the Moulin Rouge was famous for this, we should have been treated to a more or less complete can can dance. Instead we got little flashes here and there which were more annoying and headache-inducing than entertaining. Recall the flashes of flamenco dancing in the John Woo debacle, Mission Impossible 2, and you'll know what I mean.
4. The plot was moronically predictable. You could see the ending a mile away. Worse, it was boring.
Some specifics now.
Nicole Kidman acted very well, I must say, though I'm not a fan of hers. Ewan McGregor was quite good, especially at the end of the movie where Satine died in his arms - his wailing was the best I'd heard since Mel Gibson's in The Patriot. I liked Richard Roxburgh as the Duke. (By the way, Roxburgh is the actor in Mission Impossible 2 whose finger was cut off with the bad guy's cigar-cutter.) It was nice to see Roxburgh get a meatier role than what he had in MI:2 and that he could act as well in a tragicomedy as in an action movie. Jim Broadbent, as Harold Zidler, the owner of the Moulin Rouge, was outstanding. I hope he gets nominated for Best Supporting Actor at the Oscars.
And now the golden question: can the stars sing? Well, I thought Nicole had a pretty good singing voice. She sounded like Madonna, only better. Ewan sang a version of Elton John's My Song and sang it well. But that was the only song he sang well. The rest was just monotonous bellowing.
Sadly the movie didn't come up with much original music. There were plenty of spoofs e.g. Madonna's Like A Virgin, but surely an expensive movie such as Moulin Rouge deserves some good original music.
I read somewhere on IMDb.com that the Roxanne tango was the greatest thing in the movie. Well, my movie partner thought so too. But sorry, it just didn't grab me.
Certainly not on a par with The Sound Of Music, I'd give ML 6 out of 10.