Bazmark Films (Australia): 6

Elvis (2022) is a biographical drama film co-produced and directed by Baz Luhrmann, chronicling the life of American rock and roll singer and actor Elvis Presley. On his deathbed in 1997, Presley’s former manager Colonel Tom Parker reflects on their initial meeting and the rise to fame under his management. Growing up in poverty-stricken areas of Mississippi with a nurturing mother, Presley found solace in comic books and music, particularly African-American genres from Beale Street. It wasn’t until Parker, a self-proclaimed modern-day P. T. Barnum, heard ...

The Get Down (2016–2017), a creation of Baz Luhrmann and Stephen Adly Guirgis, is an American musical drama that premiered on Netflix on August 12, 2016. Sadly, it was cancelled after just one season. The show is set in the 1970s in New York City’s Bronx borough and tells the story of a group of teens who witness the rise of hip-hop and disco music. At the start of each episode, we see MC Books, a renowned artist, performing for a large crowd in 1996. Using rap as his medium, he recaps previous events and sets the stage for what’s to come. Throughout the ...

The film adaptation of F. Scott Fitzgerald’s classic novel, The Great Gatsby (2013), follows the story of World War I veteran Nick Carraway as he recounts his encounter with the enigmatic Jay Gatsby to his doctor while receiving treatment at a psychiatric hospital in December 1929. Encouraged by his doctor to channel his passion for writing, Nick begins documenting the events that led him to New York seven years prior. He had moved from the Midwest and abandoned writing to rent a cottage in West Egg near Gatsby’s extravagant mansion. One evening he has dinner with his cousin Daisy Buchanan and her ...

Baz Luhrmann’s epic adventure drama, Australia (2008), follows Lady Sarah Ashley as she travels to her husband’s faltering cattle station, Faraway Downs. It is 1939, just before the start of World War II, and Lady Sarah hopes to make her husband sell the station and save their marriage. However, upon arriving in Australia from England, she learns that her husband has been murdered by an Aboriginal elder known as ‘King George’. The vast Faraway Downs spans across Western Australia and the Northern Territory, reaching all the way to the Timor Sea. In order to secure control of the station for ...

Moulin Rouge! (2001) is a jukebox musical romantic drama film helmed by Baz Luhrmann. Set in 1900 Paris, the story follows Christian, a young writer mourning the loss of his beloved. He takes to his typewriter to pen their love story. In the Montmartre district, he joins the Bohemian movement and meets Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec and his troupe who are working on a play called Spectacular Spectacular. With Christian’s help, they finish the play and head to the Moulin Rouge in hopes that Satine, the star performer and courtesan, will be impressed by Christian’s talents and convince Harold Zidler, the proprietor ...

Romeo + Juliet (1996) was directed, produced, and co-written by Baz Luhrmann. Set in Verona Beach, the story follows two rival business empires: the Capulets and Montagues. The younger generation of these families feel the animosity held by their elders, Fulgencio and Gloria Capulet and Ted and Caroline Montague. Things escalate when a shootout breaks out between Benvolio, Romeo’s cousin from the Montague family, and Tybalt, Juliet’s cousin from the Capulet family, causing chaos in the city. The Chief of Police, Captain Prince intervenes by arresting both Benvolio and Tybalt and reprimanding their ...