A HOLLYWOOD ALLEGORY!

Rating: Null/10 (21 June 2001)

This movie is not about Moulin Rouge. Or even love at all. This is the director venting frustration against Hollywood.
Ewan's character is repeatedly told to avoid Montramarte(I know that's wrongly spelled-sue me) because it is a place of sin-something we hear about HOLLYWOOD oh so often.In a distance the words 'Moulin Rouge' glow like the Hollywood sign, promising a glamorous underworld of illicit pleasures.
He's repeatedly told by his father that he'll never make it, a sentiment that I, as young author am quite familiar with.
And the part where they tell the idiotic, supercillious Duke(read:Studio head) about the story, looks like it could be the world's flashiest Studio pitch. Its no surprise that he decides to change the ending of the play Ewan has written, destroying the writer's artistic vision, for personal reasons totally unconnected to the work itself.
The part of perpetual liar Harry, Moulin Rouge's 'ringleader', resembles a director kissing up to save his hide. Always saving the star's butt, who's off doing something she shouldn't be, brilliantly covering so the business deal he stands to profit from is not endangered.
The good guys and bad guys are clearly drawn with the studio head, sworn enemy of art and originality(the latter being Baz's forte), emerging as a throughly hissable character who's eventually deafeated and the 'underling' ,writer Ewan emerging a victor, more or less. Lest we not forget that writers bear the brunt of studio head's contempt more fiercely than any other person in the biz.
Could this not be Baz and Craig Pierce's sly satire on the goings on behind the camera, and in Hollywood's broad rooms?Perhaps I'm reading too much into the movie. I know I did enjoy it very much, and I rushed
out to buy the soundtrack immeadiatley afterward.
If you liked this movie, you should try 'The Player', 'S.O.B.', and 'Willian Shakespeare's Romeo + Juliet'.
Kudos to Baz,Pierce, Kidman, McGregor and all of those who collaborated
on the making of Moulin Rouge.