Luhrmann takes over British telly for movie launch

Tim Burrowes

December 17, 2008 10:19

The launch of the Australia movie in the UK is to be accompanied by a near-unprecedented marketing drive with director Baz Luhrmann taking over entire ad breaks on the Film4 channel.

The film, and its associated marketing push, is a major hope for Australia’s tourism industry. Tourism Australia officials believe that even if it is not a smash hit, there is still enormous value for the country in the fact that a huge marketing drive has taken place.

The movie opened slowly in America, doing a respectable, but not stellar US$20m in its opening weekend. It has since clocked up around US38$m in the US and $20m here in Australia.

However, the film’s distributors will not be expecting a smooth ride int he UK ahead of the Boxing Day opening. Overnight the Guardian newspaper published a polemical piece from Germaine Greer deriding the film.

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Tim Burrowes

Tim Burrowes is the publisher of Mumbrella and Unmade. He co-founded Mumbrella in 2008 and sister title Unmade in 2021. He's worked in the UK, Middle East, Asia & Australia and has specialised in writing about the communications world for the last 25 years. He wrote the book Media Unmade, published in 2021, and became the presenter of MediaLand on ABC Radio National in 2025.