In Australia Lantana is a noxious weed.

Thank you for the information, AbsolutelyGorgeousGoz. I first saw lantana in Athens in the Agora in 1995, a huge shrub covered in bees and butterflies. It really impressed me, I took a photo and wondered what it could be. Next sighting was in Egypt, 2000, where I saw it growing all over the sides of roads, rambling endlessly like a weed. So when I finally found lantana plants for sale in Michigan, I was amazed at the tiny size and the care that I have to lavish on them, growing them in pots, fertilizing, watering frequently, deadheading. They do not last through our nasty winter. There is no chance of lantana spreading about here. I do love them since they have interesting colours and attract hummingbirds and butterflies. They come in pale lemon, purple, white and the yellow/pinkish combination seen in places where they grow like weeds. One reason why I was so attracted to the film was the title. When I saw all that lantana in the beginning, I was hooked. The film was interesting enough, especially with LaPaglia's Australian persona, as he plays the American so often.

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Lantana is a very deep film with the metaphor of the nature of the Lantana plant. All pretty on the outside but with a deadly undergrowth. Some of the relationships are like that.. Some of the others got it.
"But I don't like German.I know perfectly well that I look quite plain after my German lesson."

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Lantana is GOOD!
Watch it dont just look at it.
Thats the problem with Northamericanized film viewers,they just see
whats on the screen at the reptilion brain level.
There is a whole subtext that must be postulated in order to VIEW
the story as intended.
Too many filmgoers watch too many films that give them everthing
up front, then when a movie comes along that requires thought they
dismiss it as purile (crap).
So WATCH Lantana once more - there is more going on than meets the eye!
"Trust me I know what I'm doing!"

Its pretty obvious that Lantana is a metaphor used through the entire film.
Duh-
Lantana, a weed that looks very pretty on the outside but is really tangled and inter wound to the point of confusion underneath, this is emblematic to the relationships portrayed.
Obviously, the extended metaphor is used to highlight Lawrence's stance on contemporary relationships.
Not only are pretty much all the themes explored in Lantana (Honesty, love, happiness ect) all linkable to the Lantana plant, it plays a role in the film itself being the catalyst for a number of events.
Its called Lantana for a lot of good reasons.
But all this 'depth' still makes for a boring piece of Australian beep
And I am Australian.

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girls girls girls

The author name for the play, which the film is based on,
is called "Speaking in Tongues"; so someone decided
to switch the title .
Tord

Has anyone verified why the title with the author or whoever chose it? If not, everything here is speculative. Not to rock the boat too awfully much, but this about as base as it might beand I hope less than relevant to everyone's lives, though the bickering is often comical here.
Want to see a real laugh riot? Take a look at the craziness on the boards for Mel Gibson's "The Passion," not even to be released until next Ash Wednesday2004 that is for those who don't know.
By the way, the flowers can smell good or bad depending on variety and one's tastes and in the US they are typically grown in the south year 'round and annually in the north. Interesting that they are a weed down under.

The film is called Lantana because it is a metaphor for the tangled thorny vine we call 'life'. Lantana is a noxious weed in Australia. It has a dense thorny undergrowth and is very hard to get rid of.

Lantana is a shrub with small bright flowers on top and a prickly, dense undergrowth. The characters all seem fine on the outside, yet their deceptive and frequently intertwined relationships are well hidden underneath the surface, similar to the shrub.

There's a lot of lantana in Southern California. The blooms are like tiny bouquets. Wonderful, somewhat wild smell. One of my favourite flowers from childhoodahhhhhhhh.
LG

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Have you seen it? It starts (and ends more or less) in the Lantana-Bushes. They are (metaphorically) the underwood of the thinking and feeling of the protagonists.

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Sorry, it was hard to calculate though my tears of laughter!
And in fact, if you look at what you were responding to, you might find I was right the first time.
Global warming is an indisputable fact and we did it. - rjfme

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4 years and 3 months later.
I bet you're a wiz on trivia night, just slamming those answers down in a flash, huh?
Global warming is an indisputable fact and we did it. - rjfme

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Because the film was held up as some art-house masterpiece in Australia and in fact it played out like any b-grade TV cop show.
It also played in every multi-plex as well as every art-house cinema.
I wasn't talking about box-office, I was talking about style and sensibility.