Australia erasure in documentary
Squeezing a 40 year career into three hours was never going to be easy, and any biographical documentary will cut events for pacing, etc, but the way this doco is so clearly from a British perspective really annoyed me.
In the world of the doco I Should Be So Lucky was her first single. Locomotion (the original Australian version, not the dreadful SAW remake) was the highest selling Australian single of the 1980s. It was number one for seven weeks. Its success is what lead to Kylie going to London to record in the first place. In this version of the story it did not exist.
Impossible Princess was breezed over as her flop era - fine - but that period completely changed how she was viewed in Australia. Commercial radio (for the first time since Locomotion) and Triple J (for the first time ever) started playing her. The Initimate and Live tour, originally just a couple of capital city theatre shows, sold out immediately and ended up being extended to 20 dates. It was the era where the kids who grew up with her suddenly had their own money and voices, and the crusty nay-sayers who were so loud 10 years earlier had to accept Kylie was loved by the public.
I enjoyed the doco, I was very moved by Kylie and her story, but I was left hoping the next time her story is told like this that it actually considers where she came from.