KEY POINTS:
Television commercials made by the acclaimed film director Baz Luhrmann will screen in New Zealand next month, as Tourism Australia aims to capitalise on his new epic movie, Australia.
Faced with flagging numbers of overseas visitors, tourism bosses across the Tasman are hoping Australia can do for their country what the Lord of the Rings trilogy did for New Zealand.
On Tuesday night in Sydney stars gathered for the red-carpet premiere of the movie, Luhrmann's first since Moulin Rouge in 2001.
Australia is filmed against the dramatic landscapes of the Kimberley in Western Australia and the Northern Territory. It tells the story of British aristocrat Lady Sarah Ashley (Nicole Kidman), who arrives in Australia on the brink of World War II.
She meets a rough-hewn local (Hugh Jackman) and reluctantly agrees to join forces with him to save the land she has inherited.
Hoping to ride the wave of publicity surrounding the film, Tourism Australia commissioned Luhrmann to make two television advertisements spearheading a new A$40 million campaign encouraging visitors to such outback locations.
Short-term visitor arrivals to Australia fell 2.8 per cent in September compared with the same month the previous year. New Zealand is Australia's largest tourism market, with 1.1 million visitor arrivals in the year to September.
Tourism Australia aims to increase arrivals from New Zealand next year by 1.3 per cent, and is particularly targeting "experience seekers" - adventurous international travellers.
It wants to move Kiwis beyond the traditional east coast gateways of Sydney, Melbourne and Brisbane.
The two Luhrmann commercials tap into the theme of the movie, where the Kidman character has lost her sense of self but finds it again when she comes to Australia.
A young Aborigine actor from the film, Brandon Walters, appears as if in a dream to stressed-out executives struggling to deal with life in their rainy, dark cities. He whispers, "Sometimes you've gotta go walkabout."
An American executive then finds herself emerging from an outback billabong, while an Asian man and his wife are suddenly dining by candlelight under a boab tree.
The ads will screen in 22 countries. They will begin screening in New Zealand just ahead of the local launch of Australia on December 26.
