Starstruck

After the surprising international success of My Brilliant Career, Gillian Armstrong did not want to direct another period film and jumped at the chance to make Starstruck, a contemporary musical. While the Australian's other films -- such as High Tide and The Last Days of Chez Nous -- are generally low-key and languid, occasionally even glum, the energetic, raucous Starstruck is anything but.

As producer David Elfick points out in one of the DVD's interviews, the film is partially inspired by those Judy Garland-Mickey Rooney, "hey-let's-put-on-a-show" movies. Jackie Mullens (Jo Kennedy) is an 18-year-old barmaid in her family's Sydney pub, but she wants to be a pop singer. Her ambitions are aided by her 14-year-old cousin Angus (Ross O'Donovan), who styles himself as her aggressive manager.

After Jackie's amateur-night performance at a club fails to make her a success, Angus convinces her to walk a tightrope between two office buildings in downtown Sydney. The stunt's publicity attracts smarmy TV host Terry Lambert (John O'May), who puts her on his program but forces her to sing a lame song. Meanwhile, Jackie's family is going to lose the pub if they don't come up with some loot fast and Angus begins plotting to win a $25,000 band competition at the Sydney opera house.

Although this may sound cliched, Armstrong and her collaborators make it seem fresh. Production designer Brian Thomson provides bright colors -- with the emphasis on red -- that cinematographer Russell Boyd, an Oscar winner for Master and Commander, makes sparkle like a 50s Hollywood Technicolor film, especially in this crisp 1.85:1 widescreen transfer.

The costumes by Luciana Arrighi and Terry Ryan are also colorful and include a bright red kangaroo costume worn by both Ross and Jackie (whose hair is also red). While the music is innocuous pop drivel, it is performed by Kennedy with great enthusiasm. The musical numbers feature frenetic cutting and camera movement, as with a long tracking shot during the club scene. A number performed in a rooftop hotel pool involves synchronized swimmers shot from overhead in homage to both Busby Berkeley and Esther Williams.

The second disc features a 43-minute roundtable interview with Armstrong, Elfick, and the the quiet Boyd. They discuss the casting, production design, and music in detail. Elfick reveals that Armstrong was hired only after his first choice, Graeme Clifford, decided to make Frances instead. Armstrong and the producers auditioned several Australian bands, including rejects INXS and Men at Work, both of whom became famous through MTV exposure before Starstruck was even released. Armstrong says Kennedy, who preferred punk, disliked all the songs she had to perform.

In a separate 19-minute interview, screenwriter Stephen MacLean -- talking on a Thailand beach, while having his legs massaged -- explains that the script grew out of his experiences growing up around his aunt's pub. There are also some deleted, alternate, and expanded scenes of mild interest. One deleted scene is actually a slightly longer version of one in the film. On the first disc, another producer, Richard Brennan, provides commentary, expanding on many of the points made in the interviews. Too bad that the articulate Armstrong, Kennedy (who has since written and directed two short films), and O'Donovan were not involved.

A very skinny Geoffrey Rush is featured in the small role of the floor manager on Lambert's TV program, fourteen years before his breakout role in Shine. Armstrong says that Rush was recommended by a friend because he had just returned from studying mime in Paris and was perfect for waving his arms around, which is pretty much all he does. -- Michael Adams