0:00:10 > 0:00:11Welcome to HARDtalk.
0:00:11 > 0:00:12I'm Stephen Sackur.
0:00:12 > 0:00:15There are some film directors who strip things down,
0:00:15 > 0:00:24shun artifice and worship at the altar of realism.
0:00:24 > 0:00:26My guest sees filmmaking through a very different lens.
0:00:26 > 0:00:29He made his directorial name with a wildly entertaining debut
0:00:29 > 0:00:31movie called Strictly Ballroom, which was theatrical,
0:00:31 > 0:00:33sentimental and sweet.
0:00:33 > 0:00:36Since then he has continued to make larger than life films based
0:00:36 > 0:00:38on epic stories.
0:00:38 > 0:00:41How did a boy from the Australian backwoods get to make his celluloid
0:00:41 > 0:00:48dreams come true?
0:01:13 > 0:01:19Baz Luhrmann, welcome to HARDtalk. I'm very happy to be here, Stephen.
0:01:19 > 0:01:22I want to start this interview in Herons Creek, this tiny little
0:01:22 > 0:01:24place north of Sydney, where you grew up.
0:01:24 > 0:01:26It was a long way from anywhere, really.
0:01:26 > 0:01:29How come you, there, developed this incredibly vivid artistic
0:01:29 > 0:01:33imagination? Mmm, you know, some point
0:01:33 > 0:01:37midway through my journey I started to get quite self-conscious
0:01:37 > 0:01:41about... And you do when you're young and
0:01:41 > 0:01:44you're trying to be someone and be creative and I gave up
0:01:44 > 0:01:50on the self-consciousness of going too deep into the who I am
0:01:50 > 0:01:54and tried to work that out just by doing.
0:01:54 > 0:01:58Having said that... LAUGH. How do
0:01:58 > 0:02:00I keep these answers short, because of never given
0:02:00 > 0:02:03the short answer in my life? Having said that, it
0:02:03 > 0:02:05never seemed exceptional, strange or unusual to me.
0:02:05 > 0:02:08I always imagined, when I was in that tiny little
0:02:08 > 0:02:11island, which was really a gas station and a restaurant and we had
0:02:11 > 0:02:17a farm down the road... And your father ran the gas station?
0:02:17 > 0:02:24My father ran the gas station but what was crazy about it was that
0:02:24 > 0:02:28that was obsessed that the isolation would not keep us isolated so we had
0:02:28 > 0:02:31so many interesting people come and live with us.
0:02:31 > 0:02:35You know, painters, and he sort of had this idea that we would be
0:02:35 > 0:02:36the Renaissance players of Herons Creek.
0:02:36 > 0:02:39Was he an Australian who felt out of tune with Australia?
0:02:39 > 0:02:42Because, my perhaps stereotypical cliches notion of the Australia
0:02:42 > 0:02:44of your youth, particularly, you know, in the nonmetropolitan areas,
0:02:44 > 0:02:47would have been about a very macho culture, pretty much preoccupied
0:02:47 > 0:02:50with sports and maybe, for the men, beer.
0:02:50 > 0:02:53And yet, you gravitated to things including cinema and dance
0:02:53 > 0:02:57and a whole bunch of other stuff that were nothing to do
0:02:57 > 0:03:00with that stuff. First of all the stereotype, right,
0:03:00 > 0:03:03because I think you're probably somewhat on point but I would
0:03:03 > 0:03:05also proffer that one of the idiosyncratic
0:03:05 > 0:03:10qualities about Australia, which is a tremendous thing,
0:03:10 > 0:03:12is what I would call flashes of lightning culture.
0:03:12 > 0:03:15Meaning, you might look at Sydney and go, well,
0:03:15 > 0:03:17what a generic bunch of buildings and then suddenly,
0:03:17 > 0:03:20the Sydney Opera House. You know.
0:03:20 > 0:03:26And you might go, well, there it is, isolated edge of the world but along
0:03:26 > 0:03:29comes a Gough Whitlam and our forebarers who say we must
0:03:29 > 0:03:33have a drama school, we must have a film school.
0:03:33 > 0:03:36This is in the 70s and we, the government, will fund it.
0:03:36 > 0:03:38And had they not done that, that extreme action,
0:03:38 > 0:03:45I would not be sitting here. All those well-known storytellers
0:03:45 > 0:03:49that you know wouldn't exist. So let's go back to my father.
0:03:49 > 0:03:52He was all those things. I mean, he was in the Vietnam War,
0:03:52 > 0:03:56he was the equivalent of a kind of Navy seal, that was his job.
0:03:56 > 0:03:58He was really disciplined. We really pushed us.
0:03:58 > 0:04:03He was such an... I now realise it was
0:04:03 > 0:04:05an extraordinary existence but he was also a very...
0:04:05 > 0:04:09He was a romantic, I think. So I suppose when...
0:04:09 > 0:04:12I'm going to fast forward a little bit, you got into acting,
0:04:12 > 0:04:17you went to Sydney, got into lots of different creative stuff...
0:04:17 > 0:04:21I was ready doing it. I was making films.
0:04:21 > 0:04:24I was always doing it. So it was in you from
0:04:24 > 0:04:27a very young age... And I was doing ballroom dancing
0:04:27 > 0:04:30and ballroom dancing was a kind of for me working-class
0:04:30 > 0:04:33escape into the theatre. I mean, you dressed up in costume,
0:04:33 > 0:04:35you perform, you travelled miles, you got very wrapped
0:04:35 > 0:04:38up with your partner. I mean, it was showbiz.
0:04:38 > 0:04:42And if you don't mind me saying, and I don't mean this in any... I
0:04:42 > 0:04:44don't.It's camp, to a certain extent.
0:04:44 > 0:04:53Ballroom dancing is camp? Let me think about that. I don't know.
0:04:53 > 0:04:56It's camp. I wonder if that appealled to you too, the gender
0:04:56 > 0:05:00fluidity, as we would now say. One thing at a time, I think. Let's
0:05:00 > 0:05:03define "camp", meaning like Oscar Wilde once said, and he probably
0:05:03 > 0:05:06didn't, maybe it was set about him, but that camp is dealing
0:05:06 > 0:05:12with something quite serious but in a very silly offhanded way
0:05:12 > 0:05:17and the idea of using silly or theatrical or cue the petal drop,
0:05:17 > 0:05:20as a device to effect an audience so that you are dealing
0:05:20 > 0:05:24with something quite serious and emotional or a big idea,
0:05:24 > 0:05:31that mechanism, I guess is inherent in me and what is so odd is that
0:05:31 > 0:05:34when I started exploring that, I mean, I went to drama school
0:05:34 > 0:05:37and did Artaud and Brecht and Minimalism but when I started
0:05:37 > 0:05:43to be honest with my own gestures and that came into my way
0:05:43 > 0:05:49of expressing myself, what is so odd about it is that now
0:05:49 > 0:05:51we live in a world where that particular sensibility,
0:05:51 > 0:05:56whether it is in fashion, cinema, music it's kind of de
0:05:56 > 0:05:59rigueur. It is hugely popular.
0:05:59 > 0:06:12Hugely popular. I tell you what, for people
0:06:12 > 0:06:22who haven't seen Strictly Ballroom, let's have a clip.
0:06:52 > 0:07:00This was your first movie?It was the first day of shooting. We said
0:07:00 > 0:07:08to have done at an an hour but it took three.
0:07:08 > 0:07:11It's kind of an outrageous success making your first move you make
0:07:11 > 0:07:17something that not only breaks the bounds of Australian cinema
0:07:17 > 0:07:20but gets shown at international awards, in Cannes, it becomes
0:07:20 > 0:07:22big in America. It is just a massive
0:07:22 > 0:07:27international hit. That sounds great but we have not
0:07:27 > 0:07:31got time to go onto the real story but the real story begins
0:07:31 > 0:07:34with making the film, committing at some point to the idea
0:07:34 > 0:07:37that had make cinematic language that somehow reflect did
0:07:37 > 0:07:45what it was as a play. I devised that as a play.
0:07:45 > 0:07:50You had written it as a play. I devised it with a group
0:07:50 > 0:07:54of actors I was working with at the National Institute
0:07:54 > 0:08:03of Dramatic Art where we were experimenting
0:08:03 > 0:08:06with you make place and I took a subject of a new, ballroom
0:08:06 > 0:08:10dancing, and I also took the hero powerful myths and I was splicing
0:08:10 > 0:08:12mythology, the ugly duckling myth, and then it was political.
0:08:12 > 0:08:15We took it to a drama school in Czechoslovakia during glasnost
0:08:15 > 0:08:18against all the Soviet State theatres, thinking this will be
0:08:18 > 0:08:22a ridiculous but, at some point, in that production, it was a bit
0:08:22 > 0:08:24more Brechtian, we had tapes of like Ronald Reagan
0:08:24 > 0:08:27and Maggie Thatcher in it and so forth so it did
0:08:27 > 0:08:30have an underlying political deal... Again, this is important we talk
0:08:30 > 0:08:32about other movies and the way you develop them.
0:08:32 > 0:08:35One message in the movie is about breaking the rules,
0:08:35 > 0:08:37not being a conformist. The strain dance commission
0:08:37 > 0:08:41had its own rules and the girl in the movie says no,
0:08:41 > 0:08:44I want to do something different and persuades the boy to sign up
0:08:44 > 0:08:47to just doing things differently, breaking the rules, being yourself.
0:08:47 > 0:08:49Correct. And, hilariously, you could apply
0:08:49 > 0:08:51that undercarriage of that story to a popular revolution.
0:08:51 > 0:08:57I mean, overthrowing the incumbent generation and leaders to say
0:08:57 > 0:09:03-- who say there is only one way to cha-cha-cha.
0:09:03 > 0:09:05I've got the rulebook, I will give you the tips,
0:09:05 > 0:09:09I will let you know whether your right or not and then,
0:09:09 > 0:09:13the youth said no, we can set aside the rulebook and we going to go
0:09:13 > 0:09:15up against it. And then you meet another youth that
0:09:15 > 0:09:18says that and then you go on and then it is
0:09:18 > 0:09:20a popular revolution. Sounds heavy but that's
0:09:20 > 0:09:22where we come in from. What interesting is,
0:09:22 > 0:09:25you say it sounds heavy, it sounds fascinating
0:09:25 > 0:09:28but what it doesn't sound like, to some people, I think,
0:09:28 > 0:09:31is a Baz Luhrmann movie because they think you have become
0:09:31 > 0:09:34so associated with the sort of over the top, grandiose, epic
0:09:34 > 0:09:36scale and at the glitz and the glamour and whatnot.
0:09:36 > 0:09:38Sure. Do you feel that a lot
0:09:38 > 0:09:41of people haven't taken your movies seriously enough?
0:09:41 > 0:09:42Yes, sure. And certainly critically
0:09:42 > 0:09:45but what's so strange - cause I am quite old now, Stephen -
0:09:45 > 0:09:50I have seen the miracle of like one of the great critics,
0:09:50 > 0:09:59Owen Leiberman, a huge critic in the States who absolutely...
0:09:59 > 0:10:10Slayed Moulin rouge. You say, here we go again.
0:10:10 > 0:10:13And there was a time when you could take the reviews
0:10:13 > 0:10:16from strictly ballroom and apply them to pretty much maligned
0:10:16 > 0:10:18and so forth. But I have never seen this happen
0:10:18 > 0:10:21before, in his book, he rewrote his review ten years
0:10:21 > 0:10:24later and has a beat in his book and are actually met him
0:10:24 > 0:10:27and I was really... Of course, you're happy that...
0:10:27 > 0:10:30He decided ten years on that actually he had missed the point?
0:10:30 > 0:10:34His language was, there was a method to the madness and I could see that,
0:10:34 > 0:10:38actually, this wasn't just kind of camp for the sake of it
0:10:38 > 0:10:41but it was employed in the pursuit of a slightly bigger idea.
0:10:41 > 0:10:45But I suppose my question would then be, d oyou ever reflect and think,
0:10:45 > 0:10:48you know, many are got a little bit seduced by the fact that Hollywood
0:10:48 > 0:10:52was flinging money at me so that by the time you made
0:10:52 > 0:10:55The Great Gatsby, I don't know how much that cost
0:10:55 > 0:10:56will probably $100 million? Yes, around that.
0:10:56 > 0:10:58Roughly. Give or take 10 million.
0:10:58 > 0:11:00I'm not good with numbers. Check with the studios.
0:11:00 > 0:11:04But you see where I'm going. You are spending more and more
0:11:04 > 0:11:07money, he will use the biggest stars from Hollywood to make an enormous
0:11:07 > 0:11:11splash and taking years to make these movies and maybe he got a bit
0:11:11 > 0:11:13overwhelmed by the money, the glitz, the glamour
0:11:13 > 0:11:14and the power? Maybe.
0:11:14 > 0:11:16Sounds like that but that didn't happen.
0:11:16 > 0:11:20I mean, in no way does someone come at you, nobody in Hollywood comes
0:11:20 > 0:11:22to you and says, you know that 100-year-old book,
0:11:22 > 0:11:25The Great Gatsby, you know that period piece,
0:11:25 > 0:11:27they say the opposite. When I made strictly ballroom,
0:11:27 > 0:11:31and that I wanted to do a modern day Shakespeare, and I was in an overall
0:11:31 > 0:11:34deal with Fox, and their like, cut you just do strictly
0:11:34 > 0:11:43ballroom to, more of that? And then when I did Moulin Rouge,
0:11:43 > 0:11:46why would she want to do the Gatsby. So there is no, hey,
0:11:46 > 0:11:49he's $100 million, go and it Gatsby, there's cajoling, convincing,
0:11:49 > 0:11:54convincing yourself, convincing others.
0:11:54 > 0:11:56Leonardo being a great partner in that process,
0:11:56 > 0:11:58Toby being a great partner in that process.
0:11:58 > 0:12:01DiCaprio and Maguire, we should say. We're talking A-list
0:12:01 > 0:12:04Hollywood people. But also artists that want to make
0:12:04 > 0:12:06sure they're making something different and, let me just say,
0:12:06 > 0:12:10all that stuff you identified, I mean, Gatsby, rightly,
0:12:10 > 0:12:13whether you like it or you don't, whether I made the right
0:12:13 > 0:12:21choices or not, it's a very quite internal narration.
0:12:21 > 0:12:25About the very noisy time. About a very brightly coloured,
0:12:25 > 0:12:33noisy time so I, rightly or wrongly, exploited that.
0:12:33 > 0:12:41Let's have a look at one of the memorable scenes from the great C.
0:12:41 > 0:12:44I cannot find anyone who knows anything real about Mr Gatsby.
0:12:44 > 0:12:47Well, I don't care. He gives large parties
0:12:47 > 0:12:53and I like large parties, they're so intimate.
0:12:53 > 0:12:55Small parties, there isn't any privacy.
0:12:55 > 0:12:59But if that's true, what's all this for?
0:12:59 > 0:13:05That, idea fellow, is the question. Are you ready?
0:13:22 > 0:13:26As I am watching that, I'm actually thinking about you,
0:13:26 > 0:13:30the director, and it seems to me, there is something extraordinary
0:13:30 > 0:13:35about the Hollywood director. The amount of resource
0:13:35 > 0:13:42that you can call upon, the hundreds of actors and extras,
0:13:42 > 0:13:46the vast stage sets. There is a power to being
0:13:46 > 0:13:50a director that interests me. Do you think there is something
0:13:50 > 0:13:51potentially difficult, maybe even potentially dangerous,
0:13:51 > 0:13:54about the power that comes with being a Hollywood?
0:13:54 > 0:13:57Look, I think we are living in a world where the subject
0:13:57 > 0:14:00of power and the danger of power and the corruption
0:14:00 > 0:14:06that comes with... I didn't write that fantastic
0:14:06 > 0:14:08light about parties, I wish I did.
0:14:08 > 0:14:10And I didn't write absolute power corrupts absolutely
0:14:10 > 0:14:13but it is certainly topical right now.
0:14:13 > 0:14:16When you do what I do, the responsibility of power
0:14:16 > 0:14:28is absolutely forefront in your mind.
0:14:28 > 0:14:32I mean, you think that is the Friday night dinner at Baz's
0:14:32 > 0:14:35because that is how everyone thinks that it how I live.
0:14:35 > 0:14:38I am interested in the answer you just gave because you have
0:14:38 > 0:14:44alluded to what we have seen in Hollywood.
0:14:44 > 0:14:53In the wake of what we have learnt, people are willing to avoid violent
0:14:53 > 0:14:57crime to line their own pockets. This would be hardly one sinking is
0:14:57 > 0:15:01about. If thou that there are some in very sick at the heart of
0:15:01 > 0:15:14Hollywood.I didn't. Harvey had Strictly Ballroom. At the start, I
0:15:14 > 0:15:17had a powerplay issue with him over the way he handled Strictly
0:15:17 > 0:15:24Ballroom. I think where you are going is this: I do think, when I am
0:15:24 > 0:15:28directing, the big question marks in the entrance of the entertainment
0:15:28 > 0:15:31world, but it is not just entertainment, we are seeing it
0:15:31 > 0:15:36everywhere, everywhere Paller said. What I am very focused on is that
0:15:36 > 0:15:46when you try to make something... Who is an attractive? You have your
0:15:46 > 0:15:52attractions. But in the space, the fear and liberty of
0:15:52 > 0:15:52attractions. But in the space, the fear and liberty of performers, the
0:15:52 > 0:15:57power that you have, but also your job is to remove that fear. It is
0:15:57 > 0:16:02called playacting. They are players. You are meant to help them be
0:16:02 > 0:16:09playful. Yes, work, but to take away their fear and to play. If, in any
0:16:09 > 0:16:16way, you are muddying the waters with your own politics or own sexual
0:16:16 > 0:16:21desire, and all that, then you are corrupting the art itself. And
0:16:21 > 0:16:27obviously it is wrong. I mean, it is, you know, a profound misuse of
0:16:27 > 0:16:33power, and I think we are seeing is is probably something, let me jump
0:16:33 > 0:16:40right in there and say I think it is bigger than that. I think we are
0:16:40 > 0:16:43sitting in a moment where the tectonic plates of history a squeeze
0:16:43 > 0:16:48on like this, and the old period, and they don't just mean old guys,
0:16:48 > 0:16:56but I mean the world has its nails and is trying to claw things back to
0:16:56 > 0:17:03make things the way they are. To quote Gatsby, you cannot repeat the
0:17:03 > 0:17:09fast. The fact the past. I think there is an old school of thought...
0:17:09 > 0:17:19Are you part of that?Pfft, no!Were you changing the way you were?I can
0:17:19 > 0:17:28honestly tell you that when I am in the room, I am so worried about
0:17:28 > 0:17:36making it work. I think is my job to take on everybody elsefear. How I
0:17:36 > 0:17:40feel about somebody when I am anonymous and Bittermann Street, I
0:17:40 > 0:17:44just can't feel like that about a cast and crew member member. I am
0:17:44 > 0:17:50just too completely responsive to make sure that everyone does their
0:17:50 > 0:17:57best. -- meet them on the street. You just talk about our age group
0:17:57 > 0:18:03and ageing, and a new generation of people looking to do things in
0:18:03 > 0:18:08different ways. Just one quick question about your future, and your
0:18:08 > 0:18:13intent. You did make one Netflix kind of box set style big budget
0:18:13 > 0:18:22television series, and it didn't get recommissioned. Did you see yourself
0:18:22 > 0:18:27moving more into television? That is where a lot of the money and
0:18:27 > 0:18:35creativity is, but in your mind, are you a movie maker?We could have
0:18:35 > 0:18:40done another season.It cost an awful lot of money, though. Too yes.
0:18:40 > 0:18:46That reason, it required me to be at the centre of it.Contractually, I
0:18:46 > 0:18:49had a ready-made arrangements whereby I would creativity some
0:18:49 > 0:18:53Wales.I just wondered whether you needed a big screen, not just the
0:18:53 > 0:19:02small screen. -- somewhere else.I don't see myself as a film maker,
0:19:02 > 0:19:07television maker, music maker, I have worked at a hotel, we have made
0:19:07 > 0:19:21stuff. Ideas and storytelling. Impacting on culture. There are 72nd
0:19:21 > 0:19:31record. It is not like arming - this is sadly that might sound arrogant,
0:19:31 > 0:19:35but we need something.I want to bring you do this because it raises
0:19:35 > 0:19:39a lot of interesting issues to be about you as a person, and that is
0:19:39 > 0:19:43your movie, Australia, because it is unusual for a director to make a
0:19:43 > 0:19:48movie so clearly about where he is from, and then entered Australia,
0:19:48 > 0:19:54and it is epic and weeds are lot of Australia's recent history. It did
0:19:54 > 0:19:59pretty well, but some critics like that and some did not like it at
0:19:59 > 0:20:05all. It was a very personal to you? Totally.What was that? A love
0:20:05 > 0:20:12letter to a straighter?Was a crazy? -- to Australia. None of my films in
0:20:12 > 0:20:21my view our complete. None of them are what I imagine to be. I just get
0:20:21 > 0:20:26on to a point where I think they are working there. It is a child.Are
0:20:26 > 0:20:30you telling me was completely finished?I don't think any of them
0:20:30 > 0:20:34are finished. There is an old saying that they are not finished, they
0:20:34 > 0:20:43take them away. But let's come back to wager that. Absolutely, we have
0:20:43 > 0:20:46always lived around the world. Australians are great travellers. I
0:20:46 > 0:20:50wanted to make sure there was an early period when my two children
0:20:50 > 0:20:57were connected to our homeland. That, and I also have, yes, a great
0:20:57 > 0:21:01love of my homeland. And it probably was, at an over was a love letter,
0:21:01 > 0:21:06but it was definitely a way of getting into the myth, but also the
0:21:06 > 0:21:10facts. One of the things about the strait, by the way, and whether this
0:21:10 > 0:21:14is good or not, this is the biggest I have ever had in Europe. It was
0:21:14 > 0:21:20number one for five weeks in Spain. And I was a surprise, even me. It
0:21:20 > 0:21:25had a different light in the US can it went nowhere.It has things in
0:21:25 > 0:21:29it, including the massive injustice done to the Aboriginal Peoples of
0:21:29 > 0:21:34Australia.Yes, and might say, and I have never said this, and I feel I
0:21:34 > 0:21:41should, I remembered Germaine Greer, and she spoke - I mean, I never push
0:21:41 > 0:21:46back on staff, but of course, we did the research, and of course we lived
0:21:46 > 0:21:51it. And everything - there is a justifiable reference to everything
0:21:51 > 0:21:55in a movie. And when the press and Jermaine Grey came out and attacked
0:21:55 > 0:21:59an actual Stolen Generation academic, Aboriginal academic, I
0:21:59 > 0:22:10just thought, like, you know, I will let time and so that. -- Germaine
0:22:10 > 0:22:16Greer. But nothing we do we research lightly.But it good of my head was
0:22:16 > 0:22:19that the arc of your career to you away from Australia to the United
0:22:19 > 0:22:24States, where you spend most of your time. But in a funny way, you could
0:22:24 > 0:22:29make an argument that Australia is moving towards you. I don't mean
0:22:29 > 0:22:36geographically - commedia, Australia.-- I don't mean
0:22:36 > 0:22:43geographically. Come out here, Australia.But recently we have seen
0:22:43 > 0:22:49the vote on gay marriage. Do you see your Australia becoming more
0:22:49 > 0:22:54tolerant and open?First of all, for the first time I have not been back
0:22:54 > 0:22:58in my own country for maybe 18 months or longer. I go back at
0:22:58 > 0:23:02Christmas. It is very important. I think flashes of lightning. The
0:23:02 > 0:23:07country has always had tremendous the openhearted vision, but it also
0:23:07 > 0:23:11pulls it back into a sort of conservatism and jostles between the
0:23:11 > 0:23:17two things. So I got great... I am not in a position to speak with
0:23:17 > 0:23:23great information. I go back to reconnect. But I think Australia and
0:23:23 > 0:23:26Australians, they really believe in a fair go, and they are really
0:23:26 > 0:23:32openhearted. And I am looking forward to be energised by the
0:23:32 > 0:23:39positive uplift.They last month a question, a lot of people, critics,
0:23:39 > 0:23:42feel that your first movie was your best. Do you think your best movie
0:23:42 > 0:23:47is yet to be made?I think probably Mick Jagger has the same problem
0:23:47 > 0:23:54with satisfaction. It is like, you know, and I - I think, to as your
0:23:54 > 0:24:00question, and I am not good at staying on track - was in my movies,
0:24:00 > 0:24:03right? There is a question is you have to believe it. Otherwise, don't
0:24:03 > 0:24:07do it. Sometimes I think, oh, you know, but recently I've been
0:24:07 > 0:24:12thinking I would like to do at least one more. And see if I could make it
0:24:12 > 0:24:17better.A great way to end. Baz Luhrmann, thank you for being on
0:24:17 > 0:24:31HARDtalk I really enjoyed it. Thanks very much.