Wednesday, December 3, 2008

Australia: The Movie

It is a very sweet, epic but long kind of movie. It is the kind of movie that wins academy awards like best picture or best actress.

It juxtaposes the Aboriginal world and the English aristocracy in Australia which are about as different as two cultures can be. However, the heroine, Lady Ashley, played by Nicole Kidman has to grow into an Australian land owner and Outback woman very quickly. Her relationships with a "creamy" orphan(a white and aboriginal child) and her relationship with the main "Drover" of her outback ranch come into play and make for high adventure of several kinds at once.

The movie is obviously historical fiction and is based around the Bombing of Darwin, Australia by the Japanese. The same people who bombed Pearl Harbor then steamed south with their aircraft carriers and bombed Darwin, Australia too.

If you want to know a little more in the Cultural Anthropology direction about Australian Aborigine's try "Mutant Message Down Under" by Marlo Morgan, which is about a lady Acupuncturist who goes to Australia and is invited on a month or more "Walkabout" with an Aboriginal tribe in reward for all the Aborigine's she helped heal while there. The copy I have of the book was published by Harper Collins in 1994.

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