Glamping, you've had a great run, but another fancy camping alternative might be about to take your mantle. You can't carry a shipping container on your back like a tent, but you can move them around — and this new portable hotel was created with packing it up, transporting it elsewhere and setting it up in a variety of different places in mind. Designed by the Prague-based Artikul Architects, ContainHotel boasts all of the comforts of a hotel in a structure that's both demountable and portable. First and foremost, visitors will find all of the comforts they'd expect from a hotel, namely proper beds, rooms and facilities, plus windows and balconies, and custom-made plywood furniture too. Reaching 40 feet in height thanks to its two-level structure, with two 20-foot high shipping containers supporting a third on top, the space can sleep 13 guests in total. The three containers have been divided into five bedrooms, a bathroom, a technical room and a storeroom. Inside and out, they're decked out with reclaimed wood — and they're also built on railroad sleepers to cause as little impact to the hotel's surroundings as possible. With being eco-friendly and self-sufficient part of its moveable plans, complete with an inbuilt tank that takes care of the site's water needs, that's clearly important. ContainHotel can currently be found in Treboutice in the Czech Republic, but just where it'll pop up next is anyone's guess. Via inhabitat. Image: Michal Hurych.
Circa is one of the leading circus companies in the world and, for Brisbanites, it's also one of our homegrown success stories. Under the artistic direction of Yaron Lifschitz, Circa has performed its thrilling, physically demanding shows to more than a million people in over 40 countries. There's nothing like seeing local talent on home soil, though. Accordingly, we're pretty lucky to have another chance to see the company's prowess in the upgraded version of a show that's been doing the rounds for a few years. Like all good sequels, Humans 2.0 is a love letter to what's come before, and a chance to go even further with its feats of strength, ferocity and boundary-pushing acrobatics. Here, eleven of Circa's finest ensemble members move to music by composer Ori Lichtik, celebrating what it means to be human — and keeping you wowed with their dazzling choreography. You can check out the results at QPAC's Playhouse, with Humans 2.0 running until Saturday, November 20. Images: Justin Ma / Pedro Greig.
What's better: free KFC, or bites to eat other than chicken being double-breaded and fried just like the Colonel's finest? The answer: a place that does both. Australia is getting one, albeit temporarily and only in Sydney. But hit up The Original Crispery, as the two-day-only world-first pop-up is called, and you'll nab a burger without spending a cent — and also get the chance to enjoy an entire menu that's been given the KFC treatment. Have you always thought that vegetables such as broccolini and asparagus would taste better if they were coated and fried just like KFC chicken? Cheesecake, too? Peanut butter and jam sandwiches? They're some of the items on the menu at The Original Crispery — and, like the burgs, they're also free. The place: 118 Crown Street, Darlinghurst. The dates and times: 10am–7pm on Friday, May 17 and 10am–5pm on Saturday, May 18. Everyone who drops by will get one free original crispy burger and one other free item from the menu, as suitably "crispified" as the fast-food chain is calling it. Why? Whenever a pop-up like this happens, it's always to promote something. This time, the brand is spreading the word about its permanent new original crispy burger series being added to the menu at KFCs Australia-wide, where every burger fillet is double-breaded. It hits outlets on Tuesday, May 14. As for what else is on offer at The Original Crispery, you'll have to show up to find out. Until then, dreaming up a list of other foodstuffs that KFC can crisp up will pass the time and make you hungry. And yes, this is the latest pop-up from a brand that's done 11-course fine-dining degustations, Peking Duk-led festivals, a nightclub, weddings, cocktails, ugly Christmas sweaters for humans and pets alike, free international trips, and a soothing playlist of chicken frying and gravy simmering — which is genuinely relaxing. KFC's Original Crispery will pop up from 10am–7pm on Friday, May 17 and 10am–5pm on Saturday, May 18 at 118 Crown Street, Darlinghurst, Sydney. Head to the brand's website and Facebook page for more details.
In 2017, one filmmaker had viewers around the world swooning. From the moment that Luca Guadagnino's big-screen adaptation of Andre Aciman's Call Me By Your Name premiered at the Sundance Film Festival and then the Berlinale, it wowed audiences, made a star out of Timothée Chalamet and had everyone talking about Armie Hammer's dancing skills. So the news that the acclaimed director is serving up another Italy-set coming-of-age drama is firmly — and understandably — cause for excitement. This time, Guadagnino is doing so on the small screen, courtesy of new HBO mini-series We Are Who We Are. It's set in 2016, and follows two American teenagers living on a US military base with their parents. Jack Dylan Grazer (IT: Chapter Two) stars as 14-year-old Fraser Wilson, a new arrival from New York with his mothers Sarah (Chloë Sevigny, Queen & Slim) and Maggie (Alice Braga, The New Mutants) — while first-timer Jordan Kristine Seamón plays Caitlin Poythress, a veteran of living on the base with her older brother Danny (Spence Moore II, AP Bio), father Richard (Scott Mescudi, aka Bill & Ted Face the Music's Kid Cudi) and mother Jenny (Faith Alabi, Cold Feet). Also featured in this eight-episode tale of friendship, teen angst, first love and finding one's identity are Francesca Scorsese (daughter of iconic filmmaker Martin Scorsese), Ben Taylor, Corey Knight, Tom Mercier (Synonyms) and Sebastiano Pigazzi — with the cast blending well-known names and faces with plenty of newcomers. We Are Who We Are started airing in the US back in September, which is when SBS revealed it would be screening it, too — via SBS Viceland and SBS On Demand. Now, the Aussie broadcaster has announced just when the show will make its local debut, screening weekly on TV from 9.30pm on Tuesday, November 3 and dropping the entire season online at the same time. If you're in the need of a virtual trip to Northern Italy, as directed by the filmmaker also behind I Am Love, A Bigger Splash and the 2018 Suspiria remake — and co-written by Guadagnino with Paolo Giordano (The Solitude of Prime Numbers) and Francesca Manieri (Daughter of Mine) — then add this to your future must-watch list. Check out the trailer below: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u6VAQ6LdnKs&feature=emb_logo We Are Who We Are will screen on SBS Viceland and SBS On Demand from November, airing weekly on TV from 9.30pm on Tuesday, November 3 and dropping its entire season online at the same time. Top image: Yannis Drakoulidis/HBO.
Have you ever wanted to send something suggestive in the mail, but thought a bag of penis-shaped gummy lollies was just a little too on the nose? In that case, we might have just the service for you. Inspired by everybody's (apparently) favourite vegetable emoji, Eggplants Express lets users mail an eggplant to anywhere in the country. You can send it anonymously, or with a personalised greeting scrawled right onto the aubergine itself. "It's real," founder Anthony Daniel tells Concrete Playground, when we call to inquire whether the whole thing is a sham. Apparently he had the idea after forgetting to arrange a gift for his girlfriend on their anniversary. "I didn't want it to be flowers again," explains Daniel. "We always joke about the eggplant emoji, which is how I came up with the idea of an anonymous eggplant." How, uh, romantic? Asked who he saw as the target audience for his service (which is very similar to Eggplant Mail in the US), Daniel admits it's probably best suited to folks who are in on the joke. "It's for people that understand the emoji," he says. "If I sent it to my father, he probably wouldn't get it." He also asks that you refrain from using their service to harass people (come to think of it, having an eggplant show up on your doorstep does seem vaguely ominous). Although Daniel sources his produce fresh from Sydney Markets in Flemington, a disclaimer on the website warns against actually eating them. Which brings up the bigger issue of food waste — is the joke worth wasting a fine bounty of perfectly-edible eggplants? We're not so sure. If we're going to receive an eggplant in the mail, we at least want to be able to eat it for dinner. For more information visit eggplantsexpress.com.au. Image: Lufa Farms via Wikimedia Commons.
It's a scenario that many Australians can relate to: it's summer, the temperature has reached scorching levels and you can hear the sounds of someone splashing around in a cool, refreshing pool. Sadly, those noises aren't emanating from your own swimming spot — because you don't have one — and you don't know your neighbours well enough to just pop by for a dip. And, maybe your local waterhole is too far away, you don't live near the beach or the nearest public pool is closed for the day. Combine all of the above, and you're stuck trying to chill out in the bath or under the fan in the sweltering heat. Enter Swimply, a service that's like Airbnb, but for pools. Already operational in the US and Canada, and finally launching in Australia on Tuesday, November 26 — in Sydney, Melbourne and Brisbane so far — it's a fairly typical sharing economy-style platform. One person rents out something they have and don't use all the time, while another person with a short-term need reaps the benefits. In this case, Swimply lets folks with pools lease out their backyard swimming spots when they're not in use, and helps people without pools find a place for a splash, all via an iOS and Android app. If you fall into the latter category, you can hire a spot by the hour. You can also look for pools with specific facilities and inclusions — such as chairs, lounges, towels, wifi, a changing area, access to a bathroom, a barbecue, a shady spot to sit under, night lighting, pool toys and heated waters. Some allow pets, while others are fine with parties and alcohol. Before booking, you can also scope out just how many guests you can bring (and whether kids are allowed), as well as how private the pool is from the neighbours. That said, prices aren't particularly cheap. Splashing around for 60 minutes hovers around the $40 mark, with some pools as low as $20 and others topping out at $50 per hour — all depending on the cost set by the owner. Of course, if you're planning a dip with your pals and can split the price, it's much more affordable. So far, just a small range of pools are available in Australia, with three in Sydney, five in Melbourne and five in Brisbane. Still, if you're keen to hop in one of them, Swimply is offering first-time users a 20 percent discount until December 31, 2019 — just use the code 'SWIMDOWNUNDER'. And if you're wondering about safety, pools are vetted before being added to the platform, in conjunction with pool and spa maintenance company Poolwerx — and checked to ensure compliance with Australian health and safety standards. Swimply is now available to download on iOS and Android.
Bunjilaka Aboriginal Cultural Centre at Melbourne Museum invites visitors into the world of First Nations fashion and textile design. Piinpi: Contemporary Indigenous Fashion runs until January 19, 2025 and reveals the depth and diversity of cultures across Australia. The title of the exhibition, Piinpi, is an expression from the Kanichi Thampanyu people (East Coast Cape York Peninsula) that reflects 'seasonal changes' and regeneration of Country. The gallery's curator, Kaantju woman Shonae Hobson, has commissioned works from some of the country's top designers. Those include hand-printed designs (using ancient techniques) by Gunnai, Wiradjuri, Gunditjmara and Yorta Yorta woman Lyn-Al Young, Teagan Cowlishaw's sparkly Deadly Kween jumpsuit (made from upcycled materials) and sculptural wearable art pieces by Grace Lillian Lee. [caption id="attachment_792476" align="alignnone" width="1920"] Image: Grace Lillian Lee 'Body Armour'[/caption] Top image: Elisa Jan Carmichael, CIAF 2017 Saltwater Footprints Collection; Photo: Tim Ashton
At most, I expected to tolerate I'm Your Man. It is, after all, about boxing, for which I (and, let's generalise, most theatregoing folk) care not. So it came as a surprise when I loved I'm Your Man, and if you allow yourself to be transported through the doors of Belvoir Downstairs into a so-real-seeming boxing gym, creator/director Roslyn Oades and her multitalented, impressively athletic cast ensure you will, too. My (self-appointed) job is to convince you to take that first step and turn up. I'm Your Man spends time with the fighters, trainers and aspirants at a Sydney gym, and one in particular, Billy Dib, as he gears up for his world title fight. Oades spent 18 months observing and gathering interviews with these athletes, scratching at the psychology and culture that makes them. Her little bit journalistic, little bit anthropological documentation is distilled through a technique she's pioneered called headphone-verbatim, last seen in her Stories of Love and Hate. Rather than memorising the lines, the actors have the recorded audio from these interviews fed to them onstage through headsets and focus on wholly and accurately replicating the subtleties of speech. It might sound awkward, but it really works. We're used to theatre speech being worlds removed from everyday speech, and there are some great verbal quirks — fast-talking, stumbling, on-the-run grammar — that would normally never survive the flattening of the rehearsal process. These rediscovered idiosyncrasies of voice prove totally bewitching, and it's a neat antidote to theatrey declamation. (Plus, no complaints about dodgy accents here.) But more than just document, I'm Your Man immerses you in its characters' world. Even before you see your seats, the walk down the corridor carries you into another, intoxicating world — one where whitewashed walls brandish fight posters, articles, autographs and inspirational quotes; one that sounds of fists hitting vinyl and sneakers squealing against the lino. It smells thankfully not of sweat but of Deep Heat. It's powerful. You soon get a sense for just how this milieu might become a clubhouse, and a comfort. The sharp observation extends to the gym-bright but cleverly flexible fluorescent lighting (Neil Simpson), evocatively ringside sound (Bob Scott), and host of behaviours, exercises and rituals enacted by the performers (Mohammed Ahmad, Billy McPherson, Katia Molino, Justin Rosniak and John Shrimpton). The wrapping of wrists is hypnotic. In place of the usual dramatic climaxes, you want to clap feats of core strength and skipping. These actors may not have memorised lines, but they've been doing some hardcore practice. Often Billy Dib and his team seem to make boxing bear the weight of dreams and ideals bigger than it could possibly contain. Their stories of struggle, migration, self-improvement and community admiration come together to produce insight into the motivations of people who pursue something that most of us don't understand, and in some cases, can't abide. I'm Your Man acknowledges that real-life violence and the competitive violence of sport are not wholly disentwined; it just won't let the violence be the whole story. After earning their trust over many months, Oades clearly had her subjects open up to her, and she's honoured that trust by using their words with warmth, empathy and unflinching honesty. This review was written about the January 2012 run of this production at Belvoir St Theatre - catch the current production at the Brisbane Powerhouse this week.
Imagine you only see one film this year (because of e.g. extreme electricity rationing, extreme ADHD, etc). You'd want to make it one that would blow your freaking mind. So take some advice from sad parallel universe you and, in a year where you'll probably see many films, make one of them Upstream Color, the dreamy feature that emphatically puts paid to the idea that there are only seven (or nine, or twelve) stories in fiction. Upstream Color is only the second movie from writer/director Shane Carruth, whose indie time travel headspin Primer won the Grand Jury Prize at Sundance in 2004 and a cult following soon after. The many fans of that film have since been hankering for another dose of Carruth's signature style. (If it seems unlikely a one-film wonder could have a 'signature style', you have not seen Primer.) However, it turns out festival success does not a Hollywood career ensure, and after some upsets (his much-talked-about feature A Topiary never came to fruition), Upstream Color finally exists in the world, having been written, directed, produced, shot, scored, edited and acted in by Carruth himself. The guy is a lesson in self-sufficiency. This gorgeous, unknowable, deeply affecting film makes Primer look almost conventional, given time travel is a genre filmgoers know a little something of. If Upstream Color had a genre, it'd be something like 'biological art sci-fi'. It starts with a worm. A worm found in the roots of a rare orchid stocked at an ordinary nursery. One of the nursery's customers (Thiago Martins) distills the worm into a drug, which we see, taken recreationally, allows its users to connect telepathically. This man, however, uses it to drug young professional Kris (Amy Seimetz) at a club, and through a complex process of manipulation lasting a week, rob her of her tangible assets. When Kris comes to, the worm is still in her body, wriggling about. Soon enough, a man (Andrew Sensenig) using infrasound lures her to a field, where he removes the worm from her body — and transfers it into a pig. In this world, or any other, a person does not bounce back from the experience lightly. Years later and convinced she's suffering a mental illness, Kris is still trying to piece her life back together. A man she connects with on the train, Jeff (Carruth), might be her shot at a real relationship. Meanwhile, Kris's pig goes back to life in its sty under the watch of the infrasound/surgery man, who also seems to indulge a sideline in field recording. Upstream Color is all this, but it's also not this. The effect is all in the way the story is layered, the way it cuts between these seemingly separate ecosystems, and the sensuous, organic cinematography throughout. It's not abstract — it is meticulously, concretely plotted — and yet the telling of it is open-ended and deliberately foggy as remnants of a dream. It moves like poetry but has the shape of quantum physics, conveying the beauty and pain of fate, as shaped by chance. It's a film you desperately want to piece together, and yet you know that piecing it together is not the point. (Though Carruth will spell it out for you if you want, and it won't disappoint a la Richard Kelly on Donnie Darko.) Sam Adams of the AV Club argues that we're mistaken in holding up puzzle-box movies with that perfect twist, like Memento or The Usual Suspects, as a cinematic holy grail when the rewards of a film like Upstream Color are greater, and he's right. You might solve the puzzle but it will open to reveal another. You might solve the puzzle but find the value was in the pieces. https://youtube.com/watch?v=SilYsr_3vrA
It's always been an excellent concept for a TV series: what happens when 456 people have a chance to make their dreams come true via a huge cash prize simply by playing childhood games? Whether or not there was a murderous edge to this contest — which, of course, there is — this situation was destined to bring out the worst in many of its players. It was also forever bound to stress a point that Squid Game's latest season three trailer utters: "no matter how you look at it, life is just unfair". Those words are directed at Seong Gi-hun (Lee Jung-jae, The Acolyte), who went through this ordeal once in the award-winning Netflix hit's debut season and made it out the other side — only to head back in season two with stopping the game forever his motivation. How he'll fare next is set to play out in Squid Game's third and final season from Friday, June 27, 2025. The mood is unsurprisingly ominous, however, in the newest sneak peek. By now, everyone knows the Squid Game concept: here, trying to win 45.6 billion won means battling 455 other players to the death. Fans will also know that when Player 456 went back into the game with new fellow competitors for company in season two, he found himself closer to the person pulling the strings than he knew. The most-recent batch of episodes dropped at the end of 2024, ended with quite the cliffhanger and seem to have only made the show's protagonist even more determined on his quest — which will again bring him into contact with the Front Man (Lee Byung-hun, The Magnificent Seven). Whatever eventuates, Squid Game's last run will feature a finale written and directed by series creator Hwang Dong-hyuk as it brings its fatal matches to a conclusion. In multiple trailers so far, audiences have been given a glimpse of pleas, big reveals and truths, mazes, jumping rope, a huge gumball machine with red and blue balls, tears, words of advice and more. In Squid Game's second season, Gong Yoo (Train to Busan) also returned as the man in the suit, aka the person who got Gi-hun into the game in the first place — and so did Wi Ha-joon (Little Women) as detective Hwang Jun-ho. That said, a series about a deadly contest comes with a hefty bodycount, so new faces were always going to be essential. That's where Yim Si-wan (Emergency Declaration), Kang Ha-neul (Insider), Park Sung-hoon (The Glory) and Yang Dong-geun (Yaksha: Ruthless Operations) all came in. If you've somehow missed all things Squid Game until now, even after it became bigger than everything from Stranger Things to Bridgerton, the Golden Globe- and Emmy-winning series serves up a puzzle-like storyline and unflinching savagery, which makes quite the combination. It also steps into societal divides within South Korea, a topic that wasn't invented by Parasite, Bong Joon-ho's excellent Oscar-winning 2019 thriller, but has been given a boost after that stellar flick's success. As a result, it's easy to see thematic and narrative parallels between Parasite and Squid Game, although Netflix's highly addictive series goes with a Battle Royale and Hunger Games-style setup. Netflix turned the show's whole premise into an IRL competition series as well, which debuted in 2023 — without any murders, of course. Squid Game: The Challenge has already been picked up for a second season. Watch the latest trailer for Squid Game season three below: Squid Game season three streams via Netflix from Friday, June 27, 2025. Season one and two are available to stream now. Images: Netflix.
This American Life no longer requires any introduction. You and your youngish, globalised, culture-hungry friends are probably all over this podcasted hour of digestible journalism and storytelling. What's slightly less well known is the producers' experiments in translating the show's trademark style to visual media, including through a Showtime TV show and stage show The Invisible Made Visible. They're playful, inventive forays for our cross-platform age. Now comes phase (approx.) four: the movie. Co-written and produced by Ira Glass, Sleepwalk with Me is the feature-length adaptation of Mike Birbiglia's very memorable extreme-sleepwalking/relationship-breakdown stand-up routine, which was included in the TAL episode 'Fear of Sleep'. He has to preface this story with an assurance that it's true, because as he goes from fighting an imaginary jackal to falling off a shelving unit he's climbed in the belief it's a winner's podium to waking up bloodied on a hotel lawn, it increasingly doesn't sound like the cute, ha-ha version of sleepwalking we know. As Mike (or 'Matt Pandamiglio' as he's known in the movie) tells it, his sleepwalking gets worse as his girlfriend of eight years, Abby (Lauren Ambrose), starts to hint at marriage, babies and other grown-up things he's not ready for. He starts using the relationship concerns he can't vocalise to her in his stand-up, getting laughs for the first time. If you've heard the comedy routine that underlies Sleepwalk with Me on TAL, you'll know its engrossing, winningly self-deprecating and very funny. But it's as if the creative team felt that to make it worthy of a feature film they had to emphasise the relationship element, and that's just not the story's strong point. The idea of the man-boy who can't commit is rather '90s, and neither the narrative nor style brings it forward two decades, to where it should be. Sleepwalk with Me is still funny, but nothing in its bones suggests the creativity, forward-thinking or immediacy that This American Life has cultivated as its brand. And that dulls the experience of watching it. Birbiglia certainly makes some adorable, true-ringing observations about life and love. Just be prepared that the laughter-to-irritation ratio may not be one you find favourable.
If you're the kind of traveller who books their hotels based on their spa facilities, then we foresee a stay at JW Marriott Gold Coast in your future. The Surfers Paradise spot is about to become home to Spa by JW, where soaking, steaming, sipping and staring at scenic views will all be on the menu in the relaxing venue's hefty 2500-square-metre wellness space. The new spa joins the hotel as part of its $35-million transformation, and will open its doors on Wednesday, July 12. Inside, everyone chasing their bliss can expect the sounds of the ocean, a vantage over the hinterland, both tea and wine service, and a sizeable list of treatment options and spa packages. Fancy a massage solely designed to help you sleep? An aromatherapy facial? Hopping in the bath with your date or best mate? They're all on offer. Upon arrival, guests will first be greeted at Spa by JW's curator's desk, then hang out in a living room-style lounge setup before diving in. From there, six different rooms will unleash the venue's treatments, including one just for couples that comes with its own private lounge, ensuite stone bath and twin showers. Also onsite: saunas, steam experience showers, pods for relaxing and an outdoor area dedicated to exactly that as well. For those making a group hang out of their spa experience, Spa by JW features a space for private groups, too, that's intimate but still in view of the wider lounge. And, if you're keen to eat and drink while you're there, the tea service is all about local inspiration, the food menu is curated by the hotel's Executive Chef Paul Smart and vino is an option. This is the first Spa by JW in the Australia and New Zealand region, with Australian design studio DBI taking care of its look. As the building's original architects and interior designers, it has a history with the site, and has gone with a coastal Queensland vibe for the wellness space. Think: curves aplenty, translucent walls, natural materials and textures, and neutral hues, plus lighting to suit the mood. "As we've watched the world re-open from the challenges of the past few years, it is an exciting time for us at JW Marriott Gold Coast Resort & Spa to finally reveal this long-awaited chapter of our renovation and welcome back both locals, domestic and international travellers to relax, unwind and rejuvenate at Spa by JW," said Ravinder Dhesi, the hotel's General Manager. Spa by JW opens at JW Marriott Gold Coast, 158 Ferny Avenue, Surfers Paradise on Wednesday, July 12 — operating 9am–6pm Monday–Saturday and 10am–5pm on Sundays.
The photography of Charlotte Tegan is not so distant from what one might label as 'happy snaps'. That is, her photographs foster a sense of familiarity and comfort in anyone who's looking at them. Tegan focuses on identifiable places, everyday scenarios and playful, light scenes that you could probably pull from your old family photo albums. It's in her latest exhibition Superimposition, that the full spectrum and force of Tegan's analogue film photography comes together, acting as a vehicle for personal memory and recollection. Tegan's work has a habit of breaking scene —and in turn, viewer's recollections — through her sharp and angular imagery, and use of inversion, repetition and superimposition. Each of her pieces is like a gem, mirroring each another and cutting through whatever sense of nostalgia it might stir. The result is something quite confusing and uncomfortable. While the subject matter is quite innocent, it results in a sense of disquiet and anxiety that places the audience in doubt of their own mind, and provides a window into the fragility of human memory. Charlotte Tegan's Superimposition shows at Bakery Lane's This Must Be The Place until February 12. Opening night is January 22 6pm to 9pm.
Visit Alice Springs at any time of year and you'll find plenty to see and do in Australia's Red Centre, including making the trip to Uluru, marvelling at Bruce Munro's Field of Light, and checking out the Tjoritja gorges and Kings Canyon. Here's a spectacular reason to head by every April, including from now until Sunday, April 16 in 2023: Parrtjima — A Festival In Light. The region's luminous Indigenous arts festival is back for another year and, set against the 300-million-year-old MacDonnell Ranges, it looks stunning as always. This event celebrates First Nations arts, culture and storytelling, and just might be Australia's most luminous event — with installations in breathtaking surroundings leading the show alongside music, talks, films, workshops and more. [caption id="attachment_896332" align="alignnone" width="1920"] Sisters at Watarru by Noreen Dixon, Grounded.[/caption] 2023's focus: 'Listening with Heart'. That's what this year's light-heavy installations, which were announced late in 2022, are focusing on. Parrtjima's theme is inspired by the artwork surrounding the Statement from the Heart, with that piece depicting Uluru-Ku Tjukurrpa, the Uluru story of connection, as created by a group of artists from Multijulu as led by Maruku artist Rene Kulitja. So, Kulitja has worked with other of artists for Parrtjima to turn the Statement from the Heart artwork into a large-scale immersive light and sound installation. Accordingly, Parrtjima attendees are currently getting plunged in the world of the Aṉangu people of the Aṉangu Pitjantjatjara Yankunytjatjara (APY) Lands surrounding Uluru. This year's festival installations feature ancient songlines, plus Indigenous viewpoints on Country, as well as connecting to First Peoples' strong links with the land, water and sky. Two things that are also on the bill: two of the festival's regular annual attractions, aka a huge artwork that transforms a 2.5-kilometre stretch of the majestic ranges, showering it with light each night of the festival; and Grounded, the installation projected over the red dirt at tourism and conservation facility Alice Springs Desert Park. As for the music program, it is overflowing with First Nations talent, including Docker River Band, Eastern Reggae Band, Emily Wurramara, JK-47, KAIIT, Karnage and Paul Ah Chee. They're joined by Radical Son, Richard J Frankland, Discovering Leerpeen Mara, Rowdy Birds, The Andrew Gurruwiwi Band and The Merindas across the ten days — and with a range of dazzling backdrops. The talks lineup features actor Steven Oliver, marathon hero Charlie Maher, media identity Naomi Moran, scientist Corey Tutt, Olympian Nova Peris and more, such as musicians Richard Frankland, KAIIT and Paul Ah Chee — doing double duty on stage and having a chat. Movie-wise, attendees can look forward to Westwind: Djalu's Legacy, Looky Looky Here Comes Cooky, Araatika: Rise Up and The Australian Wars. And, the workshops schedule includes dance, art and pottery. Parrtjima – A Festival in Light runs until Sunday, April 16, 2023 around Alice Springs in the Northern Territory. For more information, visit the festival website. Images: Parrtjima – A Festival in Light. Feeling inspired to book a getaway? You can now book your next dream holiday through Concrete Playground Trips with deals on flights, stays and experiences at destinations all around the world.
If you could travel back in time via a Delorean, phone booth, hot tub or some other nifty gadget, what would you do? Making the world a better place, rewriting dark chapters in history and solving global problems are great responses, but they’re also the replies people think they should give. Be honest: if you thought no one was watching or judging you, what would you really do? Many films about temporal trickery actually answer this question accurately, understanding that we’re all just pursuing our own happiness. That excellent adventure Bill and Ted took was a by-product of trying not to fail their history class, after all. The slackers wanted to hang out, chase girls and dream of rock 'n' roll stardom — without worrying about Ted being sent to a military academy. Project Almanac might start with science wiz David (Jonny Weston) attempting to impress his way into a college scholarship, but that doesn’t last. After building a time machine from a blueprint found in his basement, David, his friends (Sam Lerner and Allen Evangelista) and younger sister (Virginia Gardner) chase fun, success, popularity, money, revenge and romance. Sure, David would like to reunite with his father, who passed away a decade ago and shares links to his new toy, but he’s more interested in ensuring his schoolyard crush, Jessie (Sofia Black-D'Elia), falls in love with him. So far, so standard, including the butterfly-effect-style realisation that actions in the past have consequences in the present, and that selfish deeds always have repercussions. Also standard is the approach chosen, and not just in affectionate name-checking of — and offering homages to — all the other time travel films you know and love. Sci-fi meets party movie wasn’t enough in the familiar stakes, so Project Almanac throws found footage into the mix as well. Think Chronicle crossed with Project X, without the surprise of the former and with the excess of the latter. It’s a gimmick plastered over a gimmick, seemingly justified because everyone everywhere apparently films everything these days — or so the movies tell us. For the first-time filmmaking team, it’s an excuse to cover up obvious plot points and generic teen tropes with a frenetic, frenzied style. Sometimes it works, the handheld, hurried camerawork matching the energy of the characters, copying their largely carefree point of view, showcasing the likeable cast and allowing the feature to rush through numerous fun situations such as winning the lottery and going to Lollapalooza. There’s a hollowness that lingers in the selfie-esque imagery, though, like putting on a fake smile and pretending that you’re enjoying yourself. Michael Bay’s name has featured heavily in Project Almanac’s marketing, not because of any giant, intergalactic, transforming robots or a semi-clad Megan Fox, but because of his involvement as a producer. Perhaps it is fitting that his brand of always shiny, sometimes entertaining emptiness is being used to draw people in. Like the believable motivations of the teens within the film in jumping into the past to seek pleasure and act in self-interest, that’s certainly honest.
When it comes to people born on significant holidays, I’m never too sure whether to be jealous or show sympathy towards them. You’re meant to be celebrating your birth, the birth of someone amazing, and not something like Christmas or New Years. Besides, if you’re born on Christmas then people think that’s an excellent excuse to buy you one ‘combined’ present instead of two (cheapskates). I hate those people (on a related note: I am still a child). I guess Eleanor Logan doesn’t share the same sentiments about holiday-cum-birthdays that I do – born on December 31, she’s the Happiest of New Years, adopting the holiday as her stage name. Born in Australia but based in Brooklyn, Logan’s back in the motherland for the summer and is playing a show at X & Y to celebrate. Happy New Year’s supported by only the most babing of babe four-piece outfits, Go Violets. According to their bio they’re “all summer pop, slipped beats, bad guitar jacks and legs”. Saturday needs to get here faster.
A moment on your lips, a lifetime on your Instagram: that's the future we foresee when Japanese soufflé pancake pop-up Kumokumo arrives in Brisbane. After already treating Perth to its wares, the dessert joint is heading to the Sunshine State to serve up super-fluffy, ridiculously photogenic stacks for ten delicious weeks this summer at South Bank. Those thick, velvety pancakes that instantly make your stomach rumble whenever you see a photo of them (like while reading this article)? That's what's on Kumokumo's menu. It'll be slinging its various varieties from Wednesday, November 23, 2022–Sunday, January 29, 2023 on Grey Street, operating from Wednesday–Sunday weekly. While the pancakes look decadent — flavours like black sugar boba, creme brûlée, biscoffee (yes, Biscoff and coffee cream), matcha cream, tiramisu, and whipped butter with Jarrah honey also help — the pop-up keeps its recipe simple. In the pancakes themselves, you'll find eggs, flour, sugar and milk. Those various ingredients are beaten, piped, grilled and flipped, of course, including with a bit of water in the pan to keep in the moisture — and that all-important fluffiness. Kumokumo sources local ingredients at each of its stops, and has its cooking method down to a precise formula — to perfect the best pancake each time. And as for toppings, it varies per flavour. The black sugar boba version is self-explanatory, for instance, while the creme brûlée comes with custard and berry compote, the biscoffee also includes whipped mascarpone, and the matcha is paired with red bean paste. The pop-up's Brisbane setup will be a walk-in-only affair, and it'll do takeaways — but Kumokumo recommends eating its pancakes within 15 minutes. Find Kumokumo at 182 Grey Street, South Bank from Wednesday, November 23, 2022–Sunday, January 29, 2023 — open 4.30–9.30pm Wednesday–Thursday, 12–10pm Friday, and 10am–10pm Saturday–Sunday.
Once, not that long ago, Brisbanites still had to drive to either Noosa or Surfers Paradise for their Betty's Burgers fix. Thankfully, that hasn't been the case for a couple of years now. Indeed, Betty's keeps opening new stores, with its latest now trading in West End's West Village — and it's throwing a three-day village party to celebrate. This shindig has a few different components, but they all revolve around the same thing: heading to the new site for a burger. Between Friday, July 9–Sunday, July 11, you'll be able to nab two-for-one burg specials, in fact, as long as you're hankering for one of Betty's deluxe, classic vegan or crispy chicken supreme burgers. Also on offer: $5 beers, including Betty's new Village Beer brewed by Pirate Life. Buy the latter, and you'll get a free stubby cooler, too. And, speaking of not spending a cent, there'll be free ice creams in cups and cones as well. Yes, that means you can get a cheap burg, cheap booze and a free dessert.
Cross your fingers, dog lovers — here's hoping that your four-legged friend feels like heading to a brewery. From 1pm on Saturday, September 1, Ballistic Beer Co. will be turning its Salisbury space into a pupper wonderland, all while people knock back a pint or several. On the Dogs Go Ballistic agenda: craft brews (obviously), dog-centric market stalls, canine activities, an obligatory dog show, a raffle that supports a dog rescue organisation, and live music. We can't promise that the latter will feature pooch-related tunes, but perhaps both you and Fido will be wondering who let the dogs out, asking if the dog days are over and crying all the time like a hound dog. Because taking your barking bestie to a brewery is both thirsty and hungry work, five food trucks will also be on the premises, serving waffles, Thai and other yet-to-be-revealed dishes to go with Ballistic's own brews. Entry is free, and all woofers great and small are welcome at the picnic-style event — although these very good doggos must stay on their leashes.
After a year's delay due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the Olympics are almost upon us. The 2020 games will be a little different to usual, though. Firstly, it's obviously now 2021, with the postponed games being held in Tokyo from Friday, July 23–Sunday, August 8. Also, there won't be any spectators due to the pandemic — with neither overseas travellers nor local residents permitted to attend. That's all well and good and interesting; however, we've found a much cuter display of sportsmanship that's also popping up this July. On Thursday, July 22, viewers can watch four adorable guide-dogs-to-be participating in their very own paw-lympics. Yep, that's a thing and we're definitely here for it. For the second year in a row, the folks at Seeing Eye Dogs have teamed up The Petbarn Foundation to host the Puppy Games — and it'll be streaming on a device near you, too. The event will see young trainee guide dogs Chessy, Frieda, Isobel and Ivory tackle a series of skill-testing challenges, with their every move captured on camera. Watch the pups hurtle through a time trial, take on a 'puppy patience' food bowl challenge and battle it out for glory in the 'dogstacle distraction course'. The games will stream at 1pm on Thursday via the event's website — and, whether you're in lockdown in Sydney, Victoria or South Australia, or you're located elsewhere in Australia, it sounds like perfect lunchtime viewing. The project aims to support fundraising efforts for the annual Seeing Eye Dogs Appeal, of course, but also promises a much-needed boost of dopamine and general happy feels all round. Viewers can donate to the cause by hitting the link on the event's website. This year, the appeal is shooting for a goal of $750,000 to help cover the costs of breeding, training and caring for at least 15 Seeing Eye Dogs. Can't make Thursday's viewing? Fear not, the full event will be up on YouTube to rewatch any time you need a mood boost. The Puppy Games will stream via the event's website from 1pm on Thursday, July 22.
A couple of hours south of Cairns is where you'll find the spectacular sights of Tully Gorge National Park. The Tully River churns its way down the mountain creating rapids and world-class white water rafting throughout this stunning gorge. But it's not all rough and tumble in at every turn along this river. You have two options to find Ponytail Falls — by car or by raft with Raging Thunder Adventures. For drivers, follow signs to Cardstone Weir until you spot the number 11 painted on the road. Then, take a short stroll through the rainforest to uncover the hair-like spout that spills into pale blue water below. Or, if you want to see the falls from a raft, sign up to a white water rafting adventure and a guide will take you there via wet and wild rapids.
When Italian Street Kitchen first made the move to Queensland, it did so two years after making its base in Sydney, where it started serving up Roman-inspired dishes in Neutral Bay back in 2015. In the chain's home state, it has now expanded, adding new venues in Baulkham Hills and Ryde — and it's about to beef up its Brisbane presence as well. Come September, Italian Street Kitchen will set up shop in West End's West Village, with the new store joining its existing venue in Newstead. Accordingly, Brisbanites will have two places to pick up the brand's twist on traditional Roman street food, which naturally includes plenty of pizza and pasta — such as the funghi pizza with fior di latte cheese, gorgonzola, two types of mushrooms, gremolata and extra virgin olive oil; and the traditional Sardinian-style gnocchetti Sardi salsiccia, which comes with pork and fennel sausage, as well as tomato, chilli, white wine, garlic and parmigiano-reggiano cheese. Also on the menu: an antipasto selection, mains such as porchetta and bistecca, and tiramisu and gelato sandwiches for dessert. Italian Street Kitchen does a $19 weekday lunch special, too, so you can tuck into pizza, pasta or salad, plus a drink, for less than a lobster. Patrons will also be able to enjoy the chain's cocktail range, which spans five different kinds of spritzes, as well as classics like negronis, bellinis and americanos — and drinks with names like Nonna's Cheeky Marg (as made with tequila, agave, passionfruit and coconut cream). And, there's three non-boozy cocktails on the menu. The aim: to serve up dishes and drinks that a nonna might've made at home, but given an update worthy of Rome's streets. When it starts welcoming in patrons, Italian Street Kitchen's new venue will slide into West Village's growing food precinct, which has also seen Harris Farm Markets and Beirut Bazaar open already in 2021. Italian Street Kitchen will set up shop at West Village, West End from sometime in September — we'll update you with an exact opening date when it is announced. Top image: Dom Cherry.
Once upon a time someone served high-quality food at a drinking establishment and the gastropub was born. Lucky for us Brisbanites, Hop & Pickle has embraced the growing trend, opening their kitchen and tapping the keg on Little Stanley Street. A stone's throw away from the South Bank parklands, Hop & Pickle is a prime location to spend an easy, breezy evening, revelling in Brisbane’s beauty. Wrap-around benches allow customers to sit side by side and enjoy the views across the breezeway and over the parklands, while tables fill the interior to accommodate larger groups. Great food, great drinks and great service is what Hop & Pickle strives to deliver. Although they are still finding their footing on the South Bank dining and drinking scene, Hop & Pickle don’t miss the mark by far. A solid menu sees mainstay bar food served daily, revolving mains during the week, pub classics pumped out on Saturdays, and a Sunday roast to round out the weekend. Generous portions make the bar menu perfect for sharing without the fear of having to fight for the last crumb. Crunchy on the outside and soft on the inside, the ham hock croquettes served with a wholegrain aioli ($10) might just be the best we’ve eaten outside of Europe. With five of these deep-fried hot morsels — on a plate — good luck stopping at one. We're going to go out on a limb and say they are the best croquettes we've dined on in the River City — no easy feat given the tapas trend around town. Hailing from the opposite side of culinary world, the Asian glazed pork belly ($12) also puts up a mean fight. The plate is piled high with sweet but salty, crispy but tender glazed pieces of pig. And we mean piled. The cucumber relish offers a refreshing relief from the rich, porky goodness. Deep fried spicy pickles and chargrilled corn with spiced butter ($8 each) are just a few more of the internationally inspired delights that grace the bar menu. Each weeknight sees new mains and a dessert chalked up on the specials board. We spied the lamb pot pie and knew there was no turning back. The pastry was the flaky and the meat was tender, but it lacked the wow factor we were hoping for. Stil, anyone who attempts a new menu five nights a week deserves a high five for trying.
Just like fashion collections, gallery exhibitions are all about seasons — and summer at the National Gallery of Victoria is set to be a stunner. To cap off 2022, the Melbourne cultural institution will fill its walls and halls with an Australian-first showcase dedicated to designer Alexander McQueen. Boundaries will be pushed, as they always have been in the late, great fashion icon's sartorial work. Alexander McQueen: Mind, Mythos, Muse will take over the NGV International between Sunday, December 11, 2022—Sunday, April 16, 2023 — heading straight to Australia after displaying at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA), where it's running now. LACMA organised the exhibition, drawing upon 60 garments and accessories from its own holdings, and contacted NGV about both contributing and running its own season. That's where 50 designs by McQueen from the NGV Collection come in, plus other artworks from each institution. The aim: going deep and broad, rather than stepping through McQueen's career and life in a birth-to-death fashion. Indeed, it's a showcase that the team at the NGV has been hoping to put together since the designer first made a splash in the early 90s. [caption id="attachment_854685" align="alignnone" width="1920"] Installation photograph. Lee Alexander McQueen: Mind, Mythos, Muse. Los Angeles County Museum of Art, April 24–October 9, 2022. Photo © Museum[/caption] "In a bigger picture way, we started thinking about Alexander McQueen when we first acquired his work. So, the first examples we acquired came directly from the designer's studio back in 1996 — so over 25 years ago," explains Katie Somerville, the NGV's Senior Curator of Fashion and Textiles. "In a sense, the desire to represent his work and the recognition that he was someone really significant started back then." Celebrating McQueen's artistry and impact isn't just about placing an impressive array of his pieces on display, though. At Alexander McQueen: Mind, Mythos, Muse, understanding its namesake involves understanding what inspired him. "This exhibition is not a retrospective, in that it's not a go-to-whoa examination of him from a more biographical point of view," advises Somerville. "It really does do a wonderful job of exploring him as a creative soul. So, looking at not only his capacity technically — and of course he was astonishingly accomplished in tailoring, cut, dressmaking; his foundation was learning on the job, on Savile Row, in theatre costuming companies in his late teens, and he's known for that incredible craftsmanship and technique, and being very hands-on in his designs. But the overarching premise of the exhibition is really about trying to get an appreciation for all the different sources of inspiration that came to inspire Alexander McQueen." [caption id="attachment_854686" align="alignnone" width="1920"] Alexander McQueen backstage at Pantheon as Lecum collection, autumn–winter 2004–05 show. Courtesy the photographer. Photo © Robert Fairer.[/caption] That spans "a myriad of sources throughout art history, ancient history, popular culture, music and cinema across the board," says Somerville, with the NGV's showcase reflecting upon the whole picture. "By using works from our art collection, and the collection at LACMA, we're able to effectively bring together and illustrate some of the sources of his inspiration, so that you can see these incredible works alongside some of the works and artists and references that would've inspired Alexander McQueen. It's a very deep look at his working methodology, but also at his legacy, and why he was so profoundly successful at shifting the nature of how we understand fashion in this contemporary era." Thanks to the NGV's pieces, Alexander McQueen: Mind, Mythos, Muse includes McQueen-designed items dating back to 1994, and features 25 different seasonal collections — with 20 seasons covered from its own holdings alone. That includes examples from the autumn-winter 1995–1996 Highland Rape collection, the autumn-winter 2006–2007 The Widows of Culloden range, and spring-summer 2010's Plato's Atlantis, McQueen's final complete collection before his death in February 2010. While charting McQueen's story in a linear fashion isn't on the cards, the exhibition will dive into his oeuvre via various sections. So, with Mythos, three collections inspired by mythological and religious belief systems will sit together. Then, in Fashioned Narratives, four collections that showcase his knack for world-building will be in the spotlight. Next comes Evolution and Existence, which hones in on his interest in life cycles and the human condition — and Technique and Innovation, which is rather self-explanatory. Finally, Dangerous Bodies will highlight early collections with a focus on eroticism and empowerment. [caption id="attachment_854687" align="alignnone" width="1920"] Alexander McQueen. Look 38, Look 40, Look 41, The Widows of Culloden collection, autumn–winter 2006–07. Courtesy the photographer. Photo © Robert Fairer. © Alexander McQueen. Models: Natasha Poly, Querelle Jansen, Tanya Dziahileva.[/caption] Another must-see part of all of the above: behind-the-scenes snaps by photographer Robert Fairer, taking audiences backstage at McQueen's shows — because his parades were an event and an art. If it sounds huge, that's because it is. The NGV is no stranger to big summer fashion exhibitions, with Alexander McQueen: Mind, Mythos, Muse following its massive celebration of Coco Chanel's work from December 2021–April 2022. Sitting in between the two couture-focused spreads: The Picasso Century, which'll see the NGV International hone in on Picasso — and his pals — across its winter season. Alexander McQueen: Mind, Mythos, Muse runs from Sunday, December 11, 2022—Sunday, April 16, 2023 at the NGV International, 180 St Kilda Road, Melbourne. For more information, or to buy tickets, head to the gallery's website. Top images: Alexander McQueen. Look 38, Look 40, Look 41, The Widows of Culloden collection, autumn–winter 2006–07. Courtesy the photographer. Photo © Robert Fairer. © Alexander McQueen. Models: Natasha Poly, Querelle Jansen, Tanya Dziahileva. Installation photograph. Lee Alexander McQueen: Mind, Mythos, Muse. Los Angeles County Museum of Art, April 24–October 9, 2022. Photo © Museum.
There seems little that could be utopian about an alien invasion film where people are picked off by hulking, spider-limbed, lightning-fast, armour-clad creatures who punish every sound with almost-instant death, but prequel A Quiet Place: Day One makes the opening status quo of horror franchise-starter A Quiet Place look positively idyllic. If you're forced to try to survive an extra-terrestrial attack, where better to be than at your well-appointed farmland home with your family, as the John Krasinski (IF)-helmed and -starring 2018 feature depicted? Most folks, including the third movie in the saga's protagonist Samira (Lupita Nyong'o, Black Panther: Wakanda Forever), a terminal cancer patient with just a service cat called Frodo left as kin, can only dream of being that lucky — not that there's much time for fantasising about a better way to be conquered by otherworldly monsters when what looks like meteors start crashing down to earth. Samira is in hospice care as the A Quiet Place big-screen series, which also spans 2021 release A Quiet Place Part II, steps back to the moment that its apocalyptic scenario begins in New York. She hugs her black-and-white feline companion like letting go would untether her from life even before existence as the planet knows it changes forever — when she's sharing surly poems among other patients, being convinced to attend a group excursion to see a marionette show and, when the promise of pizza on the way home is nixed, telling kindly nurse Reuben (Alex Wolff, Oppenheimer) that he's not actually her friend. A Quiet Place: Day One explores the ground-zero experience for someone who feels so alone in this world and connected only to her devoted pet, and also answers a question: how do those on more than two feet react when the worst that humans can imagine occurs? It might've appeared a significant change of pace when Pig filmmaker Michael Sarnoski was announced as A Quiet Place: Day One's writer and director, a role he took on after The Bikeriders' Jeff Nichols — who, with Take Shelter, Mud and Midnight Special on his resume, had played with visions of the end of the world, science fiction and adventurous quests before — dropped out. But swap in Nyong'o for Nicolas Cage, a cat for a porcine pal and aliens for a kidnapping, and Sarnoski has moulded the terrain of his second feature to pair perfectly with his first. Wolff further links the helmer's two movies together; however, they'd prove a set without him. When the only other critter that defines your days and spends its own by your side is in peril — your one constant in a life already under the shadow of loss, too — the fierceness with which you'd react is the same whether vengeance or safety is your ultimate aim. Samira has another mission: securing that yearned-for slice in Harlem, which she's willing to navigate the chaotic streets with the utmost of hush to endeavour to taste. Sarnoski again deeply understands what our bonds with animals, places and things can say about us; why we cling to and fight for them unflinchingly and against the odds; and how devastating it can be when what little that a person has left is under threat. Accordingly, committing to hunt down a favourite piece of pizza while bedlam breaks out isn't just about enjoying an Italian meal. As with Pig, casting enormously aids the process of taking viewers on this emotional and psychological journey. Cage gave one of his finest performances in a career filled with versatile wonders as a truffle-foraging ex-Portland chef whose tentative sense of stability and self were shattered sans swine, and fellow Oscar-winner Nyong'o, ten years on from clutching Hollywood's most-coveted trophy for 12 Years a Slave, is equally as gripping. Sarnoski's current star is no stranger to horror, or to being excellent in it. See: Nyong'o's unforgettable effort in 2019, just past the midway point between 12 Years a Slave and A Quiet Place: Day One, in Jordan Peele's haunting and razor-sharp Us. Conveying the piercingly melancholy feeling of fighting what's long been a fraught fray for yourself, but holding up the battle for what you hold dearest, isn't an easy feat in her latest role — and nor is doing so when terror on multiple levels never subsides. It's also the heart and soul of the movie, which continues the franchise trademark of valuing characters over bumps and jumps, even as it still delivers the latter. Nyong'o wears Samira's determination despite several hazards to her mortality as assuredly as the fentanyl patches that get her character through the day, and the red beanie and yellow cardigan that are Samira's uniform. Knocked out amid the Big Apple erupting in mayhem, noise and white dust — any racket, of course, being the most-fatal thing for everyone desperate to avoid extinction — A Quiet Place: Day One's lead figure first wakes up in the puppet theatre, and she isn't solo. All things A Quiet Place have established in prior flicks how fleeting and fragile any calm and refuge can be, even in the best-case setup of the OG movie's Abbott clan, so it's no surprise when tragedy keeps thundering in. Via Djimon Hounsou's (Rebel Moon) Henri, though, the film gets a direct tie to A Quiet Place Part II and hope that some kind of future beckons. Courtesy of Joseph Quinn's (Stranger Things) English law student Eric, who also gives the picture another opportunity to demonstrate the comforting power of befriending a mouser, Samira's ordeal receives a new chance at human connection. And with its scene-stealing kitty, who is played by 100-percent real the real thing and is wonderful, cinema gains a complement to Alien's Jonsey. Collaborating again with cinematographer Pat Scola (We Grown Now) after Pig, Sarnoski has switched areas of America, yet there's no less of a lived-in texture to A Quiet Place: Day One's look and feel. That's another not-at-all-small achievement in a successful sci-fi/horror saga — one that has briefly jumped back to attack day in the past, in fact — that's set in a city that virtually everyone around the has globe has walked through via the silver screen almost as much as their own locations IRL. Meaningful wins when far less could've resulted sums up the film again and again, from a story co-conjured with Krasinski that does far more than merely extend a hit realm to the exactingly executed creature-feature sequences and the meticulous sound design that a tale predicated upon silence demands. Movies about attempting to endure can also be movies about finding your own idea of utopia in the absolute direst of circumstances, no matter how short-lived, and this one hears the call loudly.
Australia is getting accustomed to life without single-use plastic bags, but Europe is going one step further, with the European Union today voting to ban ten single-use plastic items by 2021. The European Parliament first drew up the plan in May last year, which is designed to specifically combat the growing amount of plastic that's clogging up the world's oceans. The ban will target ten items that are most frequently found on beaches, including plastic cutlery, plates, cups, stirrers and straws, as well as cotton buds and balloon sticks. This comes after researchers predicted that plastic will outweigh fish in our oceans by 2050. By 2029, all EU members will also be required to collect 90 percent of single-use plastic beverage bottles for recycling, while awareness campaigns will ramp up for the reduced consumption of other single-use products and countries will need to fund the public clean-up of litter — such as tobacco filters and fishing great — from beaches and oceans. A year later, in 2030, the EU is aiming to make all of its plastic packaging reusable or recyclable. You can dive into the nitty gritty of its plan here (if you please). The European Parliament passed the ban on Wednesday, March 27, and member states will have two years years to implement the legislation into their own national law. It is the latest recognition that the war on waste is one that needs serious attention. The British parliament announced plans to go plastic-free early last year, France will ban plastic plates, cups and cutlery from 2020, while Hobart will become the first Australian city to ban single-use plastics. And that's on top of the flurry of supermarkets, big name brands, well-known food chains and furniture behemoths making their own commitments to reduce, recycle or eradicate single-use plastics from their operations. The European Union's single-use plastic ban will be introduced by 2021.
In its entire concept, Sydney Opera House's All About Women has always pushed girls, ladies and women to the front. So, when the venue announced that the next version of its key feminist festival would feature riot grrrl pioneers Bikini Kill, it couldn't have been a more perfect way to start its lineup. That in-conversation event is just the beginning of the event's 2023 program, however, with the just-announced complete bill also going big on high-profile guests — such as child actor-turned-I'm Glad My Mom Died author Jennette McCurdy and human rights barrister Jennifer Robinson. Former iCarly star McCurdy will chat through her experiences, including growing up in the spotlight, finding her independence and the events that led to her New York Times best-selling memoir, in an Australian-exclusive conversation. After successfully representing Amber Heard in Johnny Depp's UK libel case, Robinson will feature in a panel called 'The War on Women', about fighting for both rights and lives, alongside Egyptian American journalist Mona Eltahawy, Pakistani author and journalist Fatima Bhutto, and Mununjali Yugambeh and South Sea Islander Professor Chelsea Watego. [caption id="attachment_885156" align="alignnone" width="1920"] Jennifer Robinson by Kate Peters[/caption] Running from Saturday, March 11—Monday, March 13, All About Women's 2023 festival marks its 11th, and sees the event held across three days for the first time ever — growing again after it only just expanded to two days in 2022, in fact. And, in another significant change for this year, the event's lineup is guided by four festival co-curators. Doing the honours: author, podcast presenter and gender equality advocate Jamila Rizvi; Gamilaroi academic and Tell Me Again author Dr Amy Thunig; feminist social commentator, novelist and writer Jane Caro AM; and Sydney Opera House's Head of Talks and Ideas Chip Rolley. Their full program includes 25 events featuring 60-plus international and Australian artists, thinkers, and storytellers, starting with an evening of storytelling, poetry, dance and music for the fest's Opening Night Gala, hosted by Clare Bowditch and featuring actor Eryn Jean Norvill (The Picture of Dorian Gray), "mother of African contemporary dance" Germaine Acogny, Iranian Australian singer and instrumentalist Gelareh Pour, and Fatima Bhutto. And, it also spans Cult Classic author Sloane Crosley chatting about modern dating with journalist Maddison Connaughton — and a romance and reality TV-focused discussion between Bachelorette Brooke Blurton, Just The Gist podcaster Rosie Waterland, and Gamilaroi and Torres Strait Islander writer and actor Nakkiah Lui. [caption id="attachment_885157" align="alignnone" width="1920"] Brooke Blurton by Jarrad Seng[/caption] In a session about neurodivergence in women and gender-diverse people, 2021 Australian of the Year Grace Tame, Heartbreak High's Chloe Hayden, and research psychologist and activist Dr Jac den Houting will talk with Thunig — and a panel examining trying to achieve justice in sexual abuse claims, and the trauma the process can bring, will feature sexual assault law reform advocate Saxon Mullins, criminal lawyer Katrina Marson, Yorta Yorta woman and survivor advocate Amanda Morgan, and lawyer and author Bri Lee. Or, attendees can look forward to Middle Eastern and Islamic Studies scholar Kylie Moore-Gilbert hosting a session on the women-led revolution in Iran, as joined by Pour, scholar and poet Dr Saba Vasefi, and author and journalist Shokoofeh Azar; plus a panel about the body positivity movement's struggles to be genuinely inclusive, featuring Wadjanbarra Yidinji, Jirrbal and African-American former model Sasha Kutabah Sarago, body love activist and podcaster April Hélène-Horton aka The Bodzilla, fashion editor and queer rights activist Deni Todorovič, disability rights campaigner Elly Desmarchelier, and comedian and broadcaster Tanya Hennessy. [caption id="attachment_844646" align="alignnone" width="1920"] Jacquie Manning[/caption] The list goes on, covering Clementine Ford exploring the history of demonising single women, a session on women's activism through a First Nations lens, diving into starting a family in a modern world, unpacking gendered emotions, and turning Eltahawy's FEMINIST GIANT newsletter into a panel. The Girlboss movement, making tough decisions, the shame often imposed on women and girls, leading movements, a Bikini Kill gig: they all get their time in focus, too. Just like in 2022, the festival will host its sessions in-person for Sydneysiders, and will also live-stream to viewers both around Australia and worldwide — which is ace news if you live outside of the Harbour City. [caption id="attachment_874299" align="alignnone" width="1920"] Debi Del Grande[/caption] All About Women 2023 will take place from Saturday, March 11—Monday, March 13 at the Sydney Opera House, with tickets on sale from 12pm AEDT on Thursday, January 19. Head to the festival's website for further details. Top image: Jennette McCurdy by Brian Kimskey.
The year 2000 seems appropriate for the release of an iconic Australian record: it was the year Daniel Johns promised he'd make it up to us; we'd recently learned Madison Avenue was not our baby; and we'd narrowly avoided death by computers crashing. It was time to celebrate a new millennium. Having sold more than a million copies, Since I Left You had fans pleading for a follow-up album from day one. But 14 years later, The Avalanches are still yet to deliver. Though a second album is expected at any moment, Vivid Sydney is keeping us satisfied in the meantime. Fronted by South Africa-born, Sydney-raised eclectic electronic whiz kid Jonti along with alt-pop local favourite Rainbow Chan and management buds Astral People, Vivid LIVE's celebration of The Avalanches will see as many as 17 performers reinterpret and rearrange some of the 3,500 samples included in Since I Left You. Between rehearsals and resting his voice, Jonti took time to chat with us about Saturday's Opera House performance, his love for The Avalanches and what to expect from the future. ON VIVID LIVE Originally produced for OutsideIn Festival last year, the Since I Left You tribute set was created to "show our own profuse love for The Avalanches," according to Jonti (who'll no doubt be blissing out himself throughout the show). If you've been a little baffled by what to expect from the Saturday May 24 performance, Jonti makes it plain. "It's a recreation of the album. We're basically just trying to bring it to life, cover every sound and play it in the same order as when you listen to the album, but back-the-front," he says. Of the whopping 18 songs making up Since I Left You — and the 3,500 samples included in it — 'Electricity' is Jonti's favourite of their reinterpretations (although it wasn't an easy task to pick just one). "I just think it ends with a lot of soul and the strings sound really beautiful. It just kind of explodes and everyone's really on their A game and it's all kind of 'game over' sounding. I've really liked the way we've been doing that one." https://youtube.com/watch?v=VfAuFAgHpzc ON HIS LOVE FOR THE AVALANCHES To have a bunch of young, celebrated musos recreating their album at the Opera House 14 years after its release must feel pretty damn great for The Avalanches. But of course, it's equally satisfying for Jonti, who's adored the Melbourne band since their first release. "There's copious amounts of love in their album and I feel that's what makes it kind of transcend over the years. "When I moved to Australia from South Africa, I wasn't really sure of my identity. I had to find myself and I think the album helped me with that; it helped me choose a path. And even last year, I was very stuck and went through a breakup, then we did the Since I Left You [OutsideIn] show and it just resparked a love of music. It's the album that keeps giving," Jonti laughs. The Avalanches have kept us on their toes with rumours of a second album since Since I Left You's release. But it finally seems likely that we'll hear more from the Melbourne legends any day soon, with Jonti recently collaborating on the forthcoming anticipated (and rather mysterious) release. Despite his undying love for their first album, it seems even Jonti thinks a second could be better. "I think it's possible. When I got back from the studio I was kind of blushing like a school girl. It definitely has the same power." But rethinking his answer, Jonti reckons it might not be his favourite. "Only because I'm on their album. I don't think I could say that's my favourite album and be on it," he laughs. "That would sound weird." https://youtube.com/watch?v=_MJNjRAkRfE PREDICTING THE FUTURE Orchestrating a 17-person show at the Opera House has become Jonti's pet project for the past year. But requiring a huge amount of effort, stress and thought, it'll all be over after Saturday night. "There'll definitely be withdrawals. We were talking about it this morning, like, 'what are we going to do?' But we have ideas. And you just don't know what's around the corner so we'll probably just keep the gang together one way or another. "We definitely want to do a show in Melbourne, because that's where they're [The Avalanches] from. But it all depends on whatever we can make feasible. It's just hard enough getting us all in the one room to rehearse!" But between rehearsals, Jonti's also been recording a solo album that's probably "40 per cent" completed. "We'll see where that leads to." Jonti will perform as part of Vivid LIVE in Since I Left You - A Celebration of The Avalanches on Saturday 24 May. More details over here.
The first half of Baz Luhrmann's The Great Gatsby is every bit its director, and is to be endured rather than enjoyed. Set during America's economic boom of the 1920s, the action is cartoonish, the dialogue is almost devoid of nuance and the lavish parties appear dull despite all the sparkles in the world — a regrettable triumph of impeccable style over substance. Apologists may argue this merely reflects Gatsby's time and theme: a shallow, superficial facade to reflect its characters and their unapologetic opulance, but that is too convenient. Simple regard to Luhrmann's history reminds us that exaggerated spectacle is every bit his custom, not a carefully chosen device, and his fondness for juxtaposing period drama with modern music (the soundtrack was produced by Jay-Z) proves more distracting than entertaining. Matters improve immeasurably, however, in the second half when Luhrmann begins to explore his favourite theme of forbidden love twixt star-crossed lovers. Moulin Rouge, Strictly Ballroom and Romeo & Juliet all hit their highest notes when the pagentry gave way to the intimate, and Gatsby is no exception. The stolen moments between its protagonist Jay (Leonardo DiCaprio) and Daisy (Carey Mulligan) are appropriately tender but ominous, presided over with a mix of fascination and regret by the film's narrator Nick Carraway (Tobey Maguire). To borrow from Fitzgerald, these few quiet moments are — compared to the 'rotten crowd' of the first hour — worth more than the lot of them put together. From a performance standpoint, the women definitely come out on top. Mulligan is utterly charming as Daisy, consistently allowing her character's fragility to worm its way to the surface before masking it with a disarming smile, and Isla Fisher is unrecognisable as the mistress of Daisy's husband Tom (played by Joel Edgerton in yet another impressive turn). Most captivating of all, however, is the statuesque Elizabeth Debicki, who commands the eye in every frame of film she occupies. In terms of the men, Maguire's doe-eyed exuberance is endearing enough, though at times it strays almost to the point of clowning, and Jason Clarke provides a nice cameo as Fisher's dim-witted husband. In the role of Gatsby, DiCaprio looks every bit the man whose smile "was one of those rare [ones] with a quality of eternal reassurance in it, that you come across four or five times in life", yet his performance feels largely wooden and unnatural. It's as if the words and accent are not his own, particularly in the first half where they seem so apart from his body as to invoke uncomfortable memories of Tom Hardy's Bane. Ultimately, it's far from the disaster indicated by some of its early reviews, particularly those that labelled it a 'two-hour music video', and there's no denying Luhrmann has a flair for engaging the senses with his extraordinary vision. That said, The Great Gatsby largely departs from the memory almost as quickly as it arrives, an impermanent and largely uncritical adaptation of F. Scott Fitzgerald's beloved take on the infirmity of the American Dream. https://youtube.com/watch?v=ozkOhXmijtk
Are you ready to get out and about and make the most of everything summer has to offer? Us, too. For some, that may mean reading by the pool and for others, it's going on week-long hikes in the wilderness. Whatever your cup of tea (or cocktail), there's plenty to do this steamy season. Naturally, when you're enjoying the season with outdoor activities and spontaneous adventures, it's good to have a top-notch drink in hand. So, we've teamed up with Whitley Neill Gin to bring you seven Aussie summer scenarios with the perfect drink to match. CAMPING TRIP Hit the highway with the windows down as you head off for a weekend camping adventure to one of Australia's many diverse and beautiful nature spots. Come summertime, there are plenty of beaches, headlands, national parks and spots in the wilderness that are calling your name. But before you jump in the car, whip up a batch of Fizzy Berry Lemonade, made with Whitley Neill Raspberry Gin and lemonade (plus a few other cheeky ingredients) to enjoy when you arrive. It's a no-fuss cocktail that's sweet, refreshing and perfect for sipping while soaking in the sun around a campsite. BEACH CRICKET Is it really summer in Australia without a hit of beach cricket? Head down to your local salty spot with the bat and ball in tow. Pairing perfectly with this game is the Royalty Gin Spritz, which you'll only need four ingredients to stir up: Whitley Neill Rhubarb & Ginger Gin, soda water, lime wheels and sprigs of mint. It's a faultless, sessionable drink that's simple, sweet and a little bit spicy. You may even try to get bowled out just so you can have a drinks break. BACKYARD BARBECUE Fire up the grill, marinate the chicken (or tofu) and get the corn prepped and ready because barbecue season is back. This year, turn it up a notch and impress your friends by pairing the feast with a Queen's High Tea. Instead of getting yet another slab, this number will bring elegant vibes. As it's made in a jug, it's perfect for sharing. It's packed with fruitiness — fresh apple, rhubarb and sprigs of mint — and has notes of peppery and sweet gingery spice thanks to Whitley Neill Rhubarb and Ginger Gin. Plus, it's topped up with prosecco and we've never known a bubbly drink that hasn't been a hit around the barbecue. [caption id="attachment_796998" align="alignnone" width="1920"] Angelo Pantazis; Unsplash[/caption] BOAT PARTY Did someone say boat party? Slap on the sunscreen, fish out your best swimsuit from the back of the wardrobe and get out on the water to enjoy the breezy air with a drink in hand. To help you refresh from the inside out is the Spring Break Gin Spritz. It's just the drink to be sipping in the sun with mates after a swim. It's light and boasts fun notes of orange, rosemary and lime that complement the Whitley Neill London Dry Gin. It's incredibly simple to make, so the real challenge with this one will be sipping it slowly. CHASING WATERFALLS Despite what TLC says, chasing waterfalls can be a great summer pastime. There's nothing like getting out of the city for a weekend to escape the hustle and bustle for an adventure in nature. There are plenty of waterfalls, both to look at and to swim under, all around Australia. Once you've found the spot, and maybe taken a dip, enjoy a Raspberry Rose Gin Spritz. There's just one thing to say: it's refreshing AF. Made with Whitley Neill Raspberry Gin, the sweet, summery cocktail is topped with raspberry and rose soda, strawberries and basil. COASTAL SWIMS Bring some romance to a summer outing by heading to the seaside for a coastal swim, then sipping a Honeymoon in Sicily. Grab a SO or mate and take to the salty water for a refreshing dip before enjoying this Aperol spritz cocktail. The drink will do the heavy lifting by transporting you to Mediterranean sweet orange orchards with the inclusion of Whitley Neill Blood Orange Gin. Plus, the grapefruit and basil will make you feel like you're on the Italian coast. DAY HIKE A day hike always goes down well in summer. No matter where you are in Australia, there are plenty of places to get out in the wilderness, clear your head, reconnect with nature and get the blood flowing with a long explorative walk. Then, after you've enjoyed the great outdoors and earned some rest, kick back with a glass of Aperitivo Sunsets. This afternoon cocktail is the refreshing hit you'll be after. It's a fruity combination, made with dry gin, orange, grapefruit and cranberry juice and slices of fruit and mint, that tastes and looks like a sunset itself. For more information on Whitley Neill's innovative gin range, head to the website.
Something delightful has been happening in cinemas in some parts of the country. After numerous periods spent empty during the pandemic, with projectors silent, theatres bare and the smell of popcorn fading, picture palaces in many Australian regions are back in business — including both big chains and smaller independent sites in Sydney, Melbourne and Brisbane. During COVID-19 lockdowns, no one was short on things to watch, of course. In fact, you probably feel like you've streamed every movie ever made, including new releases, Studio Ghibli's animated fare and Nicolas Cage-starring flicks. But, even if you've spent all your time of late glued to your small screen, we're betting you just can't wait to sit in a darkened room and soak up the splendour of the bigger version. Thankfully, plenty of new films are hitting cinemas so that you can do just that — and we've rounded up, watched and reviewed everything on offer this week. THE INNOCENTS Thanks to his Oscar-nominated work co-penning The Worst Person in the World's screenplay, Eskil Vogt has already helped give the world one devastatingly accurate slice-of-life portrait in the past year. That applauded film is so insightful and relatable about being in your twenties, and also about weathering quarter-life malaise, uncertainty and crisis, that it feels inescapably lifted from reality — and it's sublime. The Innocents, the Norwegian filmmaker's latest movie, couldn't be more different in tone and narrative; however, it too bears the fingerprints of achingly perceptive and deep-seated truth. Perhaps that should be mindprints, though. Making his second feature as a director after 2014's exceptional Blind, Vogt hones in on childhood, and on the way that kids behave with each other when adults are absent or oblivious — and on tykes and preteens who can wreak havoc solely using their mental faculties. Another riff on Firestarter, this thankfully isn't. The Innocents hasn't simply jumped on the Stranger Things bandwagon, either. Thanks to the latter, on-screen tales about young 'uns battling with the supernatural are one of Hollywood's current favourite trends — see also: the awful Ghostbusters: Afterlife — but all that this Nordic horror movie's group of kids are tussling with is themselves. Their fight starts when nine-year-old Ida (debutant Rakel Lenora Fløttum) and her 11-year-old sister Anna (fellow first-timer Alva Brynsmo Ramstad), who is on the autism spectrum, move to an apartment block in Romsås, Oslo with their mother (Blind's Ellen Dorrit Petersen) and father (Morten Svartveit, Ninjababy). It's summer, the days are long, and the two girls are largely left to their own devices outside in the complex's communal spaces. That's where Ida befriends Aisha (Mina Yasmin Bremseth Asheim) and Ben (Sam Ashraf), albeit not together, and starts to learn about their abilities. One of The Innocents' most astonishing scenes — in a film with many — springs from Ida discovering what the sullen, bullied Ben can do solely with his brain. Indeed, one of Vogt's masterstrokes is focusing on how she reacts to the boy's telekinesis, as demonstrated by flinging around a bottle cap. Ida is almost preternaturally excited, and she's lured in by the thrall of what Ben might be able to do next, even though she can visibly sense that something isn't quite right. Another series of unforgettable moments arises shortly afterward when her new pal, lapping up the attention from his only friend, cruelly and sickeningly shows off without even deploying his superpowers. It's a deeply disturbing turn in a movie that repeatedly isn't afraid to find evident terrors in ordinary, everyday, banal surroundings, and Ida's response — horrified, alarmed, yet unwilling to completely cut ties — again says everything. Vogt doesn't shy away from intimating something that society often doesn't, won't or both: that childhood and innocence don't always go hand in hand. En route to their new home in the film's opening sequence, Ida is already spied pinching the non-verbal Anna just to glean what she'll do. Later, as conveyed in economical imagery lensed by stellar cinematographer Sturla Brandth Grøvlen — who already has Another Round, Last and First Men, Shirley, Rams and Victoria to his name, and uses blood here with haunting precision — she's seen escalating that pain-fulled experimentation in a gutwrenching fashion. This side to the girl's personality isn't played as a twist or shock, and neither are Ben's skills and proclivities, or the friendly Aisha's telepathic powers (including the ability to communicate with Anna). Instead, The Innocents is positively matter of fact about what its pint-sized characters are capable of, and also steadfastly avoids trading in simplistic ideas of good and evil, or offering up neat rationales. Read our full review. HOW TO PLEASE A WOMAN When Magic Mike stripped its way into cinemas a decade ago, it didn't just turn Channing Tatum's IRL background into a movie and give his chiselled torso oh-so-much attention; it understood that women like sex, boast libidos and have desires, too. Its sequel, Magic Mike XXL, doubled down on that idea, and winningly so — even if the saga dances with a notion so blatant that it definitely shouldn't feel revelatory to see it thrust front and centre in a big-budget Hollywood film. There's no trace of Tatum in How to Please a Woman, and it has nothing to do with the saucy franchise that has a third flick on the way, but this Aussie comedy nonetheless follows in Magic Mike's footsteps. Here, women also like sex, boast libidos and have desires, and that's something that the stuck-in-a-rut Gina (Sally Phillips, Off the Rails) turns into a lucrative business. When first-time feature writer/director Renée Webster begins her sunnily shot, eagerly crowd-pleasing leap to the big screen — following helming gigs on TV's The Heights and Aftertaste — Gina's relationship with sex is non-existent. She has long been wed to lawyer Adrian (Cameron Daddo, Home and Away), but he still thinks that having a tumble on their last holiday years ago is enough bedroom action to keep their marriage going. Gina's resigned to that fact, too, until her ocean swimming club pals book her a stripping surprise for her birthday. Tom (Alexander England, Little Monsters) shows up at her door, starts gyrating and undressing, and says he'll do whatever she wants. Although her friends are later horrified — and its their eagerness to truly take Tom up on his offer that inspires a brainwave — Gina asks him to clean her house instead. Men doing housework shouldn't be revolutionary or subversive either, but How to Please a Woman still uses it as a doorway to exploring other female yearnings that are often left unsatisfied. It's as cliched a move as Webster makes — and her movie makes plenty — but it's also part of the film's devotion to celebrating what women genuinely want. Here, a comedy can be overt, easy and obvious (all things that Gina's sex life isn't), and also delightfully well-intentioned in embracing a fact of life that's rarely given much attention, especially if women past their 30s are involved. Indeed, when a suddenly unemployed Gina, devastated by being the only one downsized out of the insolvency firm she dutifully works for, spots a removalist company she thinks she can save — by turning it into a male escort service, covering scrubbing and shagging alike, and both if customers would like — How to Please a Woman is both broad and joyous. There's a caper attitude to Gina's operations from there, after convincing Tom's removals colleagues Anthony (Ryan Johnson, Doctor Doctor), Ben (Josh Thomson, Young Rock) and Steve (Erik Thomson, Coming Home in the Dark) to widen their professional repertoire. She's skirting the law, Adrian's none the wiser, and the customers (including characters played by Blacklight's Caroline Brazier, Mystery Road's Tasma Walton, Rams' Hayley McElhinney and The Heights' Asher Yasbincek) keep coming. Sometimes, those between-the-sheets antics are clumsy, and Gina's new stable of prostitutes need a few pointers. That applies to getting their paying clients' homes spick and span, too. And, it also covers How to Please a Woman overall, which is always cosier and less risqué than its sex-positive, age-positive and female-focused premise implies. It also leans on the expected rather than takes risks, but remains wonderfully cast — especially Phillips — and gleefully wears its message about finding happiness by knowing what you need and going for it. LAST SEEN ALIVE Perhaps the most positive thing that can be said about Last Seen Alive is this: it's definitely a Gerard Butler-starring kidnapping thriller. That isn't meant as praise, though; rather, the film simply manages to be exactly what viewers would expect given its star and premise. There's clearly far less cash behind it than the also-terrible trio of Olympus Has Fallen, London Has Fallen and Angel Has Fallen — or Geostorm, Den of Thieves, Hunter Killer and Greenland among the Scottish actor's career lowlights over the past decade, either. There's visibly less effort, too, and more of a phoning-it-in vibe. The second collaboration between actor-turned-filmmaker Brian Goodman (What Doesn't Kill You) and producer/writer Marc Frydman after 2017's Black Butterfly, it plays like something that a streaming platform's algorithm might spit out in an AI-driven future where new movies are swiftly spliced together from pieces of past flicks. Yes, among Butler's output and with its abduction storyline, it's that derivative. Butler plays Will Spann, a real estate developer who already isn't having a great day when the film begins — but it's about to get worse. He's driving his unhappy wife Lisa (Jaimie Alexander, Loki) to her parents' home, where she's keen to decamp to find herself and take a break from their marriage, and Will is desperate to convince her to change her plans en route. His charm offensive isn't working when they stop at a petrol station mere minutes away from their destination, and he has zero charisma for anyone when Lisa unexpectedly disappears while he's filling the tank. Fuming that local police detective Paterson (Russell Hornsby, Lost in Space) hasn't just dropped everything immediately, and that he also has questions about their relationship, Will decides to chase down any lead he can himself. Meanwhile, Lisa's unsurprisingly wary parents (Queen Bees' Cindy Hogan and Master's Bruce Altman) direct their suspicions his way. Perhaps the most backhanded compliment that can be given to Last Seen Alive is this: it'd make a better Liam Neeson movie. Both Frydman's script and Goodman's execution feel like they're aiming for Taken; instead, even this year's dismal Blacklight looks better. With Butler in the lead, Will comes across as overbearing and insufferable rather than concerned and committed to doing whatever it takes — and nothing that the character does makes much sense as a result. He refuses to let the cops investigate because, basically, he's played by an angry Butler. He can't even wait at the petrol station that Lisa disappears from for seemingly the same reason. When he gets a tip about a suspect, he takes matters into his own hands rather than tells Paterson because, you guessed it, he's played by an angry Butler. Accordingly, the entire movie is little more than an exercise in answering the same question over and over again: what would a jerk of a character played by an angry Butler do in any given situation? It doesn't help that Last Seen Alive is shot as if the bane of every recently made television's existence, motion-smoothing settings, were already set in-camera. There's low-budget naturalism and then there's the flat, dull, soap opera-style look that this film sports. And, the special effects used for explosions simply demonstrate how vast the gap between unconvincing CGI and the real thing can be. Similarly doing the film no favours: the complete and utter absence of tension that stems from its central casting, and also its eagerness to prove as generic as possible. Little that Spann does is logical, but it's also ridiculously predictable because it's exactly what has to happen with Butler in the part. That he's easily and quickly overshadowed by Ethan Embry (First Man) in a thankless supporting role says everything it needs to. If you're wondering what else is currently screening in Australian cinemas — or has been lately — check out our rundown of new films released in Australia on February 3, February 10, February 17 and February 24; and March 3, March 10, March 17, March 24 and March 31; April 7, April 14, April 21 and April 28; and May 5 and May 12. You can also read our full reviews of a heap of recent movies, such as Belfast, Here Out West, Jackass Forever, Benedetta, Drive My Car, Death on the Nile, C'mon C'mon, Flee, Uncharted, Quo Vadis, Aida?, Cyrano, Hive, Studio 666, The Batman, Blind Ambition, Bergman Island, Wash My Soul in the River's Flow, The Souvenir: Part II, Dog, Anonymous Club, X, River, Nowhere Special, RRR, Morbius, The Duke, Sonic the Hedgehog 2, Fantastic Beasts and the Secrets of Dumbledore, Ambulance, Memoria, The Lost City, Everything Everywhere All At Once, Happening, The Good Boss, The Unbearable Weight of Massive Talent, The Northman, Ithaka, After Yang, Downton Abbey: A New Era, Wheel of Fortune and Fantasy, Petite Maman, The Drover's Wife The Legend of Molly Johnson, Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness, Firestarter, Operation Mincemeat, To Chiara and This Much I Know to Be True.
Whether it's an elaborate escape act or a simple piece of sleight of hand, when it comes to magic audiences want two things. They want to be fooled into believing that what they're seeing is real, but they also desperately want to know how it's really done. It's the same principle behind heist films, with viewers keen to watch criminals execute high-stakes robberies, and then discover how they pulled it off. It's hardly surprising, then, that Hollywood decided to blend the two with 2013's Now You See Me – and when it proved a hit, a sequel was all but inevitable. Of course, easy and obvious isn't the same as interesting or enjoyable, a fact that the Now You See Me films seem to forget. Director Jon M. Chu spends the bulk of the movie showcasing slickly shot and quickly choreographed tricks, in the hopes that we won't notice that the script by writer Ed Solomon doesn't really make any sense. For those with short memories, the first film followed the Four Horsemen, a magic troupe that mesmerised crowds and fleeced banks at the same time. A year later, J. Daniel Atlas (Jesse Eisenberg), Merritt McKinney (Woody Harrelson) and Jack Wilder (Dave Franco) remain in the group, with newcomer Lula (Lizzy Caplan) filling the female quota. FBI agent Dylan Rhodes (Mark Ruffalo) calls the shots, throws law enforcement off of their trail and helps set up a big gig at a mobile phone product launch. Alas, when the Horsemen take to the stage, they soon find that they're caught up in someone else's game. As Lula, Caplan acts excited and mentions what the gang is up to as much as she can — and that's Now You See Me 2 in a nutshell. She doesn't ever look at the screen and say, "I'm having fun with magic, and you should be too," but she may as well. For a time the film's over-the-top eagerness to entertain is somewhat effective, especially when former boy wizard Daniel Radcliffe shows up as a villainous inventor. Over the course of 115 minutes, however, the setups get more absurd, the attempts at misdirection more laboured, the backstory more clumsy and the returning cast (particularly Morgan Freeman and Michael Caine) less enthused. In short, it all wears thin. Indeed, no matter how flashy it gets, Now You See Me 2 can't distract from a simple truth: at a certain point, seeing the same tricks over and over again is going to lose it's appeal. Eventually, people stop buying into the patter, grow tired of the parade of deceptions and explanations, and want more from a movie than a nod, a wink and a gimmick. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4I8rVcSQbic
Apologies, scorned women — when it comes to cinema, hell hath no fury like an impassioned filmmaker angry about race relations in his beloved country. Or, to put it another way, no one makes a seething big-screen statement about bigotry in the US like Do the Right Thing, Malcolm X and Chi-Raq director Spike Lee. You could call his latest joint many things, and they all fit: a crusading comedy laced with searing commentary, a tale so enraging and ridiculous that it can only be true, and a savage political polemic, for starters. Still, what echoes loudest in BlacKkKlansman isn't the megaphone that the film gives to its specific, valid and vital perspective. Rather, it's the shocked silence that emanates as the 70s-set picture holds a much-needed mirror up to America today. In the type of true story that'd be accused of being too far-fetched if it was fiction, BlacKkKlansman chronicles that one time an African–American police officer went undercover in the Ku Klux Klan. All his infiltration mission took was three things, each as crucial as the last. Firstly, Ron Stallworth (John David Washington) had to get a job as a Colorado Springs detective, then convince his superiors that his talents exceeded the records room. Next, he had to spot a newspaper ad, put on a white-sounding voice and call the Ku Klux Klan's local chapter. Finally, he had to enlist his Jewish colleague Flip Zimmerman (Adam Driver) to be the face of his fake persona. That Stallworth also managed to strike up a phone-based friendship with Ku Klux Klan grand wizard David Duke (Topher Grace) didn't hurt, either. With Lee adapting the real-life Stallworth's book with a trio of co-writers, BlacKkKlansman's narrative is filled with telling juxtapositions. The fact that everything on screen did happen, despite all logic seeming to dictate otherwise, is just the beginning. Furthermore, the contrast between the film's comic and horrific elements only scratches the surface. Also peppered throughout: the progressive posturing of the police force versus the bureaucratic reality, the discrimination faced along racial lines compared to gender and religion, and the smarts needed to bring down an organisation that operates on such sheer stupidity. Plus, as Stallworth strikes up a fledgling relationship with student activist Patrice Dumas (Laura Harrier) — who happens to be escorting a Black Panther leader (Corey Hawkins) into town — the movie explores clashing methods of fighting deep-seeded racism. Helming the film it feels like he was born to make, Lee approaches his weighty material with the complexity that it deserves. Indeed, there's nothing simple about BlacKkKlansman, not only in its themes but in every element both in front of and behind the lens. Acting-wise, Washington puts in an intelligent, assured performance — sharing his dad Denzel's knack for commanding the screen with little more than a look and some silent swagger — while Driver's usual casual vibe serves his character well, and Grace gives prejudice a chillingly articulate face. Stylistically, the movie boasts the visual depth and texture that comes from shooting on 35mm, a suitably layered yet stirring soundtrack, and the energetic pace you'd expect from a filmmaker so committed to his cause. And yet, there's one aspect that Lee and company perfect above all else. Tonally, BlacKkKlansman is a feat that might never be beaten. It's a procedural and a caper that combines a mix of history, humour, tragedy and a sense of injustice; a film that has no interest in subtlety, and yet sometimes feels like it's actually (and purposefully) holding back. That's not one of the movie's many juxtapositions, and nor is it a failing of nerve. Instead, it's a concerted and clever choice. Lee waves his ire around like a flag, while at the same time adopting the best approach to capture broader attention. His fury and ferocity never subsides, but rather shape-shifts through awkward laughs, surreal encounters, world-weary sorrow and raw terror alike. Whether kicking things off with a pointed overview of cinema's racist leanings since the advent of the medium, sticking to its period setting, or underscoring the narrative's parallels with the reality of today via heartbreaking news footage, BlacKkKlansman is all the more powerful, resonant and relevant as a result. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UpxJIWz8MNQ
It isn't often that a fast-food chain wins the hearts of industrial food system activists. And yet, with its anti-establishment message and over 3 million hits already recorded, Chipotle's touching new infomercial has recently cemented a subtle but powerful message to otherwise apathetic customers. Produced by Oscar winners Moonbot Studios, the animation is being used by American fast food chain Chipotle Mexican Grill to promote their mobile app game, which warns against the horrors of industrialised factory food production. Accompanied by a haunting rendition of the uber-familiar 'Pure Imagination' from Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory, sung by musician and animal rights activist Fiona Apple, the video succeeds as an indirect marketing hook, encouraging a more sustainable model for food cultivation. Also impressive is the fact that the video achieves this with almost non-existent branding, the Chipotle pitch not appearing until the final seconds of the video. https://youtube.com/watch?v=lUtnas5ScSE The brand — which took a hit earlier in the year after a fake Twitter hack and criticism over changing standards of beef — is once again proving its worth, the Scarecrow video showing an impressive commitment by the Mexican food chain to serve responsibly raised food. The app is already one of the top ten most played free games on the iOS charts. It sees players act as the Scarecrow, the empathetic protagonist of the short film, with users then rewarded with free burritos. Via Gawker.
With the temperature and acidity of the oceans gradually rising comes the possibility of the extinction of the colourful, gorgeous coral reefs that are home to thousands of sea creatures. So, MUSA (Museum Subacuático de Arte) was created in 2009 in an attempt to preserve the precious coral reefs, using the ocean floor near Cancun, Isla Mujeres and Punta Nizuc, Mexico as a museum for sculptures that would also help sustain life beneath the surface. Senior TED Fellow and artist Colleen Flanigan's innovative Biorock sculptures have been chosen to become part of the project. Flanigan's metal sculptures are designed to counter the damage already done by global warming and pollution and regenerate the coral by raising the pH level of the surrounding water and help them acquire sufficient calcium carbonate for the coral's exoskeleton. The Biorock structures will also provide the living reefs with an alkaline environment that will increase resistance to environmental stressors. $15,000 is needed to fund Flanigan's underwater installations in MUSA, so she's kickstarted a Kickstarter account. $12,542 has been donated to date, but there is still a ways to go before the April 12th deadline. If you donate just a dollar, Flanigan will even say your name as she plants a polyp — every little bit helps.
In gleaming news for streaming viewers, Mick Herron's Slough House novel series boasts 12 entries so far. In another ace development, several more of the British author's books have links to the world of veteran espionage agent Jackson Lamb. If you're already a fan of Slow Horses, you'll be thrilled. For newcomers, you'll feel the same after diving into this small-screen spy delight and binging your way through it as quickly as possible. Thankfully, all those tales on the page mean that the episodic thriller based on Herron's work has plenty more stories to draw upon in its future. Now up to its third brilliant season as a television series, long may its forward path continue. Apple TV+ has clearly felt the same way since the program debuted in April 2022. In June the same year, the platform renewed Slow Horses for a third and fourth run before its second had even aired. That next chapter arrived that December and didn't disappoint. Neither does the latest and 2023's only batch of six episodes, this time taking its cues from Herron's Real Tigers — after season one used the novel Slow Horses as its basis, and season two did the same with Dead Lions — in charting the ins and outs of MI5's least-favourite department. Slough House is where the service rejects who can't be fired but aren't trusted to be proper operatives are sent to dwell in record-keeping drudgery, with Lamb (Gary Oldman, Oppenheimer) its happily cantankerous, seedy and shambolic head honcho. Each season, Lamb and his team of losers, misfits and boozers — Mick Jagger's slinky earworm of a theme tune's words — find themselves immersed in another chaotic case that everyone above them wishes that they weren't. That said, Slow Horses isn't a formulaic procedural. Sharply written, directed and acted, and also immensely wryly funny, it's instead one of the best spy series to grace television. Each repeat go-around might feature Lamb's band of disgraced agents demonstrating that they're not the write-offs that the rest of the espionage field thinks — and often wants — them to be, but every season-long predicament is meticulously detailed, as are the series' characters. It's easy to see why all things Slough House have gone the television route, rather than following Bond, Bourne and Mission: Impossible into cinema: these are people and scenarios that benefit from spending as much time with as possible. Slow Horses' astuteness, excellent cast and knack for comedy are all present in season three, which starts with two British intelligence officers in Istanbul. Sean Donovan (Ṣọpẹ́ Dìrísù, Gangs of London) and Alison Dunn (Katherine Waterston, Babylon) share a bed as well as the same outpost, but there's a shadow over their bliss: he's been tasked with investigating whether she's leaking classified information. The Bourne movies come to mind in early chases, but Lamb and his spooks are still the show's focus. Accordingly, when the fallout from the opening events touches Slough House, River Cartwright (Jack Lowden, The Gold), Catherine Standish (Saskia Reeves, Creation Stories), Louisa Guy (Rosalind Eleazar, Class of '09), Marcus Longridge (Kadiff Kirwan, This Way Up), Shirley Dander (Aimee-Ffion Edwards, Dreamland), Roddy Ho (Christopher Chung, Gods of Their Own Religion) and their boss — plus his boss Diana Taverner (Kristin Scott Thomas, Rebecca) — are thrust into a game of cat-and-mouse that revolves around secret documents. In London, the situation hits home when one of the Slow Horses' own, the forever-loyal Standish, is abducted. The talented Cartwright again endeavours to illustrate why being banished to Slough House for a training mistake was MI5's error — and why caring about his team has always been one of his finest and most-reliable traits. This'd be a lesser show if Cartwright was simply a gleaming hero forced down the ladder for one false move and always excelling, however, and if Lamb's relentless cynicism about his team's highest flyer was just the bitterness of an old hand about an up-and-comer. Slow Horses doesn't ever throw around the terms in its opening song 'Strange Game' as insults, instead understanding that none of the agents on a slippery slope are perfect because no one is. Indeed, Cartwright and company don't keep chasing a ghost of a chance to get out of spy purgatory solely out of pride, but also due to skill, tenacity and resilience. Lamb's team isn't kept in their place merely because of vendettas or politics — although both factor into the ongoing storyline — but also via struggles, troubles and flaws that are hardly uncommon. All of MI5's inflated egos, uncooperative attitudes, bad tempers, problem gamblers, substance abusers and recovering alcoholics haven't been banished to Slough House, either. While there's a sense of romance to every underdog tale about ragtag outsiders finding somewhere to fit in, Slow Horses is clear-eyed about an unassailable fact: often, all that separates the Lambs and Cartwrights from the Taverners and Spiders (aka The Great's Freddie Fox as James Webb, who has long loved lording his status over his former training rival) is however the cookie happens to crumble. Season three adds extra emphasis to this truth by digging into Taverner's icy turf war with her superior Ingrid Tearney (Sophie Okonedo, The Wheel of Time); the squabbling between MI5's top two women might be more refined than among the Slow Horses, but there's still no one faultless here. As it flits between the service's upper echelons and its lowest ranks, this season also continues to hone its piercing mistrust of everything, especially bureaucratic power. John le Carré (Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy, The Night Manager, A Most Wanted Man, Our Kind of Traitor) meets Armando Iannucci (The Thick of It, In the Loop, Veep), then, and it's as glorious as that sounds. Tense, taut, riveting, rollicking, witty: throw in impeccably penned, staged, shot and acted, and that's the Slow Horses package. Giving both Scott Thomas and Okonedo more screen time gifts the series some new standout scenes, too, although there's not a moment wasted or a sequence that proves superfluous in this tight and gripping show. Of course, no one will ever best Oldman for Slow Horses' top performance — his blend of slovenly but savagely smart as Lamb is an art in everything from his can't-give-a-fuck gaze to his slicing line readings. And if Lowden pairs this stint of cloak-and-dagger antics with gadgets and martinis as 007, as keeps being rumoured, it'd be well-deserved based on his layered portrayal as Cartwright. It'd be right on theme as well, just as Oldman's jump from Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy to Slow Horses was; being at the summit or the foot of the spy game, and life, can just be a matter of circumstance. Check out the trailer for Slow Horses season three below: Slow Horses streams via Apple TV+.
Tree-lined, open green space with adjacent rooftop gardens. A network of publicly accessible, New York-style laneways and arcades lined with markets, shops, restaurants, bars and cafes. Rooftop gardens. Community-use and artist-in-residence studios. A knowledge incubator. West End's Boundary Street doesn't currently boast all of the above, but it will in the near future. Alongside a car-sharing scheme and space for markets, festivals and events, this is all part of the West Village development, which has just been given the government's tick of approval. The $800 million project will revamp the area around the original 1920s Peters Ice Cream factory and warehouse, and preserving the two heritage-listed buildings is all part of the plan. Across the 2.1 hectare site, seven new structures will also be added, ranging from eight to 22 storeys high and including a maximum of 1250 apartments. If you're thinking that the heart of Brisbane's inner west is going to look rather different when West Village comes to fruition, you'd be right. And if you're a little concerned about the changes taking place in an area so beloved by so many, and with such a distinctive sense of character and history, then you have company. Providing a potent example of the range of feelings flying about the project, the announcement of West Village's official green-light sparked a heated Facebook exchange between Deputy Premier Jackie Trad and Greens Councillor for The Gabba, Jonathan Sri. With much of the city in a constant state of redevelopment at any given time, particularly in the CBD and neighbouring suburbs, West Village was always bound to be controversial. Locals have been wary for some time now, with more than 700 submissions reportedly received during the call-in period. For more information about West Village, visit the development's website. Via Brisbane Times.
Ben Stiller is having a very good year. The actor has only made two movies, and neither have really proven to be a stretch for him, but when it comes to middle-aged malaise in soul-searching comedy-dramas, he well and truly knows what he's doing. The furrowed brow, the frustrated gaze, the constant passive-aggression streaming towards everyone his characters interact with: if you've seen Greenberg, While You're Young or this year's The Meyerowitz Stories, then you definitely know the type. And while Brad's Status mightn't reach quite the same heights as any of those titles, it still demonstrates Stiller doing what he does best. Playing the eponymous Brad, Stiller gets ample chances to show off his world-weary on-screen persona. Running his own non-profit organisation, married to the laid-back Melanie (Jenna Fischer) and about to see his son Troy (Austin Abrams) off to college, Brad still finds himself unhappy with his lot in life — purely because he hasn't done as well as his former friends. Nick (the film's writer-director Mike White) is a Hollywood hotshot, tech wiz Billy (Jemaine Clement) has retired to Hawaii with stacks of cash, and Jason (Luke Wilson) has a high-powered hedge fund job, a wealthy wife and a growing family. Meanwhile, the last time Brad saw author and TV political commentator Craig (Michael Sheen), he asked for a favour and didn't hear back. White's script, his third this year after The Emoji Movie and Beatriz at Dinner, uses a trip to Boston to stoke Brad's anxieties about his status. It's not really a surprising development; he's touring college campuses with Troy, and thinking about who he was when he was a student, who he is now, and the difference between his youthful dreams and his current reality. Just as Stiller isn't flirting with anything particularly fresh, but still knocks his performance out of the park, White does much same behind the camera. Having previously directed Year of the Dog and TV's Enlightened, the filmmaker is no stranger to pondering how people see their place in the world — and their reactions when they contemplate making a change. Here, of course, White has rich material to mine, especially in today's social media-obsessed world. Brad's Status shows Brad scrolling through his old pals' Facebook and Instagram feeds and fantasising about the glamorous lives he's sure they're living. Sound familiar? Far from simply serving up a Generation X riff on Ingrid Goes West, however, White also unpacks Brad's sense of entitlement as a perfectly comfortable white guy living in Sacramento (#firstworldproblems). On top of that, he probes the envy that can spring when a parent thinks their child might grow to eclipse them. It's an ostensibly straightforward, emotionally dense scenario, albeit one that overplays Brad's inner monologue a tad. There's an interesting balancing act at work here, one that Brad's Status aces more than it might initially appear. While the film's warm visuals might seem to clash with its pointed score, they encapsulate a movie that's both affectionate towards its flawed protagonist and painfully aware of his many faults. That, if nothing else, is something you don't see every day. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=43jt74GwBmk
More summertime magic is on its way: after first announcing four Australian shows for 2025, Childish Gambino has expanded his upcoming Down Under tour to add two extra gigs. Sydney and Melbourne, the musician that you also know as Donald Glover has expanded his stops in both cities — and, as Olivia Rodrigo also just did, he's popped more concerts on his itinerary before general ticket sales even start. This year started with Glover on-screen in the TV remake of Mr & Mrs Smith. Next year will begin with Childish Gambino returning to Australia on his The New World tour, on what will be his first trip to these shores since 2019. The rapper and hip hop talent won't just play tracks from his latest album Atavista — the finished version of 2020's 3.15.20 — but also from a career behind the microphone that dates back to 2011. Accordingly, expect to hear 'This Is America', 'Redbone', 'Sweatpants' and other songs from his past records Camp, Because the Internet and Awaken, My Love!. [caption id="attachment_955315" align="alignnone" width="1920"] Eli Watson via Flickr.[/caption] Across February 2025, the Australian leg of the tour will kick off at the Brisbane Entertainment Centre, then hop to Sydney's Qudos Bank Arena, Melbourne's Rod Laver Arena and RAC Arena in Perth. When he last headed this way — complete with a headline spot at Splendour in the Grass — it was after initially announcing a 2018 Australian tour, then cancelling it due to an ongoing injury. Before that, he performed at Falls Festival in 2016. Gambino mightn't have been on Aussie stages for a spell, but Glover had the final two seasons of Atlanta — both in 2022 — reach screens since he was last Down Under. Voice work on Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse, producing TV series Swarm, the aforementioned Mr & Mrs Smith: they've all joined his resume as well. He'll also be heard as Simba again in Mufasa: The Lion King, the prequel to 2019's photorealistic version of The Lion King, before 2024 is out. On all Australian shows — and in New Zealand, too, which is also part of this tour — Gambino will be supported by Amaarae. [caption id="attachment_955317" align="alignnone" width="1920"] Eli Watson via Flickr.[/caption] Childish Gambino 'The New World' Tour 2025 Australia and New Zealand Dates Tuesday, January 28 — Spark Arena, Auckland Saturday, February 1 — Brisbane Entertainment Centre, Brisbane Tuesday, February 4–Wednesday, February 5 — Qudos Bank Arena, Sydney Friday, February 7–Saturday, February 8 — Rod Laver Arena, Melbourne Tuesday, February 11 — RAC Arena, Perth Childish Gambino is touring Australia and New Zealand in January and February 2025 — with ticket presales from Thursday, May 16, 2024 at staggered times, and general sales from Monday, May 20, 2024 (at 11am in Sydney, Brisbane and Perth, all local times; and 1pm in Melbourne). Head to the tour website for further details.
The game is ending. That the deadly contest at the heart of Squid Game just keeps going, continuing to pit new batches of 456 players against each other in a battle to the death to win 45.6 billion won, sits at the heart of the award-winning Netflix hit — but the show itself is wrapping up. That the series will say goodbye with its third season was announced in 2024, as was the fact that its final run will arrive in 2025. The streaming platform has now confirmed exactly when: Friday, June 27. Mark your diaries — and get ready to see what happens next in Seong Gi-hun's (Lee Jung-jae, The Acolyte) quest to bring down those responsible for the killer contest. If you've watched season two, which dropped on Boxing Day 2024, then you'll know that Player 456 went back in the game with new fellow competitors for company, and also found himself closer to the person pulling the strings than he knew. Season three will see Gi-hun keep at his pursuit to stop the game. It'll also feature more of his nemesis Front Man's (Lee Byung-hun, The Magnificent Seven) attempts to thwart his plan. However their respective efforts pan out, the show's last run is also set to feature a finale written and directed by series creator Hwang Dong-hyuk. Squid Game is now Netflix's most-popular non-English show of all time; in fact, it holds both the first and second spots on the list, for its first and second seasons respectively. Money Heist season four is third, Lupin season one is fourth, while La Palma, Who Killed Sara? and Berlin are also in the top ten. That Squid Game is a smash isn't new news, of course. It proved such a huge success in its first season that Netflix was quick to confirm that more was on the way — even if season two arrived after a three-year gap. In the show's second season, Gong Yoo (Train to Busan) returned as the man in the suit who got Gi-hun into the game in the first place, as did Wi Ha-joon (Little Women) as detective Hwang Jun-ho, but a series about a deadly contest comes with a hefty bodycount. Accordingly, new faces were always going to be essential — which is where Yim Si-wan (Emergency Declaration), Kang Ha-neul (Insider), Park Sung-hoon (The Glory) and Yang Dong-geun (Yaksha: Ruthless Operations) all came in. If you've somehow missed all things Squid Game until now, even after it became bigger than everything from Stranger Things to Bridgerton, the Golden Globe- and Emmy-winning series serves up a puzzle-like storyline and unflinching savagery, which unsurprisingly makes quite the combination. It also steps into societal divides within South Korea, a topic that wasn't invented by Parasite, Bong Joon-ho's excellent Oscar-winning 2019 thriller, but has been given a boost after that stellar flick's success. As a result, it's easy to see thematic and narrative parallels between Parasite and Squid Game, although Netflix's highly addictive series goes with a Battle Royale and Hunger Games-style setup. Netflix turned the show's whole premise into an IRL competition series as well, which debuted in 2023 — without any murders, of course. Squid Game: The Challenge has already been picked up for a second season. There's no dedicated trailer for Squid Game season three yet, but you can watch a teaser Netflix's big returning 2025 shows below — and revisit the trailer from Squid Game season two: Squid Game season three streams via Netflix from Friday, June 27, 2025. Season one and two are available to stream now. Images: Netflix.
When Disney+ made its way into the world back in 2019, it gave viewers — including folks in Australia and New Zealand — access to a huge range of Disney, Marvel, Pixar, Star Wars and National Geographic movies and shows. What it didn't do is bring Hulu, which the Mouse House owns the majority stake in, to audiences Down Under. And, with Disney+ focused on family-friendly fare, it didn't deliver the kinds of series and films that Hulu screens, either. Hulu still isn't heading our way. But, on Tuesday, February 23, Disney+ expanded to include a new section that's basically an international equivalent of Hulu. It's called Star and, when it was first announced late in 2020, film and TV fans were advised that it'd screen "an additional 1000 unique titles... in the first year". Wondering exactly what that includes? Well, more than 150 TV shows and 450–plus flicks have been added so far, and there are plenty of highlights among the bunch. From the pile of television programs, four fall into the 'Star Originals' category at the moment, meaning that they're brand new to viewers Down Under. Three of the four newbies are Hulu shows, too, so if you've been wanting to watch Love, Victor (the spinoff from 2018 movie Love, Simon), Helstrom (which forms part of the Marvel Cinematic Universe) or Solar Opposites (an animated sitcom co-created by Rick and Morty's Justin Roiland), now you're be able to. Plus, by the end of the year, Disney+ will release at least 30 more TV series that haven't made their way to Aussie or NZ viewers before. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XKeugS4qjag Also the television front, you can binge your way through every episode of Alias, 24, Felicity, Futurama and Glee — or opt for New Girl, Prison Break, Scandal and The X-Files instead. You can also check out ten seasons of Bob's Burgers, too. The list goes on and, like the existing Disney+ range, you'll find a hefty focus on older shows over new titles. From Star's big list of classics, plenty of titles stand out. Among the film selection, you'll find the Alien, Planet of the Apes, Die Hard and Omen franchises, plus the Predator and Taken flicks as well. And, you can also pick between older movies like Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, The Fly, Never Been Kissed, Office Space, Pretty Woman, Romeo + Juliet and Moulin Rouge!, or more recent fare such as Black Swan, Eddie the Eagle, Logan, The Favourite and Jojo Rabbit. A heap of Wes Anderson films, including Rushmore, The Royal Tenenbaums, The Grand Budapest Hotel and The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou, are also featured. Star draws upon Disney's studios, such as Disney Television Studios, FX, 20th Century Studios, 20th Television and Touchstone. And it doesn't everything that Hulu does, because plenty of Hulu's series and films pop up elsewhere Down Under — like The Handmaid's Tale, for instance. That said, it's safe to expect that some of the rights deals that deliver Hulu content to other networks and streaming platforms in Australia and might change after Star's hits, moving where you can catch certain flicks and programs in the process. As you might've already guessed, Disney+'s expansion to include Star comes with a price increase. Australian subscriptions have gone up to AU$11.99 per month or AU$119.99 per year, while New Zealand subscriptions are now NZ$12.99 per month and $129.99 per year. If you're already a subscriber, the new price won't kick in for six months, though — so whenever your next renewal hits after August 22. Star joined Disney+ in Australia and New Zealand on Tuesday, February 23, with Disney+ subscriptions costing AU$11.99 and NZ$12.99 per month or AU$119.99 and NZ$129.99 per year from now on.
Concrete Playground is taking the edge off the death of daylight saving by giving you the chance to experience Sydney's best cultural events for an entire month. One lucky person will win $1500 worth of fun, including: Dinner for two at Grasshopper to the value of $150 Double passes to two Vivid LIVE 2011 shows at Sydney Opera House Double passes to Baal and Edward Gant's Amazing Feats of Loneliness at Sydney Theatre Company Double movie passes to Incendies and Source Code (plus a pack of 10 Hopscotch DVDs) A double pass to see Guineafowl play live A pass to all events and talks at the Creative Sydney 2011 festival Two cocktail jugs and entry for two to the gig of your choice at Goodgod To enter, just make sure you're subscribed to Concrete Playground then email your name to hello@concreteplayground.com.au. Entries close Friday, April 9 2011 at 5pm. https://youtube.com/watch?v=14e1507YOLs
For more than six decades, the eastern suburbs of Brisbane have celebrated a red, juicy and delicious fruit. RedFest: Redlands Coast Festival is about more than its eponymous foodstuff; however it's definitely the place to be if you're keen on strawberry sundaes — and strawberries in all kinds of other foods as well. In 2023, RedFest is back, taking place around at the Redlands Showgrounds. And if you think that you can eat more strawbs than anyone else, an eating contest usually forms part of the fun. Want to wander around the venue dressed as a strawberry? You'll also be in your element. And yes, the word strawberry will be uttered so many times that it'll lose all meaning. Running over three days from Friday, September 6–Sunday, September 8, the full program also spans general show shenanigans — such as live music, arts and cultural displays, carnival rides, a sideshow alley, show bags and fireworks. Oh, there will be a heap of food other than strawberries, although they can still be your main attraction.
Through their Fresh Ink program, the Australian Theatre for Young People (ATYP) has been giving Australia's finest emerging writers space to play on stage, page, film and online. Their latest development under the banner of the Voices Project is worth checking out. It takes two heartbreaking monologues about first love and turns them into different but equally heartbreaking short films, which can be viewed online. Bat Eyes by Jessica Bellamy will give you a whole new appreciation of WH Auden, as it hones in on the fleeting bond shared between a teenage bully and his visually impaired, poetically charged target. The optometrist's office has never before seemed so romantic. Bat Eyes and its counterpart, Boot — about teenage recklessness and tense girl best-friendships — have been beautifully shot by director Damien Power. The great thing about the Voices Project is that it brings together young people from different backgrounds and disciplines, and it makes writers and viewers think about how storytelling changes from medium to medium. As well as the adapted short films, you can watch the original monologues (directed by Laura Scrivano) and see how they've changed while making the jump out of just one person's head. If you're under 26 and have your own thoughts on love to share, you can enter Fresh Ink's current Love Bytes competition, open until Friday, May 4. https://youtube.com/watch?v=qyDEEQoVqjY
February 2018 marks four years since the lockout laws hit Sydney's entertainment precinct. In that time, venues have shut up shop (like Hugos Lounge, which directly attributed the lockout laws to its closure), others have closed and reopened under new ownership (The Flinders and The Lansdowne, among them) and Kings Cross, once the nightlife hub of the city, has turned into a ghost town after midnight. Moreover, tens of thousands of people have rallied in opposition to the laws. Regardless, the NSW Government has given no indication that it will make any huge changes to them. The only consolation has been a half-hour extension of trading hours for businesses hosting live events. Sure, it's better than nothing — but it hasn't been enough to restore Sydney's nightlife to what it once was. That's why entrepreneur Paul G Roberts, founder of Fashion Industry Broadcast and Style Planet TV, decided to make a documentary titled After the Lockouts. When Roberts, who previously ran Melbourne night club Checkpoint Charlie, first moved to Sydney in the late 1990s, the nightlife was, in his words, "amazing". "You were spoilt for choice," he says. "You could go out from sunset to sunrise, seeing bands, going to clubs, going to cool bars...it's really not the same anymore." But, rather than mourn and complain, he wanted to get to do more research on the matter. So, with a camera crew in tow, he spent most of 2017 researching, studying media representations, speaking to venue owners and travelling to cities around the world, to find out how they manage busy nighttime economies without lockouts. "I wanted to cut through the spin and get down to the facts, the evidence," he says. After the Lockouts gains authority with interviews with some of Sydney's leading nightlife figures, including Keep Sydney Open's hardworking Tyson Koh, Mark Gerber (Oxford Art Factory), Maurice Terzini (Icebergs Dining Room), councillor Jess Scully and Dave Evans, former owner of Hugos Lounge, which closed down in mid-2015 due to revenue loss following the lockouts. There's also a tour of Amsterdam with night mayor Mirik Milan, who, since 2014, has overseen the city's nocturnal happenings. The documentary doesn't seem to include any interviews with any NSW Government spokespeople. Through the doco, Roberts also poses alternative solutions to the laws — that is, strategies for reversing the laws and renewing the city's vibrant all-night scene. "I'm very confident that anyone who sits through the whole film will walk out with a new perspective," says Roberts. "There are so many people doing a Herculean job to fight the lockout laws...but there needs to be a united voice. There needs to be an ongoing campaign to put pressure on the government. The film is just the first part of a multi-pointed campaign." After the Lockouts will premiere at a private gala screening tonight, February 1. The plan is to then roll it out across cinemas and the Internet. For more info, visit afterthelockouts.com. Image: After the Lockouts.
If you've been spending the summer getting reacquainted with your couch, we're betting we know exactly what you've been watching. Well, one show at least — because Netflix has revealed that 82 million households around the globe have been feasting their eyes on Bridgerton. Those hefty viewing figures apply to the gossip-fuelled, 19th-century-set series' first four weeks, with Bridgerton launching on the streaming service on Christmas Day. And if 82 million sounds like a huge number, that's because it is. Indeed, Netflix has announced that the figure has catapulted Bridgerton to the top of its most-watched original shows ever. Yep, this episodic adaptation of Julia Quinn's novels has beaten out last year's favourites such as The Queen's Gambit and Tiger King, as well as the debuts of older series like Stranger Things. So, if you keep seeing the show pop up in the top ten list included in Netflix's interface, that's because it has proven that popular — in every country except Japan, in fact. Obviously, when streaming service unveils its lineup of its most-watched programs and movies at the end of 2021, as it did in 2020, Bridgerton is going to feature. That said, whether folks in that many homes worldwide have watched the whole eight-episode first season of the show yet is another matter entirely. Netflix's viewing numbers only capture how many of its subscribers have watched at least two minutes — yes, just two minutes — of the platform's movies and series. So, while a very large amount of people worldwide are aware that the show exists and have had a peek, they might not know the ins and outs of Daphne Bridgerton's (Phoebe Dynevor) quest to find a husband, her dalliances with the Duke of Hastings (Regé-Jean Page), the scandal in the Featherington household, all the other dramas that come with Regency London's marriage market and just what Lady Whistledown has been writing about. And, they may not have spent any time dreaming about wandering around the program's super-green gardens, either. Nonetheless, all the attention has meant that Netflix is keen to keep the series going, with the company announcing that a second season will start production this year. An airdate yet to be revealed, however. Check out the trailer for the show's first season below: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gpv7ayf_tyE The first season of Bridgerton is available to stream now via Netflix. The show's second season has been announced, but a release date is yet to be revealed. Top image: Liam Daniel/Netflix.
The in-flight experience will soon exit the amateur days of free peanuts and on-demand movies with the latest luxury seating design by Contour Aerospace and Factorydesign. A futuristic chair paired with the ultimate gaming experience is the newest plan for flying in style. The Not for Wimps (NFW) game simulator is built into passenger seats and includes a full sized monitor suspended at eye-level in front of each seat, surround sound with speakers on each side of the headrest and an abundance of leg room for a stimulating, realistic gaming experience that will have you wishing your flight lasted longer. Each seat is also encased in what can only be described as a noise-cancellation bubble, that prevents other passengers from hearing any sound effects or ambient noises except those from their own games. The NFW is only in the prototype stage and is being proposed at the Aircraft Interiors Expo at the German Messe in Hamburg this week, but gamers everywhere will be chomping at the bit for news of the go-ahead to jump-start this futuristic feature of flying. [via PR Newswire]
At many times in Breaking Bad's history — and in even-better spinoff prequel series Better Call Saul's history, too — Mike Ehrmantrout (Jonathan Banks, The Commuter) has known exactly what to say. The former cop-turned-private investigator, fixer, cleaner and hitman doesn't speak if he doesn't need to, so when he does, it's worth listening to. And in the just-dropped trailer for Better Call Saul's long-awaited sixth and final season, he makes quite the statement. "Whatever happens next, it's not gonna go down the way you think it is," Ehrmantrout utters in his inimitable gravelly voice towards the end of this first sneak peek at the new season — and if you've been along for the Breaking Bad–El Camino–Better Call Saul ride since 2008, that's quite the intriguing choice of phrase. We all do already know what happens in Breaking Bad for Mike, and obviously for lawyer Saul Goodman (Bob Odenkirk, Nobody), but series creator Vince Gilligan clearly has a few more tricks up his sleeve. Nothing about either two shows has ever just hit the expected beats, of course. And part of what's made Better Call Saul so brilliant is the way it spins its story, fleshing out the two Breaking Bad figures' histories after we've already seen what comes next. For the eponymous Saul — aka Jimmy McGill, his birth name — we've also been getting very short black-and-white glimpses of his Cinnabon-managing post-Breaking Bad life, contrasting with his earnest initial quest to be a legitimate lawyer. We've said it before and it's worth saying again: Better Call Saul is television's greatest tragedy. It's also one that not only spans Jimmy-slash-Saul and Mike — and, in recent seasons, Los Pollos Hermanos owner Gus Fring (Giancarlo Esposito, The Boys), drug kingpin Hector Salamanca (Mark Margolis, My Big Fat Greek Wedding 2) and DEA agent Hank Schrader (Dean Norris, Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark) — but the characters in their orbit that didn't appear in Breaking Bad. That includes Jimmy's successful older brother Chuck (Michael McKean, Breeders), and his girlfriend and fellow lawyer Kim Wexler (Rhea Seehorn, Veep), plus gangland figure Nacho Varda (Michael Mando, Orphan Black). Stating the obvious, this aren't turning out well for most of them. The first trailer for Better Call Saul's sixth season — its first batch of episodes since 2020 — doesn't dive too far into the narrative, but it does make plain what we all know is coming. That'd be Jimmy-slash-Saul breaking bad and embracing his "s'all good, man" new persona as a criminal lawyer (and not just because he represents criminals). However, again, that doesn't mean that we know exactly how the season will play out. Whatever the show's future holds, its sixth season will arrive in two parts — with the first seven episodes airing from Tuesday, April 19 in Australia, and the final six arriving from Tuesday, July 12. We'll also see more of post-Breaking Bad Saul's story, where he's known as Gene. Best break out the cinnamon scrolls, obviously. Check out the Better Call Saul season six trailer below: Better Call Saul's sixth season starts streaming in Australia via Stan from Tuesday, April 19 — and will stream in New Zealand via Neon. Images: Greg Lewis/AMC/Sony Pictures Television.
2012 seems too future a year to still be talking about radio. Invented so many moons ago, how is it possible that radio has dodged the inevitable demise of all other pre-internet devices for information dissemination? And yet, radio is an almost unchanged, non-visual, intangible medium that has managed to engage an audience for over one hundred years. Perhaps it is the pared back simplicity of the sound of the human voice which has enabled the wireless to endure. Or perhaps it's the ability of radio to act as a constant companion – from beside buddy waking us from sleep to background fodder in morning traffic to emergency weather warnings in far corners of the state. Radio possesses a remarkably static history but it is also a diverse, easily accessible technology and one too which has developed through the advent of podcasts and on-demand radio apps. A friend recently introduced to me the This American Life app, and here I quickly spiralled into the world of radio apps. There is beauty in the voice of someone’s story and it makes excellent feed for light-on small talk (although beware the compulsion that can ensue). Other people’s stories are addictive and here, a second warning; radio streaming is a data killer — either get yourself an unlimited data plan or make good use of your workplace wireless. In a world so rammed with visual stimulation, it is incredible to think that the simplicity of the sound of a voice is still an engaging notion. We love stories and with the world just a touch pad away it is all primed and waiting to be streamed (data limit pending). Here are some of Concrete Playground's favourite radio apps to get you started. This American Life For those not yet savvy to the sounds of host, Ira Glass, This American Life is a long-running, weekly one-hour program on America’s public radio station NPR. Each week TAL takes a theme and presents a number of stories on that theme. For example, a 2011 program on gossip looked at the relationship between gossip and the AIDS epidemic in Malawi. The Held Hostage program of 2012 told of a Colombian late night radio program where families of victims of kidnapping call in to send messages to their loved ones, hoping that they are still alive and might just be listening in. The beauty of TAL lies in the lateral consideration of each theme and, most importantly, in the classic tools used to create the stories for radio. TAL is one of the few radio programs to provide a program-only app (Radio National, are you listening?). It is not free but $2.99 is a small price to pay for access to the entire TAL archive, including viewing of the two seasons of the TAL television series. All programs can be streamed, saved for offline listening or alternatively downloaded for a small fee. It is a simple app to use with a clear layout, search bar, full descriptions of each program and labels to mark shows as read or favourited. Price: $2.99 Planet Money Planet Money is an economics-for-dummies radio program, also on NPR. I first heard about Planet Money through my obsession with TAL as the team from Planet Money frequently guest programmes TAL. Primarily though, it is a twice-weekly show and the app is an excellent entry into the program with accompanying articles and their additional appearances on TAL, All Things Considered and Morning Edition. Don’t think you need to know about economics? Think again. Understand economics and you start to understand how most of how our world operates. Highly recommended for dazzling cocktail party swagger when it comes to impressing all. Your education starts here. Price: Free BBC Listener More interested in British radio? BBC Listener is the app for you. With a great old-school wireless interface this app can immediately transport you to the cool tombs of the BBC studios of the 1950s. BBC Listener is especially curated for an international audience with a weekly delivery of 20 of the best BBC programs for that week. Programs are divided into genres and are accompanied by visuals – still and video. Price: One month free trial and then $3.99/month. The app is free to download. TuneIn Radio With the American and British equivalents of the ABC (BBC and NPR) branching out into the world of apps, I guess it is only a matter of time before the ABC gets more serious about their digital platforms. Whilst we wait we are stuck with TuneIn. TuneIn is a radio streaming app which gives you free access to thousands of radio programs across the globe, including Australia. It is a clunky app with no program descriptions and a search function which is a tad redundant unless you actually know what you are looking for. The upside is that when you don’t know what you want to listen to you can stumble upon some goodies. And with thousands of programs to choose from you have access to a diverse mix of radio from around the world. Price: Free Stitcher Much like TuneIn, Stitcher is a radio streaming app although with the addition of a personalisation scheme. As you listen and build up a stable of favourite programs, Stitcher will recommend other shows based on your listening habits ie. the app will ‘stitch’ together your own personal radio station. Prefer not to have a computer claiming, ‘You might also like…’? Not to worry. Stitcher also lets you build this process yourself. Price: Free Podcasts Now, all that I have said above is pretty much negated by the recent addition to the Apple stable, Podcasts. Although technically we have always been able to subscribe to podcasts and have them automatically appear in our iTunes – Podcasts make this process less complicated. Podcasts is simple to use and holds all your subscriptions in one place on your phone. It connects to the iTunes store with just a swing of the window and includes full descriptions of all programs. Of course, it is reliant on your favourite radio programs providing podcasts, but most do. Radio National programs can all be subscribed to, as can BBC Radio programs and NPR. The beauty here is the ability to somewhat branch out of radio and discover some of the cross-platform spoken word interviews and stories which are only available as podcasts. Price: Free
Berndnaut Smilde has challenged preconceptions of visual art with 'Nimbus II'. In this collection of photographs, a natural entity has become synthetic, and what has always been ephemeral is now captured forever. A thematic continuation of Smilde's original 'Nimbus' (pictured below), 'Nimbus II' features a petite, fairy floss-like cloud hovering below the lofty white ceiling of Hotel MariaKapel in Hoorn, Netherlands. Smilde generates the clouds using a smoke machine, carefully monitoring the humidity of the room and using lighting to enhance the life-like essence of the storm cloud. "On the one hand I wanted to create an ominous situation. You could see the cloud as a sign of misfortune," said Smilde of 'Nimbus' in a 2010 interview with Probe online gallery. "You could also read it as an element out of the Dutch landscape paintings in a physical form in a classical museum hall. At the same time I wanted to make (for once) a very clear image, an almost cliché and cartoon-like visualisation of having bad luck." Despite the bad luck connotations of a cloud, the photos of 'Nimbus II' succeed in establishing a whimsical element as well. Smilde said that this work plays with the concept of the ephemeral and is influenced by "physical presence found within transitional space." [via Trendhunter]
