He directed Romeo and Juliet as a modern love story in 1996, and now Baz Luhrman sets the scene in Paris, 1899. The film takes a long journey with stars such Ewan Mc Gregor, Nicole Kidman, John Leguziamo, Jim Broadbent...with an attractive formula, for he directs “Moulin Rouge” as a singing and dancing rock opera.

Christian [Ewan Mc Gregor] is a young bohemian who's running away to the dark underground of Paris and the Moulin Rouge Cabaret. There, he finds glamour and sex, naively folling in love with the best paid cabaret star and most famous prostitute in Paris.

The Moulin Rouge cabaret used to attract the richest and poorest in Paris. Glamor and neon lights soon result in a passionate romance between Christian and the prostitute [Nicole Kidman]. This unhappy love allows him to mature inside and grow up spiritually.

Director Baz Luhrman uses pop music to create an extraordinary mix of screen dialogue and classic cabaret. Similarly to the way he modernized Romeo and Juliet, in Moulin Rouge, instead of classic cabaret music, he uses modern rock music.

Moulin Rouge is a sex-drugs-and-rock 'n' roll film. It has all that. Passionate sex between a poet [McGregor] and a prostitute [Nicole Kidman], drugs in high Paris society, and rock-and-roll in the form of a musical. The best is, both stars, McGregor and Kidman are really singing and dancing. Moulin Rouge is a truly post-modern film. Luhrman got the basic idea in India, where he saw Shakespeare's play among 2000 viewers from India, in Hindu language, in the huge Ice Cream Film Palace.