Unconditional Love

Another of the Australian filmmakers whose successful work in their homeland brought Hollywood calling, P J Hogan burst into international awareness when his first feature as director and writer, “Muriel’s Wedding”, debuted to a 15-minute standing ovation at the 1994 Cannes Film Festival’s Directors’ Fortnight. A box-office champ, “Muriel’s Wedding” dominated the Australian Film Institute Awards, earning eleven nominations and winning four. Basically an ugly-duckling story that relied on broad humor to make its point, the film benefited from Hogan’s capabilities with actors. He elicited star-making performances from lead Toni Collette and supporting player Rachel Griffiths. Its success led to his directing “My Best Friend’s Wedding” (1997), starring Julia Roberts. With a screenplay by Ronald Bass, this “Wedding” presented Roberts in a return to comedy and featured strong turns from Cameron Diaz (as Roberts’ rival in love) and Rupert Everett (as her gay editor). Both films utilized popular music (ABBA in “Muriel’s Wedding”, Burt Bacharach in “My Best Friend’s Wedding”) and Hogan showed increasing growth handling diverse comic material.

Hogan received attention for writing, directing and editing “Getting Wet” (1984), which won two Australian Film Institute Awards, including Best Short Fiction. His extensive Australian TV credits include the 1986 movie “The Humpty Dumpty Man” (released internationally on video, in 1988), which he directed and co-wrote, and “Sloth” (1993), an episode of the “Seven Deadly Sins” series. In 1991, he was second unit director and script editor on the acclaimed feature “Proof”, directed by his wife, Jocelyn Moorhouse. —TCM