Every country has a distinct perception of one’s ideology, history, and values. These characteristics, combined with the language and ethnicity, make up the culture of a nation. Large communities of persons manage to function on one territory only through a shared culture that unites single individuals into a nation. It broadly defines the way of life for people, determines the values, and creates the cultural identity people carry into art as well. Art gives men a way to express their individual and cultural struggles. The movie industry allows the directors to explore cultural identity specifics through tailored characters and scenery, as in an Australian film Muriel’s Wedding.
Cultural Identity
The cultural identity of an individual is formed through the perceptions and traditions of the whole country. Australian culture is commonly considered as one of the most welcoming and warmest (Kapferer, 2020). Australians are open, outgoing, and relaxed, which is usually considered friendly. They may also be direct and say what they mean straightforwardly. Australians generally tend to be relatively informal in everyday interactions. The Australian culture is generally considered more individualistic than collectivistic, and people are usually more concerned about their personal success (Kapferer, 2020). All these characteristics leave a trace in the individual qualities of a person who bears the cultural identity of an Australian.
However, all the positive traits of Australian culture are often unnoticed because of the underlying flaws. The outgoing and direct nature of Australians may frequently be considered rude and offensive (Khan, 2019). The individualistic culture damages family institutions and leads to being egocentric (Kapferer, 2020). The following controversies and cultural flaws are usually underlined through art. Filmography becomes the way to affect the societal norms and values and shift the cultural identity through showcasing specific cultural features.
Australian Film Industry
The era of globalization has undoubtedly brought immense benefits to the global community making access to quality products and international connections. However, the increasing speed of globalization also means a decrease in cultural individuality. The languages, traditions, and cultures of various countries get erased with the establishment of global standards and unification (Kapferer, 2020). Such a process proves to be especially detrimental to film and television industries other than Hollywood. Australia’s film industry can not rival with Hollywood and loses its peculiarity and ability to share a unique cultural perspective with the audience (Zernetska, 2020). It fights for survival because of the lack of film proposals, financing, and the global demand for standardized western movies.
However, several Australian masterpieces managed to survive and became internationally, commercially, and critically acclaimed. Muriel’s Wedding proves to be one of the Australian movies that managed to conquer the world’s appreciation (Zernetska, 2020). It reflects the non-typical approach to filmmaking like many Australian movies. The peculiar characters and the plot depict a distinct cultural identity. The movie also portraits the province and the rural surroundings where Muriel is from. The movie manages to mix the oddity of a comedy with heartbreaking drama and highlights the work’s critical issues but does not bother the viewers too much. The plot has many laughs and a melancholy that reveals itself towards the end as an unexpected twist.
The film shows how making fun of Muriel and her relationship’s awkwardness can be used to underline societal and cultural problems. The edgy comedy leaves one thinking of the true meaning and message of the story. It appears to be radically different from sweet American movies with happy endings and showcases the cultural and social issues. Muriel’s Wedding also breaks the Australian New Wave movies’ traditions, where the national identity was reflected through the landscape. It is shown only to be the background for the story, with the focus shift to the locals’ family and society to make it more internationally approachable.
Plot Overview
The story tells us about Muriel Helshop, an awkward young woman who listens to ABBA and dreams of getting married. It appears the only way for her to change her bare life in Porpoise Spit with her dysfunctional family. Moreover, the womans friends expel her from the group and make her feel even more miserable to run away to Sydney with the new friend Rhonda. She changes her name to Mariel and starts to work at a video store (Muriel’s wedding, 1994). Everything seems fine until Rhonda gets partially paralyzed and is diagnosed with a cancerous tumour. Muriel promises to take care of her but instead uses her story to get wedding photos, and they argue. Muriel becomes desperate and marries a swimmer for $10000, so he can join the Olympics (Muriel’s wedding, 1994). She has an elaborate wedding but forgets about her friends and family. Rhonda moves back home, her mom is dying by the wedding, and all that for David to completely disregard Muriel. Betty is absolutely devastated by her ruining marriage and commits suicide.
Muriel’s mom’s death finally makes her reconsider her values and constant lying, that is why she divorces David, repays his dad the money, and returns to Sydney with Rhonda for a promising future. Muriel represents the typical Australian woman in an average family. Her family is big and consists of five children, a father, and a mother. However, it cannot be called complete. The children stay at home and watch TV in a grown-up age; the gender roles in the family are strictly defined (Pickering, 2017). Mom is told to make tea and bring coffee, dad is cheating, and mom is bearing it. The following surroundings force Muriel to run away from despair.
Characters Analysis
Muriel, as the main character of the story, strongly possesses national identity. She was raised in the coastal town of Porpoise Spit and has a typical relaxed and odd spirit. The woman and her siblings do not seem to be bothered by the absence of a job and staying at home, even after graduating. Muriel appears to be more concerned about marrying, which is not a typical Australian feature but rather gender-specific (Pickering, 2017). However, it also shows female preferences and views on life in Australia (French, 2020). Muriel hates her personality because of the constant bullying, and she reinvents herself as Mariel. She created a new identity to escape from her past and the identity shaped in her cultural surroundings to become more similar to her peers. Muriel admires the typical glamorous girls and wants to be part of the community and bear a group identity.
At the end of the movie, Muriel shows her determination to accept her own identity and allow herself to be whomever she wants to be without the cultural standards that pressured her. Her values of marriage dissolve as she realizes she did not love whom she has married. She only had to do it because of the cultural and peer pressure to prove the Australian society she is a valuable part of it.
Rhonda is another crucial character in the story who has a robust cultural identity. In contrast to weird and uncertain Muriel, Rhonda is direct and even more business-like. Rhonda shows how cultural identity can vary and be multi-folded. She presents an active extrovert type of Australian, who does not seem to be easily embarrassed. She dances at the strip club and performs at the stage. Rhonda is relatively straightforward as a typical Australian – she directly approaches Muriel and bluntly tells Tanya about her friend’s affair. She does not try to hide behind lies as Muriel, and it empowers her. Their friendship appears organic, affirming, and real, compared to Tanya, Cheryl, Janine, and Nicole. The movie also highlights the issue of disability and the cultural perspective in Australia. Rhonda suffers to find a place for the disabled at the wedding and has to return to her mom because she cannot even go to the shops without Muriel’s help. The disability is regarded as a joke that Muriel’s friends laugh about.
The other characters of the story also reflect the typical Australian cultural characteristics. Muriel’s mom Betty was a poor, abused woman in the toxic environment. Her story shows the downfall of the traditional gender relations in the family (Pickering, 2017). She represents the typical oppressed woman in the family who, in the end, does not bear it and commits suicide (French, 2020). However, she was strong as the whole family relied on her with the children watching Cricket and lying on the sofa during all days. Her husband left their house and did not care of the children at all. Betty lived the life that was fated for Muriel if she would not have changed her ideas conformed by typical gender roles in Australia (Pickering, 2017). It was the result of the Australian bit of toxic masculinity in the face of abusive Bill that terrorized the whole family (Arnold, 2019). Being abused by the husband for the family’s sake was shown as a dysfunctional life that Muriel’s mother lived.
The father, Bill, on the other hand, was a cheater who also verbally abused his children by publicly calling them “useless.” He portrays an individualistic culture caring primarily about himself and his own benefit, both monetary and spiritual. Bill hid the evidence of his wife’s suicide to save his face and use sympathy to improve his job situation because he deeply cared about his public image more than about his family. The cheating culture seems to be expected for Australians since the issue is marked several times throughout the movie. The father cheats, Muriel’s friend group cheats, and it appears normal.
Bill’s position as a public figure is also essential considering his corrupt politics. He uses his power and position to bribe and escape punishment when his family steals. This is notable as the domestic anti-bribery law was only introduced in 1999 in Australia. The movie represents the actual bribery problem and the issue of corrupt politics, which are culturally defined in Australia through Bill’s character. The authors make Bill lose his position in the end and show how this person who only wished the power and money now has to live on allowance without a job.
It is also critical to consider typical popular girls in Australia – Muriel’s former friends’ group of Tanya, Cheryl, Janine, and Nicole. They are egotistical and shallow but are popular among their peers and opposite sex because they follow the cultural standards. They represent the ideal female characters in the local field (French, 2020). The friend group values their public image and beauty, so they expel Muriel because she does not belong to their level. They deeply care about clothes and poke Muriel for her dress at the wedding. Tania, Cheryl, Janine, and Nicole represent the toxic environment that conforms her to the ideas of ideal appearance. Their abusive remarks about Muriel’s look and character make her feel useless. The following actions are considered normal in the local culture as the other guests do not even notice these acts of bullying. Porpoise Spit does not encourage Muriel’s weirdness and spunk, following the way of conformity that Muriel and Rhonda battle.
Muriel’s Wedding as a classical Australian movie managed to portray a small coastal town’s typical life with its prejudices and flaws. It reveals the social and personal issues of the usual people embedded in the culture. Muriel’s Wedding‘s plot develops from a seemingly light romantic comedy to drama, referencing the pressures of gender and class oppression, disability, corruption, and abuse. The stories of the realistic detailed characters who develop throughout the story combined compose an exhaustive picture of varied national identity. All these features of the movie combined make Muriel’s Wedding an accurate cultural portrait and a thoughtful work that gives a strong message.
References
Arnold, B.B. (2019) ‘On a screen darkly: Outback noir, erasure and toxic masculinity’, Canberra Law Review, 16(1), pp. 79-98.
French, L. (2020) ‘Gender still matters: towards sustainable progress for women in Australian film and television industries’, in Liddy, S. (ed.) Women in the international film industry. Berlin: Springer, pp. 271-291.
Kapferer, J. (2020) Being all equal: identity, difference and Australian cultural practice. London: Routledge.
Khan, N.R. (2019) ‘Cultural nationalism and Australian cultural pride in cartoons’, Literary Endeavour, 10(1) pp. 209-214.
Muriel’s wedding (1994) Directed by Hogan J. Paul [Film]. Australia: Miramax Films
Pickering, K. (2017) Muriel’s Wedding is a feminist masterpiece and more relevant than ever.Web.
Zernetska, O. (2020) ‘The development of Australian culture in the XX century: Australian film industry’, Problems of World History, 11, pp. 174-200.