How's this for a paradox: Despite having a thin storyline, completely clichéd characters, and a frequently annoying visual style, Baz Luhrmann's deliriously over-the-top musical revels in artifice to such a degree as to qualify as a must-see. For Luhrmann artifice is all, and this Nicole Kidman-Ewan MacGregor starrer lives-and sometimes dies-by it.

Luhrmann announces his intentions right off the bat by having a curtain open to reveal the 20th Century Fox logo while a small manic figure conducts the familiar fanfare. In a flash we are plunged into a swirling montage of colour and light representing a kind of Paris of the mind, as a voiceover intones, "It was 1899-the summer of love..."

The voice belongs to Christian (MacGregor), a naïve, would-be writer new to Paris who finds himself with some new comrades thanks to an overly exuberant rehearsal in the flat above him that causes Toulouse-Lautrec (John Leguizamo) and his absinthe-soaked friends to come crashing through Christian's ceiling. Christian is promptly enlisted as the writer for the musical about freedom and love that the bohemians are intent on producing. And then it's off to the fabled Moulin Rouge, presided over by the impresario Zidler (Jim Broadbent), to recruit the beautiful courtesan and chanteuse Satine (Kidman) for the lead. Before you can say "can-can," (and after a wild array of dance numbers staged by a troupe of beautiful people who appear to be speed freaks) our hero is wooing Satine, true love is in the air, a prissy and very rich Duke (Richard Roxburgh) is determined to make Satine his own or steal the Moulin Rouge from Zidler, and the hoary, but contextually appropriate spectre of death by consumption is raised.

The two things that make Moulin Rouge stand out as an ambitious and audacious adventure are also at the root of its problems: Luhrmann's outrageously kinetic and colourful visual style and the use of contemporary (and not-so-contemporary) pop songs to propel the storyline along.

Luhrmann is a visual magician and a compulsive cutter, in love with the wild swirling montage-if you thought his Rome and Juliet was busy with jump cuts and rock video-style editing, Moulin Rouge makes it look static. The cuts are so many and so often that the movie frequently comes across as a kinetic action painting, a kind of abstract impressionism, if I may mix my art movement monikers. The detail that Luhrmann packs into every frame is also astounding but by the mid-point the phrase "full of sound and fury and signifying nothing" came into my mind and stayed there.

Similarly, the pop songs, while sometimes apropos-the use of David Bowie's "Heroes" is the one genuine moment in the film where the grandiosity Luhrmann is looking for is perfectly realized-are frequently so trite as to render the thing boring or obvious, if not embarrassing. I don't know about you but for me Phil Collins' "One More Night" was crap then and is crap now. It must be said that the leads pull off the songs (which also include "The Sound of Music," Elton John's "Your Song," Madonna's "Material Girl," "Diamonds Are a Girl's Best Friend," The Police's "Roxanne," and many others) very well; Kidman's voice is good and MacGregor's is absolutely wonderful.

While these may be just the cavils of a curmudgeon, consider the oft-repeated message of the film, which springs forth on several occasions: "The greatest thing you'll ever learn is just to love and be loved in return." If that makes you wince a bit, we are on the same wavelength. If it makes you swoon, then you'll love it. Either way, given how ambitious, daring and risky Moulin Rouge is, you should see it.