By PETER THOMAS BUSCH

The post modernist auteur synthesizes hyperbole into a broader thematic commentary on iconic cultural facts that survive history to drive the collective consciousness.

Director Baz Luhrmann creates narrative from the historical truth of a culturally significant moment in time and space, and from a personal truth layered in humanist themes, most notably love, relationships and all that relationships entail, and of course, death.

This rich aesthetic of art and history becomes one commentary brought forward in the narrative like filtering stories to ask why characters do what they do, and act toward each other as they do, when everything ever always inevitably leads to death for everyone equally.

A consciousness surfaces in fragile layers with one fragile layer over another being brought forward to underscore a particular important truth.

In Elvis (2022), of all the stories that one could tell about the iconic Elvis Presley, Luhrmann tells the story of the business manager, Colonel Tom Parker, played by Tom Hanks. Hanks does not entirely create a sympathetic character in Parker, but the Hollywood icon certainly makes him appear less of villain than might have previously been believed.

The search for the truth of the characters is all part of a compelling surrealism as if the cast and crew are riding the collective consciousness, like Judy Garland playing Dorothy in The Wizard of OZ (1939).

Colonel Tom Parker is presented on his death bed, but the narrative circumvents the inevitable day to day mortal decay with a wraparound, and instead, begins to follow the title character from learning his craft during childhood to his last show as the greatest showman in the world – and of course the impact of Colonel Tom Parker on the cultural phenom.

Hanks provides a voice over to drive certain scene sequences as an omniscient narrator, but Luhrmann gives Austin Butler, as Elvis, a voice as well. And Luhrmann runs his own commentary in between and around the two characters by bringing forward those fragile layers one at a time, all in all running the story like three distinct ribbons fluttering in the wind only to become intertwined in the tumultuous carnival of life.

The three leading characters are at times individually omniscient as the only ones that can tell their bit of personal truth for a particular point in time and space.

For example, Colonel Tom Parker hyperbolically exclaims that Elvis is “white” singing black music in a white music industry. This statement is highlighted in such a way as to define the relationship between Parker and Elvis while also providing Luhrmann’s social commentary about the music industry and how Elvis Presley became Elvis.

Luhrmann then weaves in a number of scenes showing how Elvis learned his song and stage craft from the black gospel singers during Sunday sermons and from black R&B singers performing inside clubs along Beale Street in Memphis.

The collective consciousness is different from the historical record. Luhrmann reconciles this amorphous appearance of truth taken from the collective consciousness with the awakening reality that nothing, even the prevailing story about the culturally significant occurrence, is as true as the story seems.

Luhrmann gathers up the lost fragments he has found in time, as part of his personal commentary as director, to make the scenes seamlessly bleed into one another as the story line shifts from one character’s truth to another character’s truth to the director’s socially relevant commentary.

The organic nature of historical truth is made into an exhibition with the reimagining of William Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliete in Romeo & Juliete (1996) starring Leonardo Di Caprio and Claire Danes, and John Leguizamo as Tybalt.

Luhrmann shows how truth gets distorted by myth while the humanist values of the greatest stories remain the same throughout time. Onto that ether, Luhrmann grafts popular culture, which existed in Los Angeles during a particularly violent epoch in the megalopolis, in one form or another, onto the old story of love and hate that has survived through the ages for a very good reason.

Often many forms of truth tell the story in the electronic media age. So, a newspaper headline and the program on a television set add content to a scene above the character dialogue and the panning camera of an auteur.

Romeo and Juliete are members of rival gangs in Los Angeles during the deadly turf war of the 1980s and 1990s that made headlines around the world. Instead of Shakespearian swords, the characters wield couture, semi automatic handguns.

Instead of drums and trumpets, the contemporary pop music of Prince drives a scene sequence. Luhrmann layers a tapestry of music onto the narratives of his films, like an operatic, with the rhythm of the music having as much to do about historical truth as the humanistic emotions that drive civilization and get individuals into a lot of trouble.

In Elvis, a number of cover versions of Presley songs are purposely distorted by popular cultural influences to drive the surreal take on the truth, in between Austin Butler performing Elvis songs on one live stage or another.

In Moulin Rouge (2001), Ewan McGregor and Nicole Kidman give emotive significance to their actions by singing their dialogue, a method of telling the story that is aesthetically more truthful to the heart felt emotions of relationships being depicted on screen in the city of love.

Emotions of the heart and intellectual reason struggle together to define the truth.

Music often forms an aesthetic layer of sound, that becomes elevated in importance mixed in with a simplified storyline and basic individual characters with rudimentary emotions and uncomplicated motives.

Everything on screen, from film to film, becomes all the more part of a psychotropic dreamscape with intertextual references to influential films such as Gone with the Wind (1939) and Wizard of Oz (1939) and Citizen Kane (1941), from the Golden Age of Classic Hollywood.

In Australia (2008) the clash of city influenced female individuality with rugged landscape male individuality meshes out by trial and error during a life and death adventure through the outback.

Hyperbolic characters define themselves through a gender specific world of black and white truths. The adventure story explores the humanistic motivations of the characters a bit further until the rigid gender stereotypes are removed and the characters come to view the world in closer proximity to each other.

Luhrmann wraps everything in a textured aesthetic that involves rich colours, distinct set designs, carefully chosen music and a lot of inner truths.

Los Angeles has become a modern tragedy with gang violence ruining the peace and tranquility of an ocean paradise.

Memphis is the center of the music revolution, but few black musicians find the universal justice corresponding to their individual contributions.

Australia is tough and ruthless and may never have a moment of tranquility, while Paris may never leave love alone despite the known risk of love lost.

In the Great Gatsby (2013) the lavish tapestry of aesthetics becomes a didactic instrument to show how decadence consumes everything else. Even the dark sky is filled with the brilliant colors produced by fireworks. And the scenes become reminiscent of pages from a graphic novel.

In Elvis, the decadence of the rock star lifestyle destroys the personality and makes fame fleeting at best. But in Gatsby, the decadence is near nonsensical to the point of corrupting everything.

Friendship, love and personality become blurred inside the opulence depicted by a rich color pallet and luxurious set and costume designs.

Luhrmann’s signature film style is that of a big, lavish production put on display for a socially conscious audience wanting to be entertained, but not lied to, by a sensory array of color, sound and carefully chosen dialogue.

Baz Luhrmann, by Pam Cook, London: Palgrave MacMillan, 2010.