New footage will be added to turn the epic story of Baz Luhrmann’s Australia into a six part series, it’s been revealed.
The movie Australia was released to mixed reviews in 2008, with some critics calling the film overlong. The public disagreed on the whole, however, with the film making over $200 million at the box office.
The film told the story of Nicole Kidman’s Lady Sarah Ashley, an English aristocrat who inherits a cattle station in Australia at the start of World War Two. When it is threatened, she turns to Hugh Jackman’s rugged man of the land Drover to drive the cattle across harsh open terrain to safety.
The series will be called Faraway Falls, based on the name of the ranch in the film, will use additional footage as well as an entirely new ending and soundtrack to turn the story into a six part series.
Of the project, Luhrmann said “I originally set out to take the notion of the sweeping, ‘Gone With the Wind’-style epic and turn it on its head — a way of using romance and epic drama to shine a light on the roles of First Nations people and the painful scar in Australian history of the ‘Stolen Generations.’ While ‘Australia’ the film has its own life, there was another telling of this story; one with different layers, nuances and even alternative plot twists that an episodic format has allowed us to explore. Drawn from the same material, ‘Faraway Downs’ is a new variation on ‘Australia’ for audiences to discover”.
Luhrmann has form in revisiting projects, recently revealing that there is a four hour cut of Elvis he hopes to release.
While no release date has yet been announced, we do know that it will land on the Star section of Disney+ in the UK.
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