Back in the glory days of Mary-Kate and Ashley Olsens straight-to-VHS movie career, they gave us the masterpiece that is Our Lips Are Sealed. The year was 2000, and the Olsen Twins graced Australia with an action/romance-packed teen film set in Sydney.
Except it is not the Australia that we know. This is an Australia that is so, so much better. At least to watch.
Let’s recap for anyone whose childhood memories of Our Lips Are Sealed have not burned the nuances of the plot into their mind forever. Mary-Kate and Ashley play the Parker twins, who are forced to join the Witness Protection Program after foiling a jewel heist.
Their family keeps being relocated, and the twins keep spilling the tea on their situation, until they get sent to the last (ish) place left they haven’t lived: Australia.
On one level, there’s an elaborate plot that unfolds in which the thieves chase the twins (Maddie and Abby) down under in search of the big-ass diamond they don’t even know they have. It’s fittingly surreal for a Mary-Kate and Ashley movie.
Then on another level, we see the Olsen twins immersing in classic Aussie – or as they say, ‘Ossie’ – culture. They immediately make acquaintance with two hot (for their age and target audience) surfer dudes who have access to cars and boats and Harbour Bridge climbs with impossible ease.
I LOVE this Australia.
They have a pet kangaroo named boomer who eats potato chips and watches TV! I always wanted one of those!
They crush cans on their heads – something that all Aussies can ostensibly do in the parallel universe version of Sydney, Australia that the Olsen twins have stumbled into. Not enough Australians in real life can crush cans on their heads. We need to do better.
It’s all yacht parties and impromptu participation in surf competitions and Luna Park frolicking. Was this movie produced by Tourism Australia on the down low? Perhaps.
The crowning moment is when one of the girls (Mary-Kate I believe) stops the bad guys by throwing a boomerang at a sea plane. There just happen to be boomerangs on hand, because they are an everyday item for the Olsen twin’s Australia.
And THEN it seems as if the girls are allowed to keep the fat diamond they realise they’ve had all along??? This particular plot point is not specifically ‘Australian’ but it’s definitely a world I’d like to live in.
In conclusion, the Australia in Mary-Kate and Ashley’s Our Lips Are Sealed is an absurd kind of utopia that I would rather be living in.
