Netflix’s new Aussie flick, “Back to the Outback”, is jam-packed with important life lessons – and plenty of well-known local stars too!
If you ask my two children, the best opening scene of a movie is no doubt seeing Melvin living his best life in the wild in Madagascar. It’s a dream, but it’s pure happiness for a giraffe locked up in a zoo.
My little crew is filled with animal lovers, you see. And animal lovers love nothing more than seeing creatures big and small in their natural habitat.
So when Netflix dropped their latest film, Back to the Outback, we wasted no time hitting the couch in our best khaki’s – with me knowing full well that this humble family film would hit the perfect spot for my herd (more on that later).
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These ‘dangerous’ Aussie animals are a little misunderstood. Image: Netflix
Ready for adventure
To celebrate the Aussie film coming to our screens in time for summer holidays, hundreds of families were invited to join Netflix in welcoming the outback to Sydney Harbour with an immersive family experience.
The Back to the Outback Park popped up at the Entertainment Quarter in Moore Park On December 18 and 19 and featured thrilling escape courses, live reptiles and unique activities for the whole family to experience.
It was a real treat for those children craving a bit of the outback after sinking their innocent fangs into the fun film… just ask my daughter, who threw on her Will & Bear hat and a belt full of bug-hunting tools and binoculars the moment the film ended.
“I’m ready for my own adventure!” she declared.
And that’s what a film like Back to the Outback does. It ignites all of that bravery, curiosity, and sense of adventure we want our children to discover within themselves.
The film encourages kids to go on their own adventure. Image: Netflix
A brave mission
“Monsters. That’s what they think we are in here…”
They’re the sad words that are uttered by the film’s main character, Maddie, a “dangerous” Taipan snake who can kill a human in mere seconds. At least that’s what every visitor to the zoo is told when they enter the reptile section.
It’s a description that Maddie (voiced by Isla Fisher) hates hearing, because, despite her scary fangs, she is quite friendly.
Finally, she becomes fed up with being locked up for people to gawk at her, so she convinces her mates – Frank, a purple lovelorn funnel-web spider, Nigel, a sensitive scorpion, and Zoe, a thorny devil lizard, to escape their quarters and return to the outback where they belong. Only problem is, Pretty Boy, the zoo’s most treasured Koala, unexpectedly joins in on the adventure.
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Maddie is sick of being called a monster… because she isn’t one! Image: Netflix
Celebrate who you are
Their mission to return to the outback is a hair-raising and hilarious adventure as they’re pursued by zookeeper Chaz and his adventure-seeking mini-me.
As the children hang off the edge of their seats, important lessons about kindness can be found throughout the film – particularly the age-old saying of not to judge a book by its cover.
The crew of reptiles trying to get back home might be the ones you’d find in any “Australia’s deadliest animals” book, but in this film, they’re quite the opposite. In their case, beauty truly does come from within.
Jokes and silly laugh-out-loud moments are throughout, but when I asked my two primary-school-aged children what they took away from the film, they both answered that it was important to treat our animals with respect and help each other – no matter how different we look. And how right they were!
Australia is home to such diverse and unique animals, critters, and plants that we should celebrate their uniqueness and protect them.
Chaz is a mix of Steve Irwin and Crocodile Dundee, which the parents will appreciate. Image: Netflix
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Feel-good fun for the adults too
Now, before you roll your eyes over having to sit and watch an animated flick with your kids this summer, I promise you, you’ll enjoy it in the way you enjoy Bluey.
There are plenty of adult-only jokes thrown in there (and yes, they went completely over my little ones’ heads, phiew!) – like when the tarantula gets toey and just wants to breed, or the references to Steve Irwin when Chaz talks about his past.
You can also play a little game of ‘guess who’ as I did. There are so many Aussie names voicing this film – Isla Fisher, Guy Pearce, Kylie Minogue, Jacki Weaver, Eric Bana, Keith Urban, Tim Minchin, Celeste Barber, and more – you’re bound to guess a few of them correctly.
We’d be surprised if your little ones didn’t want to go on their own adventure after watching it.
This article was brought to you in partnership with the new Netflix animated movie Back to the Outback.
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