Realizes what film can truly do

Rating: 10/10 (4 October 2004)

I'm not going to sit here and give my personal opinion on things like acting quality, emotive reactions to the film, etc., because that ground has been trod into mud by other commenter's and boardcrawlers. All I wish to say here is that this movie is, to me, the realization of what the pioneers of film wished it to be. Think back to the Follies and the Gold Diggers shows of the 1920s. Though they were little more than filmed showing of stage productions, their influence upon Baz is readily evident in this film. And that's what he wanted.
This movie, this trilogy (Simply Ballroom, Romeo+Juliet, and Moulin Rouge!, the Red Curtain Trilogy) is Baz's tribute to stage arts: Dance, Drama, and Music. In all three cases, he took pre-existing mediums of stage art and set them to his own, idiosyncratic tune before the camera. Flamenco was flamenco, Shakespeare was Shakespeare, and love ballads are love ballads here. This is why there is so little original musical material in this movie: it is a tribute. And, though I said I would keep my personal opinions out of this one, it's a 10/10 tribute in my eyes.