DVD Review - Behind the Red Curtain Version
"Welcome to the 'Behind the Red Curtain' version.
Here you will be able
to glimpse into the minds that created the world of Moulin Rouge"
I was so impressed by the information revealed in the Behind the Red Curtain version of Moulin Rouge that I decided to sit down one day and summarise all the clips! Short clips are interlaced throughout the film, and there are eight in total. The following is a description of each clip in order, along with a short introduction of where the clip can be found within the movie:
Clip 1: Introduction
The movie begins to play, we hear the 'audience' clapping and the conductor, Satie, taps his stick for silence. We then watch the red curtains pull back as the 20th Century Fox logo is displayed on the 'stage'. The curtains pull back again for the opening credits, and Satie conducts the orchestra manically, dancing around in front of the stage as the title logo appears...
CUT
We see the character of Satie standing in front of a blue screen conducting under the direction of Baz. This footage is interlaced with how Satie appears in the beginning frames of the film, and we also glimpse the design team designing the title graphics.
We are then shown Toulouse singing 'Nature Boy', and he is shown standing in front of a blue screen on a windmill contraption. We are then taken on a multi-layered ride within the opening sequence through the streets of Paris, where individual shots are interlaced with computer graphics, live action and blue screen.
Finally, we see an alternate introduction to Christian, where the camera pans around the walls of his
garret covered with images of Satine before closing on Christian at his typewriter. A big cross appears with the word 'Rejected'. We are then shown the 'Reshoot', which is the introduction through Christian's
window under the L'Amour sign which we see in the final film.
A note is attached to the end of this clip informing us that we can visit the 'Visual Effects Gallery' on disc 2 for more information about the opening sequence was
achieved.
Clip 2: "The Windmill"
(Narration by Catherine Martin, Production Designer)
Christian is describing how he came to Paris one year ago in 1899, and how the village of Montmartre was the centre of the Bohemian world. As the camera zooms through Christian's
garret window to the tune of 'Children of the Revolution'...
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CM explains that Montmartre was once where flour was milled (hence the
windmills) and, as time went on, became the location of working class dance halls. Zidler and his business partner had a radical idea of a night club not for the working class, but for the rich and elite. We are then shown design images of the movie Moulin Rouge.
CM further explains that Zidler hired a designer to put a windmill as the centre piece of the Moulin Rouge. Zidler also embraced electricity. Electricity was new, and the area surrounding the Moulin Rouge was one of the first to be electrified.
Clip 3 - "Christian's
Garret"
(Narration by Catherine Martin, Production Designer)
Christian tastes his first cup of absinthe and starts singing 'Children of the Revolution' with the Bohemians as they watch the Green Fairy sing 'The Sound of Music'...
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CM explains that Christian's garret was designed to be the room of a penniless poet, and that Baz wanted the red windmill of the Moulin Rouge to be in view directly outside the window as Christian was typing.
CM further explains that there were two versions of the garret. The first was full size, and this was where the interior shots were filmed. The full size version also had an exterior bit where scenes such as the Green Fairy sequence was partly filmed. The second version of the
garret was an exterior model with Toulouse's apartment above and the L'Amour sign on the outside.
We then see the 'stick' in action, which was a camera attached to a large stick that Baz used to demonstrate the shot and the look he was trying to achieve in certain scenes. We see Baz using it and talking to the camera a bit as CM's voice over explains that it was the best way for the creative team to get inside Baz's head. She also adds that while the
garret may have looked like the simplest set in the film, it was actually quite difficult as there was so little furniture in the room to create focus.
Clip 4 - "The Main Hall"
(Narration by Catherine Martin, Production Designer)
During the 'Lady Marmalade' introduction, the camera zooms through the doors into the Moulin Rouge...
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Baz tells us that "the feeling is 70's disco with full on costume in top hats."
CM then explains that the real Moulin Rouge was built to capitalise on the dance craze of the can can. There were several clubs around at the time, but the Moulin Rouge was the largest and most sumptuous hall. She explains that there could be up to 1500-2000 people in the real Moulin Rouge, but only 350 extras were allowed on set at any time. So the design team built a model of the Moulin Rouge with scale railway people in realistic groupings to show Baz what it would look like. We then see the model set, hear Baz raving about the 'atmosphere', and watch as he asks for the Satine figure to be lowered down in the middle of the hall. We then watch part of Satine on the trampeze in the film itself.
CM tells us there were up to 100 - 150 people constructing the set of the Moulin Rouge at any one time including carpenters, soft furnishers, decorators, metal workers and plasterers. The rule was to give the audience the feeling of being in the Moulin Rouge like the punter was in 1890. We then watch some filming of the frantic can can sequence.
Clip 5 - "The Garden"
(Narration by Catherine Martin, Production Designer)
During the middle of the can can sequence in the Moulin Rouge...
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CM explains that the garden was the secondary dance area. It was also the historical
equivalent of a beer garden and pick up booth, including sideshows, boxing ring, donkey rides, bushes and a giant elephant. Baz then adds that the real Moulin Rouge did have an elephant in the garden. Inside it was an opium den and nightclub. In the movie, their elephant was a little different and houses Satine's boudoir.
CM tells us that designing the elephant was one of the most lengthy processes in the movie. The audience
needs to believe that they're inside an elephant, so the room needed to feel round and belly like. They also had to make a real scale elephant that was about 10 metres tall.
The Moulin Rouge garden had two interpretations - one was real life and the other was a one in ten scale model used to fill in the gaps of things that were not able to be shot on the real life set. They had limited filming time in the garden and went over schedule.
'Star Wars : Episode I' was looming hot on their heels and they had to leave the garden after 4 days of shooting instead of the scheduled 7.
We then see footage of the garden real life set being dismantled, and CM says that
seeing the elephant destroyed was a very sad moment in the filming of Moulin Rouge. The images fade to black, and we see the text "Rest in Peace - 1999 - 2000".
Clip 6
After Toulouse sings the end of the 'Elephant Love Medley'...
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This is a very interesting clip that details the significance of the lyrics in the songs in MR, particularly the
'Elephant Love Medley'.
First of all, Baz talks about writing Moulin Rouge and how it is based on the Orphean Myth. He explains, "Orpheus was a young man who had a genius gift of song. It was so beautiful that the very rocks and stones would get up and follow him everywhere he went - that's how great it was. And it was essential in our film that Christian had an almost magical gift for poetry."
Baz the admits that it soon became obvious that he and co-writer Craig Pearce couldn't come up with genius poetry.
Baz, Craig and Anston Monsted then go on to explain the development of the 'Elephant Love
Medley'. Craig explains it is "a mad outpouring of great love songs" and there is discussion about how it is meant to represent an argument between Christian and Satine. We are told that it's meant to represent dialogue between two people, and Baz explains that this is part of the style of Red
Curtain filmmaking - to take something and look at it from another angle.
Craig - "The writing of the love medley came from the dramatic need for Christian to break her golden rule and fall in love."
Baz - "Look at these songs you think you know, and discover them and experience them in a new and different way."
We get to watch Ewan and Nic rehearsing it together, singing to each other and experimenting with the delivery of the lines. We also get to see this rehearsal interlaced with footage from the film.
The clip finishes with Ewan and Nic in the recording studio talking to each other playfully
over microphones, demonstrating the friendship they formed throughout the shoot.
Clip 7
After the 'Like a Virgin' sequence in the Gothic Tower...
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CM explains that the Moulin Rouge was a combination of historical fact and research that was done on bordellos of the period. The gothic tower was based on a themed
facade featured in the actual MR, and they decided that it could have possible been like an incredible themed brothel room. There were many revival styles in the late 19th century, and gothic was one of the most popular. We then see Baz talking with Richard Roxburgh (the Duke) between takes of the 'Like a Virgin' sequence.
CM then reveals that they originally had a sequence in the film where Mome Fromage was shown in black leather whipping half-naked men wearing leather nappies to establish a dominatrix theme to the tune of Grace Jone's
'Slave to the Rhythm' within this particular room. We get to see this scene, CM says she worked very hard on this scene and she can't believe it was cut! I thought it was a very amusing little scene that would have served well to establish the Gothic Tower as a themed room in the Moulin Rouge. I also
realised while watching that this must have been the scene that corresponds to the 'nipple powdering' Easter Egg!
:-)
Clip 8
After the breathtaking performance of the final reprise of 'Come What May'...
We see John Leguizamo and Jim rehearsing the
"He's trying to kill you scene" during the final reprise of 'Come What
May', as Baz tells us that one of the challenges of
Moulin Rouge was to make a comic tragic cinematic language. The trick is to switch from comic to tragedy very quickly - it's comic, it's a
fairy tale, but when you come behind the characters towards the audience, it makes them seem more real, more dramatic
Baz explains that he and Craig had written a script of Satine dying on the stage
in front of the audience, but that it defied the comic-tragedy nature of the film.
Baz and Craig then rewrote the script so that they had a happy ending on stage, but behind the curtain there was a tragic sad ending of
Satine's death.
We are then taken to shoot day 77 and we watch more rehearsal. Baz then explains that on the day of shooting, before they'd
even begun he realised they had problems with the new ending. He realised the rewrite had not dealt with three major issues.
They had already shot the Duke up on top of the stage with Warner, which meant he would be included in Satine's death scene. This was wrong, as his function ended with the happy ending on the other side of the curtain. The second problem was what to do about the gun - how the Duke got the gun, what he did with the gun - and three - what to do with Zidler -
which side of the curtain should he end up on and how to get him there.
We see a sign come up on screen -" Cameras roll in 20 minutes".
We then watch Baz in a little car driving towards the studio through the backlot trying to resolve the ending. He playfully says to the camera, "We're trying to resolve the ending, isn't there any privacy?" He's with
John "Cha Cha" O'Connell, the choreographer. Baz discusses what would become the ending seen in the film, and even acts out the Duke's movements with the gun, as well as Zidler's punch. We then see watch a short rehearsal of the final
ending that is seen in the finished film.
