4) Moulin Rouge
Baz Luhrmann often gets characterized as a director interested solely making movies with spectacle rather than substance (as though spectacle does not, itself, contain substance). I find this unfair; the quality I appreciate most about his best films are their ability to combine his signature razzle-dazzle with subtler details and themes that are reinforced by his love of capturing excess. This made him the perfect person, in retrospect, to direct The Great Gatsby.
In terms of Luhrmann’s craziest cinematic combination of visuals and music, though, Moulin Rouge stands alone. There’s too much going on in this movie’s big scenes to even keep track of it all, although the frantic cutting gives us a chance to at least catch a glimpse of as much of the madness as possible. As someone who is easily overwhelmed by the sensory stimulation of wild party scenes in real life, the feeling of not knowing where to look is recreated nicely by the frenetic editing of these sequences. Not only is the frame always active, but the music is often accompanying it—even upstaging it—with bold moves like mashing Nirvana together with “Lady Marmalade.” The over-the-top direction of the entire story aligns with the over-the-top emotions of the romance, getting at the nature of romance itself.
