Moulin Rouge! (2001)
August 19, 2022 8:18 AM - Subscribe
Director Baz Luhrmann's anachronistic musical is a celebration of love and creative inspiration set in the infamous, gaudy and glamorous Parisian nightclub, at the cusp of the 20th century. A young poet (Ewan McGregor), who is plunged into the heady world of Moulin Rouge, begins a passionate affair with the club's most notorious and beautiful star (Nicole Kidman).
Also starring John Leguizamo and Jim Broadbent.
Directed by Baz Luhrmann. Written by Luhrmann and Craig Pearce.
76% fresh on Rotten Tomatoes.
Currently streaming in the US on Starz and available for digital rental on multiple outlets.
Also starring John Leguizamo and Jim Broadbent.
Directed by Baz Luhrmann. Written by Luhrmann and Craig Pearce.
76% fresh on Rotten Tomatoes.
Currently streaming in the US on Starz and available for digital rental on multiple outlets.
Experiencing the insanely propulsive opening 20 minutes of this movie on the big screen was such a treat.
Opening night, Ziegfeld Theater, NYC. The 20-minute opening was too bright, too chaotic, too much for some of the audience and a good 50 people got up and walked out.
I still don't get it. I spent the rest of the movie enraptured. The music is the second best part but I've played it at home as a silent movie and it's weirdly just as gorgeous that way.
posted by mochapickle at 10:54 AM on August 19, 2022 [3 favorites]
Opening night, Ziegfeld Theater, NYC. The 20-minute opening was too bright, too chaotic, too much for some of the audience and a good 50 people got up and walked out.
I still don't get it. I spent the rest of the movie enraptured. The music is the second best part but I've played it at home as a silent movie and it's weirdly just as gorgeous that way.
posted by mochapickle at 10:54 AM on August 19, 2022 [3 favorites]
Mochapickle: I don't think I was there on opening night, but I definitely saw it at a packed Ziegfeld Theatre, which is exactly the way to see this movie. I will never not love this.
posted by Navelgazer at 11:02 AM on August 19, 2022 [1 favorite]
posted by Navelgazer at 11:02 AM on August 19, 2022 [1 favorite]
Oooh, maybe you were there! Let's see, it was packed to the gills, it was super hot outside. But the thing I remember most clearly is the opening frames where the conductor is doing the overture, and people unfamiliar with the dark velvety theater interior slowly started to realize it was the movie and not an actual conductor and everyone started to laugh.
posted by mochapickle at 11:17 AM on August 19, 2022 [1 favorite]
posted by mochapickle at 11:17 AM on August 19, 2022 [1 favorite]
Truly one of the best Jukebox Musicals.
posted by bartleby at 1:19 PM on August 19, 2022 [3 favorites]
posted by bartleby at 1:19 PM on August 19, 2022 [3 favorites]
I kind of liked it, but god damn is it exhausting. It's kind of like being stuck inside a theater kid's head during a manic episode.
posted by Ursula Hitler at 1:43 PM on August 19, 2022 [12 favorites]
posted by Ursula Hitler at 1:43 PM on August 19, 2022 [12 favorites]
It's kind of like being stuck inside a theater kid's head during a manic episode.
Ursula .. you say that like it's a bad thing.
posted by Faintdreams at 2:01 PM on August 19, 2022 [6 favorites]
Ursula totally walked out of the Ziegfeld Theater.
posted by mochapickle at 2:10 PM on August 19, 2022
posted by mochapickle at 2:10 PM on August 19, 2022
I did say I kind of liked it. The visuals were impressive and there was plenty to admire, but it's kind of assaultive with its too-muchness. Just yatta-yatta-yatta, in your face.
posted by Ursula Hitler at 2:35 PM on August 19, 2022 [3 favorites]
posted by Ursula Hitler at 2:35 PM on August 19, 2022 [3 favorites]
It's a trainwreck. Trainwrecks are almost never dull.
posted by Jessica Savitch's Coke Spoon at 4:27 PM on August 19, 2022 [1 favorite]
posted by Jessica Savitch's Coke Spoon at 4:27 PM on August 19, 2022 [1 favorite]
By the end of the movie Mrs. Fedora and I were jokingly finishing the guy’s sentences with a spoken-word “it’s a little bit funny, this feeling inside…” whenever possible
Also the Like a Virgin scene is the single most repulsive thing I have ever seen in a movie in my entire life
I will say, though, it was generally either good enough to be good or bad enough to be memorable, and there are worse things to be
posted by DoctorFedora at 11:03 PM on August 19, 2022 [2 favorites]
Also the Like a Virgin scene is the single most repulsive thing I have ever seen in a movie in my entire life
I will say, though, it was generally either good enough to be good or bad enough to be memorable, and there are worse things to be
posted by DoctorFedora at 11:03 PM on August 19, 2022 [2 favorites]
It's kind of like being stuck inside a theater kid's head during a manic episode.
The metaphor one reviewer used was that it was like being stuck in a freight elevator with an entire circus troupe.
posted by ricochet biscuit at 3:42 AM on August 20, 2022 [1 favorite]
The metaphor one reviewer used was that it was like being stuck in a freight elevator with an entire circus troupe.
posted by ricochet biscuit at 3:42 AM on August 20, 2022 [1 favorite]
Memorable it is, but geeze, this movie annoys the hell out of me.
posted by 2N2222 at 5:42 AM on August 20, 2022
posted by 2N2222 at 5:42 AM on August 20, 2022
I once heard someone describe ska music as “what plays in a thirteen-year-old boy’s head when he gets extra mozzarella sticks”, and this movie has always seemed like what that same kid vamps when he read the Cliff’s Notes very thoroughly but never cracked the actual book.
posted by Etrigan at 7:17 AM on August 20, 2022 [3 favorites]
posted by Etrigan at 7:17 AM on August 20, 2022 [3 favorites]
The musical numbers (except Like A Virgin, which I agree is THE CREEPIEST, along with the "NOBODY! TOUCHES! MY! THINGS!!!!!") are very good. It is a pretty circus. But the plot is pretty bad/creepy/ridiculous, especially the handling of being "dying" yet still able to do a lot of sex and complicated dance numbers.
posted by jenfullmoon at 5:37 AM on August 21, 2022
posted by jenfullmoon at 5:37 AM on August 21, 2022
especially the handling of being "dying" yet still able to do a lot of sex and complicated dance numbers
Wait til you hear what people dying in opera can do!
posted by praemunire at 9:30 AM on August 21, 2022 [8 favorites]
Wait til you hear what people dying in opera can do!
posted by praemunire at 9:30 AM on August 21, 2022 [8 favorites]
Recently a friend watched this with teens and had to explain to them that a movie character from this era coughing a bit of blood into a hanky = tuberculosis = they will die by the end of the film, and that moreover, even stories set in the modern day where you notice a character coughing probably also are foreshadowing the character's death.
My spouse and I watched this for the first time a few days ago and:
Luhrmann was partly inspired by Bollywood musicals! Makes sense.
Amazing how very lovely the movie makes Kidman look in EVERY shot of her. Just so striking.
I looked up the history of tuberculosis so I could plausibly imagine an alternate ending where Satine lives. Like, maybe one of Christian's The Sound Of Music crew poses as an ambassador from Switzerland who tries to get the Spectacular Spectacular creators to set the story in Switzerland to spur French tourism in Switzerland, and The Duke says to Zidler "I'm going to stay right here and make sure you don't do something like physically abscond with the building while I'm gone," so Christian and Satine and their pals go on "a fact-finding trip" to Bern or Zurich. There, she gets to move into a sanatorium and these hippies get to start the Swiss hippie scene, where they inspire Albert Einstein early in his career. Back in Paris, Zidler connives to get the henchman Warner to betray his employer in exchange for a role on stage - he's way more excited about playing a thug than being one - and The Duke loses all documents proving his claim to the building's title deed, is humiliated, and heads home to England pretty much penniless and with his tail between his legs. Treatment at the sanatorium keeps Satine going ok until there is a more effective treatment for consumption, at which point she and Christian and the hippies put on a big show for the sanatorium residents in celebration.
OK, it's plausible in terms of the history of tuberculosis.
posted by brainwane at 4:50 AM on September 10, 2023 [3 favorites]
My spouse and I watched this for the first time a few days ago and:
Luhrmann was partly inspired by Bollywood musicals! Makes sense.
Amazing how very lovely the movie makes Kidman look in EVERY shot of her. Just so striking.
I looked up the history of tuberculosis so I could plausibly imagine an alternate ending where Satine lives. Like, maybe one of Christian's The Sound Of Music crew poses as an ambassador from Switzerland who tries to get the Spectacular Spectacular creators to set the story in Switzerland to spur French tourism in Switzerland, and The Duke says to Zidler "I'm going to stay right here and make sure you don't do something like physically abscond with the building while I'm gone," so Christian and Satine and their pals go on "a fact-finding trip" to Bern or Zurich. There, she gets to move into a sanatorium and these hippies get to start the Swiss hippie scene, where they inspire Albert Einstein early in his career. Back in Paris, Zidler connives to get the henchman Warner to betray his employer in exchange for a role on stage - he's way more excited about playing a thug than being one - and The Duke loses all documents proving his claim to the building's title deed, is humiliated, and heads home to England pretty much penniless and with his tail between his legs. Treatment at the sanatorium keeps Satine going ok until there is a more effective treatment for consumption, at which point she and Christian and the hippies put on a big show for the sanatorium residents in celebration.
OK, it's plausible in terms of the history of tuberculosis.
posted by brainwane at 4:50 AM on September 10, 2023 [3 favorites]
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posted by merriment at 9:22 AM on August 19, 2022 [7 favorites]