Since late 2016, the One Day crew has been hitting the road, bringing their famous daytime block parties to live music venues around Australia. Now it's time for round two, with DJs from the beloved Sydney hip hop collective bouncing back to Brisbane for a One Day Sundays session on January 8. Taking its cue from the group's massive monthly blowouts in Sydney, One Day Sundays will see the One Day crew team up with local DJs and artists as they roll through Ric's in Fortitude Valley. Expect food and booze, live graffiti and a whole bunch of hip hop. And, in even better news, there'll be more where this came from. That's right, One Day Sundays will become a regular Brissie event in 2017. Keep your eyes peeled for future dates.
If enjoying live music while having a couple of pints is your idea of a perfect night out, then you'd best mosey on over to The Triffid on Thursday, March 24. Sure, both are on the bill at the Newstead venue most nights of the week, but their pre-Easter shindig has a little something extra. On the tunes front, The Belligerents, Good Oak, Deena, Michael David Thomas, DEEDS, and DJ Black Amex will serve up a free sonic smorgasbord for your ears — but that's still not the best part. Knock back a few of The Good Beer Co.'s Great Barrier Beer while you're watching their sets, and help put your drinking money to good use. All proceeds from the beer go towards the Australian Marine Conservation Society.
Bringing together some of the region's finest fare, the Margaret River Gourmet Escape presents a tantalising four-day festival of food, drink and merriment, all set in one of the most naturally beautiful areas imaginable. It's a packed program with over 100 boutique producers involved and highlights, including a star-studded chef's table, cooking masterclasses, coffee workshops and a buzzing village green featuring an array of local produce. Margaret River is often seen as a wine region. While that's not wrong, seeing it as just a destination for vineyard-hopping would massively underplay the charms of this picturesque spot for a multi-faceted summer holiday. Few regions of Australia are as rich in natural beauty and densely populated with world-class dining options. We've teamed up with Mazda3 to help you make the most of your trip to Gourmet Escape. Here are the best options for what to eat, what to do and where to stay during the feasting fest. [caption id="attachment_632002" align="alignnone" width="1920"] Elements Margaret River.[/caption] EAT AND DRINK If you're looking to make the most of Gourmet Escape, be sure to plan ahead — you'll find there are more than just a few fringe events and degustations you'll want to find. This year's all-star program corrals top chefs like Andrew McConnell (Supernormal, Supernormal Canteen, Cumulus Inc.), David Thompson (Long Chim), Guillaume Brahimi (Bistro Guillaume), Clayton Wells (Automata) and Paul Carmichael (Momofuku Seiobo). There is also the option to simply kick back in idyllic surrounds and sip some local tipples. Outside of the festival, Saturday mornings in Margaret River see the buzzing Margaret River Farmers' Market set up with dozens of stalls offering all kinds of local baked goods, fruits, vegetables, flowers, chocolates and wines. It's an ideal spot to stock up on supplies for a beach picnic, as is the gourmet deli located at Smiths Beach at Lamont's winery. This coastal favourite is also a great spot for a laidback brunch with an all-day menu split in two — offering brekkie eats like buttermilk pancakes and shakshuka or lunchtime bites like pork rillette and spaghettini with walnut sauce. [caption id="attachment_642075" align="alignnone" width="1920"] Margaret River Farmers' Market.[/caption] An iconic restaurant of the region, the acclaimed Cape Lodge's menu revolving around local produce attracts many to the area — everyone from Bill Clinton to Katy Perry has stopped off at this famed lakeside restaurant. On any given visit, you might find Western Australian options like marron from Donnybrook, mussels from Safety Bay or Exmouth prawns. And if you're after a more casual option, White Elephant Beach Café — who'll also be among the many local dining options in attendance at Gourmet Escape — is located ideally overlooking the boat ramp at Gnarabup beach and pumps out great coffee and classic all-day breakfast options like bircher muesli and smashed pumpkin on sourdough. [caption id="attachment_642073" align="alignnone" width="1920"] Peta Hopkins via Flickr.[/caption] DO Along with great eats, there's also plenty of entertainment on offer at Gourmet Escape. Matt Okine will do his food and comedy thing, DJ sets from the likes of Hugo Gruzman (Flight Facilities) and Triple J's Tom Tilley will be held throughout and locals San Cisco will headline the closing night party. So plan to have a boogie or two during your visit. Spending some time in the Leeuwin-Naturaliste National Park is also an absolute must. Named as a world biodiversity hotspot by the World Wildlife Foundation, the region's unusual climate and soil profile means it's home to a dazzling variety of colourful wildflowers, many of which are rarely seen elsewhere. Look out for the likes of blue grass lilies, spider orchids and crimson one-sided bottle brush. The very keen hikers may want to tackle the famous Cape to Cape Track, a 135-kilometre walk which hugs the coastline. For everyone else, there are many options to drop in on the track for much shorter walks. [caption id="attachment_642066" align="alignnone" width="1920"] Mammoth Cave.[/caption] The area is also notable for its limestone cliff and crystal caves. You can enter a network of caves at CaveWorks, just south of Margaret River. A narrow staircase leads you down into the most spectacular of the underground hollows, the giant Lake Cave, which includes an ethereal sunken forest. A rare example of an 'actively dripping' cave, it's like something taken from the pages of a fairytale. Further natural beauty is found in the region's string of stunning beaches, which include Hamelin's Bay, a photogenic stretch of white sand and blue-green water where stingrays weave their way through bathers. The popular Smiths Beach is another gorgeous part of the coastline, while Prevelly Beach, where Margaret River meets the ocean, is home to professional surfing events. STAY Riverglen Chalets offers a range of boutique accommodation options, with everything from studios to larger chalets for up to eight people. Best of all, it's set amongst seven acres of lush, green natural surrounds with a picturesque pond and towering gum trees. In a seemingly secluded location, the chalets are only a few minutes from town proper. Grab a breakfast hamper from the festival and head back to the chalets and start the day with an al fresco feast. Old Dairy Cottage is a quirky, character-filled option, proudly wearing its heritage as a pioneering district farm, but also including all the modern amenities. The light, airy accommodation is designed to make the most of the summer sun. Hilltop Studios also splits the difference between pastoral living and pure luxury; their designed accommodation comes with an award-winning chef on site and views of rolling hills and rugged countryside from your bathtub. For something entirely different, Conto offers a range of camping options alongside the winding coastline and peppermint woodland. Whether you're looking for a cheaper option or just like the idea of waking up to the sound of roaring waves, it's perfect a way to experience a truly spectacular part of the country. Margaret River Gourmet Escape 2017 takes place in the Margaret River region from November 16 to 19. Top image: Elements Margaret River. Personalise your next adventure via The Playmaker, driven by Mazda3.
Broadcast live via YouTube from a polo field in a desert west of Los Angeles this weekend was Coachella, one of the world's truly super festivals. The massive video library created its own live-stream channel, appropriately named YouTube Live, and Coachella was the first partner to offer to broadcast live content for the channel. Among the lineup of over 100 performers include top acts The Strokes, Arcade Fire, Mumford & Sons, Kanye West, Cee-Lo Green, Kings of Leon and Duran Duran. Although most of the incredible content has been taken down, as if oft the case, we have scoured the annals to bring you five of our favourite video moments from the festival. https://youtube.com/watch?v=bj8Kd6h9TV8 1. Kanye. West. Brought it. https://youtube.com/watch?v=S3X7Zqdsuuc 2. Arcade Fire unleashed not only a killer Saturday night headline set but also an army of LED beachballs that looked more akin to a sea of globular jellyfish. Changing colours throughout their finale of 'Wake Up', the balls started shining independently red, purple, orange and green capturing (or is that diverting) the audiences attention well beyond their set. https://youtube.com/watch?v=2DxokBv_49Q 3. The Strokes rounded out an incredible set with 'Under Control', 'Gratisfaction', 'Reptilia', 'Last NIght' and 'Take It or Leave It'. Tough to beat. https://youtube.com/watch?v=XC4uK99AAWA 4. Jeff Goldblum, at Coachella? Those two names went as well together as....well they went well. For a full 90 minute set Jeff and his band, the Mildred Snitzer Orchestra performed in the campgrounds of the festival. Although a stunt from comedy website Funny or Die, funnier things have happened. https://youtube.com/watch?v=4si2JyDpCik 5. Cee-Lo Green turned up 50 minutes late, blamed it on the organisers and their poor timetabling skills and performed a lacklustre and rushed set. Getting through six songs in twenty minutes, his performance of Fuck You took on extra meaning for the aggravated and constantly dwindling crowd.
One huge day, 18 designers, 180-plus outfits, oh-so-much fantastic fashion. That's what's on the agenda at the first-ever BrisAsia Festival Fashion Program, which was originally slated to take place in February during Brisbane's annual BrisAsia fest, but is now happening on Friday, March 25 — after an Omicron wave-inspired delay. This extremely well-dressed event has one big focus: showcasing local design labels with Asian, Indigenous and international heritages. Whether you're the most stylish person you know (and the most modest, too) or you're keen to get some tips, heading along means supporting a heap of homegrown talent and celebrating culture through fashion. Labels in the spotlight include Akira, Native Swimwear Australia, Joteo, Moreno Marcos, Anannasa and Murrii Quu Couture, as well as Pagoni, M7 by Miu Tsujikawa, Hestia by Yip Wing Chi, Liz Clift and Mode Voyage. Also popping up: DAN STUDIO, SAJO, MYKA Studio, Nevidebla, Luna + Sun, Fancynators and Hopevale Arts & Cultural Centre. And, there are multiple ways to slide into the couture-focused fun. Hit up either or both of the group shows (one at 6pm, the other at 7.30pm), stay for the afterparty (at 8.30pm) or, beforehand, hear some insights at the daytime fashion forum (from 2–4pm). At the latter, designers Akira Isogawa, Sher Lo from Anannasa and Natalie Cunningham from Native Swimwear will chat about their work, and about how their heritage has shaped their vision. [caption id="attachment_847527" align="alignnone" width="1920"] @thebrisbanegirl[/caption]
In 2022, theatre production company Prospero Arts gave Brisbane a song-filled tribute to one of the best movie musicals ever made, bringing Singin' in the Rain to the Queensland Performing Arts Centre as an onstage concert. How does anyone manage to back that up? With another huge show for 2023, also offering up an ode to a big-screen favourite overflowing with beloved and well-known songs: The Wizard of Oz. This winter, consider QPAC's Concert Hall somewhere over the rainbow. You'll be off to see the wizard there, too. There's never a bad time to pop on your ruby slippers, and hasn't been for the past 84 years since the page-to-screen hit first reached cinemas — but this instance is all about the music. No one will be acting out the storyline, but you will hear all of the tracks that everyone has stuck in their head forever, including Oscar-winner 'Over the Rainbow', 'We're Off to See the Wizard', 'Ding-Dong! The Witch Is Dead', 'If I Only Had a Brain' and 'The Merry Old Land of Oz'. As The Wizard of Oz — In Concert's yet-to-be-announced talents sing under the direction of Amy Campbell, an onstage orchestra will play the film's score — which also won an Academy Award. For those who've somehow missed the 1939 classic flick so far, it adapts the 1900 novel The Wonderful World of Oz by L Frank Baum. In The Wizard of Oz, Dorothy Gale (played by Judy Garland in the movie) and her little dog Toto are whisked off from her Kansas farm to the titular realm, where she needs to avoid the Wicked Witch of the West — and find the eponymous wizard to make it home. To locate the latter, a stroll down the yellow brick road with the Tin Man, Scarecrow and Cowardly Lion is on the agenda. Running from Friday, June 30–Sunday, July 2, The Wizard of Oz — In Concert will put on five shows across its three-day season. There's no trailer for the concert, you can check out the trailer for the film that sparked it all below: The Wizard of Oz — In Concert will hit QPAC's Concert Hall from Friday, June 30–Sunday, July 2, with tickets on sale now.
In George Orwell’s Confessions of a Book Reviewer essay, the Nineteen Eighty-Four author describes the job as a thankless task, saying: “The prolonged, indiscriminate reviewing of books is a quite exceptionally thankless, irritating and exhausting job.” Thankless as it may be, reviewers have the power to introduce new books into the world in passionate praise or downright scathing criticism. And, as with most reviews, it really can be a matter of taste - as we’ll see here - in this list of ten early, negative reviews of literature we now consider sacred. 1. The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn Mark Twain’s The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn (represented here with the baby-faced Elijah Wood from the 1993 film) was banned by the Concord public library on the year of its release, slamming the novel as “trashy and vicious”. In full support of the ban, The Springfield Republican (published again in The New York Times in 1885), said: “[The book is] no better in tone than the dime novels which flood the blood-and-thunder reading population… his literary skill is, of course, superior, but their moral level is low, and their perusal cannot be anything less than harmful.” 2. American Psycho “Numbingly boring, and [for much of the book] deeply and extremely disgusting,” said Andrew Motion in 1991, printed in The Observer. He went on to criticise Bret Easton Ellis’ most controversial novel by saying: “Not interesting-disgusting: sickening, cheaply sensationalist, pointless except as a way of earning its author some money and notoriety.” 3. Catch-22 The common idiom "catch 22" came from Joseph Heller’s famous satire and today the book is regarded as one of the best in modern times. But, for Richard G. Stern, it was “an emotional hodgepodge”. The critic said, in The New York Times Book Review in 1961, “no mood is sustained long enough to register for more than a chapter.” He does, however, go on to compliment Heller (sort of): “Its author... is like a brilliant painter who decides to throw all the ideas in his sketchbooks onto one canvas, relying on their charm and shock to compensate for the lack of design…” 4. The Catcher in the Rye J.D. Salinger’s praised coming-of-age novel didn’t sit well with James Stern, who, in The New York Times (1951) said: “This Salinger, he’s a short story guy. And he knows how to write about kids. This book though, it’s too long. Gets kind of monotonous. And he should’ve cut out a lot about these jerks and all that crumby school. They depress me.” 5. The Great Gatsby Baz Luhrmann’s movie adaptation of The Great Gatsby (pictured) is looking like 2013’s most anticipated film. However, not all first readers of the book were won over by Gatsby and Daisy. Published in The Saturday Review in 1925, L.P Hartley said: “Mr. Scott Fitzgerald deserves a good shaking. Here is an unmistakable talent unashamed of making itself a motley to the view. The Great Gatsby is an absurd story, whether considered as romance, melodrama, or plain record of New York high life.” 6. Lolita “[Lolita] is undeniably news in the world of books. Unfortunately, it is bad news,” announced Orville Prescott in The New York Times in 1958. Vladimir Nabokov’s novel about a middle-aged literary professor who retells his semi-incestural relationship with a 12-year-old neighbour, still provokes strong feelings from readers today. Prescott went on to say: “There are two equally serious reasons why it isn’t worth any adult reader’s attention. The first is that it is dull, dull, dull in a pretentious, florid and archly fatuous fashion. The second is that it is repulsive.” 7. Moby Dick In 1852, the New York United States Magazine and Democratic Review, stated: “If there are any of our readers who wish to find examples of bad rhetoric, involved syntax, stilted sentiment and incoherent English, we will take the liberty of recommending to them this precious volume of Mr. Melville’s". Ouch! 8. Ulysses Though a painful 265,000-odd words long, Ulysses has been hailed as one of the most important works in Modernist literature. James Joyce’s experimental stream of consciousness techniques, though popular with Ms. Monroe (above), were not popular with the writer at The Sporting Times in 1922. It said: “[Ulysses] appears to have been written by a perverted lunatic who has made a speciality of the literature of the latrine... there are whole chapters of it without punctuation or other guide to what the writer is really getting at.” And in a sense, quite true. 9. Where the Wild Things Are Where the Wild Things Are is a classic children’s bedtime read, written by Maurice Sendak in 1963. Generations later, Spike Jonze directed a movie version in 2009. However, in an issue of Publisher’s Weekly in the year of its release, a reviewer says: “The plan and technique of the illustrations are superb. … But they may well prove frightening, accompanied as they are by a pointless and confusing story.” 10. Wuthering Heights “How a human being could have attempted such a book as the present without committing suicide before he had finished a dozen chapters, is a mystery,” said the Graham’s Lady’s Magazine in 1848. The reviewer was clearly not as taken by Emily Brontë’s depiction of a bleak and cruel life on the Yorkshire moors as most. Suicidal or not, the relationship between Cathy and Heathcliff still resonates today as is evident from the popularity of contemporary adaptations like Andrea Arnold's 2009 movie (pictured).
Losing yourself in a giant Pac-Man-inspired maze may or may not be your idea of the ultimate reality break, but it is something you'll actually be able to pencil into the diary when The Pac-Maze hits Brisbane on Friday, August 9 and Saturday, August 10. Yep, someone has created a human-sized version of the classic 80s arcade game that had you losing hours navigating tiny yellow Pac-Dots and avoiding ghosts. As with most immersive, themed experiences happening across Australia these days, this one is popping up in a secret location — in New Farm, and ticket-buyers will obviously be told exactly where it is before the date. It's popping up for two days only, after adding a second day due to demand. Tickets are now on sale for sessions running hourly from 6–10pm on Friday night (when the fun will be restricted to adults only) and from 10am–11pm on Saturday. The Pac-Maze comes courtesy of the same masters of nostalgia that brought you the adults-only Lego bar, The Brick Bar, which means you can expect a bunch of interactive fun that'll delight both your adult self and your inner kid. Organisers are promising an immersive escape room-style experience, held within a huge, luminous maze, with the chance to score prizes if you're quick enough to elude those multi-coloured ghosts (aka Blinky, Pinky, Inky and Clyde). Once you've made it through, you can also hang out in an 80s-themed pixel room, play the original Pac-Man game how it was meant to be played, and dance to retro DJ-spun tunes. Updated June 26.
In these days of ubiquitous mass production, unique pieces of gear are usually rare and often rather costly. However, Canada's reCycledride is changing all that. At least for cyclists, that is. By combining stylish vintage frames with contemporary parts, the Toronto-based company creates bicycles that are guaranteed to be one-of-a-kind. Their "first-ever art-on-wheels" was completed in September 2012. Featuring a 49cm racing frame, double wall wheels, coaster brakes, front brakes, a single gear system and a 52cm raised handle bar, it went up for sale for $500 Canadian Dollars. Nine months and a few 'artworks' later, Dolce & Gabbana's online magazine, Swide, selected reCycledride's 'Pennington' as one of 2013's 'Best Fixie Bikes', justifying their decision with lavish praise. "The beautiful Pennington takes a '70s Miele frame that is powdercoated in Opel Green, pairs it with a brown saddle and handle setup and completes it all with an unexpected gold-chain laced through the heart of it," Swide's description goes. "It gets its name from the fact that they wanted it to be worth every penny that the owner spent on it, in terms of style, safety and substance." 'From Paris, with Love' is the company's latest. According to their blog, the designer felt compelled to make it immediately after laying eyes upon its Raleigh frame, a 1980s relic that belonged to a Parisian businessman. To this was added a Brooks B17 Champion standard saddle, new wheels, a new handlebar grip, a cog and Continental tyres. The bike, pictured here, is currently on sale for $2000 CDN. [via PSFK]
Wow is the right word for Brisbane's latest fest: the Women of the World Festival. Returning to the city as part of the Commonwealth Games' cultural offshoot, aka The Festival, WOW is all about celebrating ladies being awesome. It might sound obvious, but it's never a bad time to showcase the ace feats achieved by women — while also exploring the issues that still remain around gender equality. Taking place from April 6 to 8 at the Brisbane Powerhouse, WOW will feature women from more than 20 Commonwealth nations, taking part in talks, performances, exhibitions, workshops and panels, plus speed mentoring sessions, yoga classes, skateboarding, Femi-oke and more. There'll also be a healing space and a marketplace, including meditation and shopping (and both, if that's what helps you de-stress). Highlights include Hot Brown Honey's return, interactive feminism sessions for kids under 10, a panel on the politics of hair, and classes on everything from juggling, journalling and dance to using tools and online safety. Or, mosey on over to New Farm Park on April 7 for The Beautiful Game, a creative take on football and its roots featuring armour, an oversized football and bike-riding referees.
The next time that you see Hannah Gadsby on your screen, they'll be in feel-good mode. There's a wedding to talk about — their own, to their producer Jenney Shamash — after all. And, you'll be seeing the Australian comedian share the details, and dive into the politics around nuptials, plus homophobic bakers, queer domesticity and bunnies, too, very soon: on Tuesday, May 9, in fact. Get ready for Something Special, Gadsby's new comedy special — and their third with Netflix following smash-hit Nanette and then Douglas. Based on their recent stand-up show Body of Work, announced in 2022 and filmed at the Sydney Opera House that same year, it's being pegged as "their first feel-good romantic comedy show" — but still with Gadsby's usual wit, insights and sense of humour. "I didn't say who it's a feel-good show for," noted Gadsby's in Netflix's announcement. "I feel real good." It's been a huge few years for the Tasmanian-born talent, and they keep going from strength to strength onstage — and on-screen. Indeed, when the time came for Gadsby to initially follow up international smash-hit show Nanette, that seemed a rather difficult task. After all, the one-performer stand-up set copped serious praise on its 18-month travels across Australia and the UK, even scooping the top honours at both the Melbourne International Comedy Festival and Edinburgh Festival Fringe — and, of course, spawning its very own Netflix special. But, then Douglas was born, with Gadsby returning to the stage with a performance named after a pet pooch. While Nanette pulled apart the concept of comedy itself, dishing up an insight into Gadsby's past, Douglas took comedy fans on a "tour from the dog park to the renaissance and back". It made its way across stages around Australia and New Zealand in late 2019 and early 2020, and then hit Netflix in 2020 as well. After that came Body of Work — first as a live show again, and now as Netflix special Something Special, too. It's the first release in Gadsby's new a multi-title deal with the streaming platform that is also set to span a new multi-comic special featuring gender-diverse performers. Something Special doesn't yet have a trailer, but you can check out Nanette and Douglas' sneak peeks in the interim below: Hannah Gadsby's Something Special Netflix special will be available to stream from Tuesday, May 9, 2023. Images: Jess Gleeson/Netflix © 2023.
Two Chicago-based designers have come up with an entertaining and sustainable solution to their city's heavy winter snowfall. Noel Turgeon and Natalya Egon's Second Hinterlands Project proposes to turn Chicago's snow into a playground for young and old alike. The project suggests that instead of spending large amounts of money removing the snow, certain areas could be left snow covered, and the remaining snow strategically relocated to this uncleared area. In the process a unique new landscape would be created for the locals to interact with and enjoy until the weather starts to thaw. Think giant snow mountains, snow forts, tunnels and other delightful things. Whilst it has basically zero implications for Australia, both designers live in a place where heavy snowfall has an inevitably transformative quality upon the cityscape and upon its citizens' movements, and they want to make this transformation a positive one. "The experience of the city is altered overnight; for a short while the city transforms from a system of streets, transportation networks, landmarks, and nodes into a landscape of concealment and exposed void, dramatically simplified yet overtly dynamic," says Egon on her website. The project won the 2013 competition “COLDSCAPES: New Visions for Cold Weather Cities" organised by Kent State University's Cleveland Urban Design Collaborative (CUDC).
When Joaquin Phoenix and Ridley Scott joined forces in 2000, exploring a brutal (and fictionalised) slice of history in the process, it brought both the actor and the director Oscar nominations. Repeating the feat 23 years after Gladiator, they might be hoping for the same outcome — or better. The new teamup: Napoleon, with Phoenix (Beau Is Afraid) on a campaign to rule France as the movie's namesake, and Scott (House of Gucci) also returning to a period he dived into in his debut feature The Duellists back in 1977. The focus this time is clearly all there in the title, charting Napoleon Bonaparte's rise to French Emperor, then fall from the post. No, ABBA's 'Waterloo' doesn't feature in the film's just-dropped first trailer. Present instead is a whole lot of wars being waged in a quest to first fight for and then to hold onto power, as well an examination of Napoleon's relationship with Joséphine de Beauharnais (Vanessa Kirby, Mission: Impossible — Dead Reckoning Part One). The hat, the determination, the military and political scheming, battle scene after battle scene: they all get a look the Napoleon sneak peek, too, in a movie that's being touted by distributor Sony as boasting "some of the most dynamic practical battle sequences ever filmed". Also accounted for: lines of dialogue, as scripted by All the Money in the World's David Scarpa, establishing Napoleon's arrogance. "I'm the first to admit when I make a mistake. I simply never do," Phoenix notes. When Napoleon hits cinemas Down Under in November, Phoenix and Kirby will be joined on-screen by everyone from Tahar Rahim (The Serpent) as Paul Barras and Ben Miles (Hijack) as Caulaincourt to Ludivine Sagnier (Lupin) as Theresa Cabarrus — plus Catherine Walker (House of Gucci) as Marie-Antoinette, whose fate opens the trailer. After a silver-screen date, the movie is headed to Apple TV+, just like another big flick with a starry cast and an acclaimed octogenarian filmmaker that's on its way before 2023 is out: Martin Scorsese's Killers of the Flower Moon. Check out the first trailer for Napoleon below: Napoleon releases in cinemas Down Under on November 23, 2023.
In 2025, World Margarita Day has been and gone. February 22 might be the official date to say cheers to 'ritas each year, but it isn't the only time to celebrate the beloved drink in Brisbane. Fish Lane decided the extend the fun in 2024, starting its March Into Margarita festivities to dedicate an entire month to margs — on menus in general, as well as at events focusing on the cocktail. This year, from Saturday, March 1–Monday, March 31, the 'rita-fuelled fun is returning. Venues taking part include Bar Brutus, Chu the Phat, Julius, Kiki's, Midtown, Next Episode and Southside, all with special margs available across the month — and some with pop-ups as well. If you're most excited about trying different takes on a classic, your options include a fruit tingle variety at Midtown, a Tommy's yuzu margarita at Chu the Phat, a spicy mango tipple at Julius, and both watermelon and passionfruit at Next Episode. And yes, the OG marg is on offer at a heap of joints. If you're looking for a specific day to head along rather than simply dropping in whenever suits your diary, take inspiration from shindigs such as the Fish Lane March into Margarita Trail on Saturday, March 1. You'll stroll, you'll try different margs — classic and Tommy's — at different bars, and you'll take in the precinct's public artwork and greenery, too. Or, hit up the Margs-a-Million festival. Taking place on Sunday, March 23 (postponed from the week earlier due to Tropical Cyclone Alfred) across two sessions, it'll again see Southside serve up margaritas — ten types this year — and host a mezcal and tequila tasting station. Also, the folks from Baja are joining in to take care of the snacks, and mariachi music will set the mood. Southside and Baja are teaming twice, actually, the second time on Sunday, March 23 for three-course set-menu lunch that'll pair Mexican and Asian-fusion flavours, and also feature a range of agave-based drinks. A few days earlier, on Thursday, March 20, Chu the Phat is hosting The Phat Fiesta, complete with margs given Asian-inspired twists. The Margarita Edit is back at Midtown on Wednesday, March 26, with margs instead of its usual martini spread in the spotlight, plus small plates to line the stomach. Or, each Friday and Saturday in March from 3–5pm, you can head to Hello Please for margs, tacos and ceviche. It was true in 2024 and it remains the same in 2025: with all of this marg-centric fun, if you claim that you don't know what to drink to kick off autumn in Fish Lane, no one will believe you. Images: Pixel Punk.
There's a reason that the Ekka comes with its own public holiday. Brisbanites are set free from work to rush to the Royal Queensland Show, fill themselves up with fried and sugary goodness, then brave the rides and gaze at the fireworks. In 2019, the annual exhibition runs from Friday, August 9 to Sunday, August 18 — and, as always, that means ten days of sideshows, show bags and more. Of course, there's much more going on than that, with everything from animal competitions to cooking demonstrations on the bill. Where else are you going to see a giant pumpkin, pat a pig, eat a strawberry sundae, listen to live music, crash dodgems, throw a ball in a clown's mouth for a prize and take home all the Bertie Beetles you can eat? Specifically on the 2019 lineup, Ekka-goers can also feast their way along King Street, mash buttons at the pinball and games arcade (complete with 50 pinball machines and 20 arcade games), and wander along a 70-metre stretch of Gregory Terrace that'll be turned into a lush green zone. Feeling thirsty afterwards? There'll also be a craft beer alley. Tickets cost $35 for adults, but if you're keen to head by at night, nab a $20 twilight pass — it gets you in from 6pm onwards.
With Sydney in lockdown, Gelato Messina has been pumping out new specials with quite the enthusiasm. That's been great news for dessert fiends not only in the city, but wherever the gelato chain has a store. And, while Messina's latest one-off creation has a strong Sydney skew, you definitely don't need to be familiar with a beloved dish made by pastry chef Andy Bowdy of Enmore's Saga to enjoy a mouthful — or several. Bowdy's peanut butter and banana sundaes have long been considered the stuff of legend in Sydney. Now, Messina is reinventing them as a cookie pie. The gelato brand does like giving other much-loved desserts a twist, as seen with its takes on Iced VoVos, lamingtons, Viennetta, Golden Gaytimes, fairy bread and Cinnabon-style scrolls, so it has plenty of form in this area. Also, Bowdy used to make his cakes in Messina's Rosebery headquarters. This limited release has been dubbed a 'banana split kit', because there's multiple parts to it. You'll get a peanut butter and banana custard cookie pie, which comes topped with peanut crumble — and you'll also nab a one-litre tub of peanut butter and pretzel cluster gelato, a 350-gram serve of dark chocolate fudge sauce and six maraschino cherries. From there, once you've baked your pie, you can scoop gelato on top, pour the sauce and then add a cherry for maximum pie-meets-sundae fun. Like all Messina specials, this one can only be ordered online on Monday, August 30. It will set you back $55 for the kit— and, because Messina's specials always prove popular, the brand is staggering the on-sale times. Accordingly, folks in Queensland and the ACT are able to purchase at 9am, Victorians at 9.30am, and New South Wales customers split across three times depending on the store (with pies from Circular Quay, Surry Hills, Bondi, Randwick and Miranda on sale at 10am; Brighton Le Sands, Tramsheds, Parramatta and Darlinghurst at 10.30am; and Darling Square, Newtown, Rosebery and Penrith at 11am). The catch? You'll have to peel yourself off the couch and head to your local Messina store to pick up your order. They'll be available for collection between Friday, September 3–Sunday, September 5. Sydneysiders, remember to abide by lockdown restrictions when it comes to picking up your pie — with folks in most suburbs required to stick to their Local Government Area, or within five-kilometres from home, and a strict five-kilometre limit in place in LGAs of concern. Melburnians, if lockdown is extended again until then, you'll also only be permitted to travel within a five-kilometre radius to pick up food. Then, after you've got the peanut butter and banana custard cookie pie safely home, you just need to whack it in the oven for 25 minutes at 165 degrees and voila! You can preorder a Messina banana split kit from Monday, August 30, to pick up from Friday, September 3–Sunday, September 5.
2021 is well past halfway through, the pandemic has been going for more than 19 months and two Australian states are in lengthy lockdowns — and Australia's vaccination campaign has only recently started picking up steam. The nation's vax efforts have been plagued by plenty of issues since the beginning of the year, in fact, which means that most folks under 40 have had to wait to get their chance to get jabbed. But, if you've had either your first or second dose on and you'd like to grab a beer in September, here's some fantastic news. Anyone who has rolled up their sleeve at least once can then visit The Brightside on a Friday in September between 5–7pm and nab a beverage — although you will need to donate to Support Act in the process. Originally, good ol' Brighty was going to hand out freebies; however, after being contacted by the Office Of Liquor and Gaming Regulation, plans have changed. So, meet its new Jab Club. The Fortitude Valley spot hasn't yet provided further details about what type of brew or brews will be on offer, or how it'll be checking vaccination status; however, there'll definitely be some love shown to folks who've been jabbed. Brisbane's hospitality venues — and those around Australia — have obviously done it tough during COVID-19 lockdowns and restrictions, which is why the watering hole is celebrating people who've been vaccinated. It's aiming to encourage people to get the jab and help the city — and the country — progress towards fully opening back up, and to a stage where lockdowns, restrictions and limited venue capacities become a thing of the past. The Brightside's Jab Club afternoon follows in the footsteps of other hospo initiatives that endeavour to help boost vaccination rates by rewarding folks who've been vaxxed. The Prince Alfred pub in Melbourne handed out free brews, Hawke's Brewing Co did slabs for jabs, and Sydney's Lord Gladstone Hotel has temporarily renamed itself 'The Lord Jabstone' and is serving up free beers, too. Updated September 3, 2021.
When the Australian Government announced on Sunday night that pubs, bars and nightclubs would be closing the following day to help contain COVID-19, it led to the mass-buying of booze across the country. Bottle shops are not impacted by the closures, but it didn't stop Aussies stocking up just in case. Booze is just the latest item to be targeted by panic-buying, with toilet paper going first, then essential food items. Supermarkets across the country have since introduced strict two-pack-per-person limits on coveted items, such as eggs, sugar, white milk, frozen desserts and canned tomatoes, and now bottle shops are following suit. BWS and Dan Murphy's, who are both owned by the Woolworths Group, introduced temporary limits on alcohol. A statement on the Dan Murphy's website reads, "these limits are in place to ensure everyone has access to the drinks they love". Thankfully, the limits aren't quite as strict as those on food. https://twitter.com/BellTowerTimes/status/1242662405701660672 At Dan Murphy's in NSW, Vic, ACT, Qld, NT, SA and Tas, the limit per customer per day is 18 bottles of wine, three casks of wine, six bottles of spirits and three cases of beer, cider and premix. BWS has implemented similar restrictions, with all states and territories (except for WA) having per customer, per shop limits of 12 bottles of wine, three casks of wine, four bottles of spirits and four cases of beer, spirits, premix and cider. WA has stricter limits, in-line with state regulations, with customers able to buy a maximum of two from the following categories: 11.25 litres of beer, cider or pre-mix spirits; 2.25 litres of wine; one litre of spirits; and one litre of fortified wine. Both chains are also encouraging social distancing, have introduced maximum capacities at their stores, and are offering pick-up and delivery services. The temporary alcohol limits are now in place at stores across the country. To order pick-up and delivery head to the BWS and Dan Murphy's websites. To find out more about the status of COVID-19 in Australia and how to protect yourself, head to the Australian Government Department of Health's website. Top image: Stephen Dann via Flickr.
It's happening again, musical fans: Wicked is returning to Australia. That statement also applies to a mighty magical chance to see the smash-hit show for cheap. Yes, TodayTix is doing another of its ticket lotteries. When a big musical heads our way, there are often two reasons to get excited: the fact that the particular stage show is coming Down Under, and possibly getting to catch it without breaking the bank. That budget-friendly option has spanned everything from Hamilton and Moulin Rouge! to Mary Poppins and Tina — The Tina Turner Musical in recent years — and now it's Wicked's turn. This is an enchanted opportunity to enjoy The Wizard of Oz-inspired show at a discount, with tickets costing just $45. To take part in the lottery, you will need to download the TodayTix app — which is available for iOS and Android — and submit your entry each week for the next week's performances. The lottery will go live at 12.01am AEST every Thursday morning, and is already up and running for its first week. Then, the winners are drawn after 1pm on the following Wednesday. If your name is selected, you'll have an hour to claim your tickets from when you receive the good news. If you need a reminder, you can also sign up for lottery alerts via TodayTix, too. Opening in Sydney on Friday, August 25, Wicked returns to Australia two decades after composer Stephen Schwartz and playwright Winnie Holzman initially took a book that gleaned its influences from The Wizard of Oz, put it to music and turned it into one of Broadway's biggest hits of the 21st century. Even if you haven't seen the blockbuster show before, including on its past Aussie run from 2008–11, then you've likely heard of it. Following the Land of Oz's witches — telling their untold true tale is the musical's whole angle, in fact — Wicked has notched up more awards than you can fit in a hefty cauldron over the years. That includes three Tonys from ten nominations, a Grammy, an Olivier Award and six Drama Desk Awards. Story-wise, Wicked starts before The Wizard of Oz and continues its narrative after Dorothy Gale lands, adapting Gregory Maguire's 1995 novel Wicked: The Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West. The text itself has sold 5.5 million copies, including five million since the musical first opened. Here, before Dorothy blows in, two other women meet in the Land of Oz: Elphaba and Galinda. One will later be known as the Wicked Witch of the West, while the other will become Glinda the Good Witch. Exactly why that happens, and how, and the pair's relationship from rivals to unlikely friends to grappling with their new labels, fuels the show's tale. There's no word yet if Wicked will also hit up other Aussie cities, with only a Sydney season locked in so far. Pop on your ruby slippers and click your heels three times in hope that'll defy gravity in Melbourne, Brisbane and more afterwards — or make a Harbour City date ASAP. Wicked will open its Australian-premiere season at Sydney Lyric from Friday, August 25. To enter the TodayTix $45 lottery, download the company's iOS or Android app, and head to the company's website for more information — and to set up an alert. Images: Joan Marcus.
Any animated film buff should know about Hayao Miyazaki. As one of Japan’s greatest animators and story tellers, Miyazaki has created some iconic pieces of Japanese cinema. Movies such as Spirited Away, Laputa: Castle In The Sky and Nausicaa of the Valley of the Wind have become much loved in Japan and internationally. If you are yet to see any of these movies but really, really want to, you’re in luck. Palace Centro Cinemas are playing select Japanese anime in their Pop-Up Manga Film Festival. Miyazaki favourites and other cherished titles will be screened throughout July; a different movie will be played each Friday night and Saturday day. These movies rival Disney classics in scope, style and imagination. Check out the schedule below to see which week your favourite falls on: Friday Jun 28 8:45pm Spirited Away [PG] - Buy Tickets Friday Jul 5 8:45pm Nausicaa of the Valley of the Wind [PG] - Buy Tickets Friday Jul 12 8:45pm Arrietty [G] - Buy Tickets Friday Jul 19 8:45pm My Neighbor Totoro [G] 25th anniversary screening! - Buy Tickets Friday Jul 26 8:45pm From Up On Poppy Hill [G] - Buy Tickets Saturday Jun 29 12pm My Neighbor Totoro [G] 25th anniversary screening - Buy Tickets Saturday Jul 6 12pm Laputa Castle in the Sky [G] - Buy Tickets Saturday Jul 13 12pm From up on Poppy Hill [G] - Buy Tickets Saturday Jul 20 12pm Arrietty [G] - Buy Tickets Saturday Jul 27 12pm Kiki's Delivery Service [G] - Buy Tickets
Oceans cover 70 percent of the world’s surface. With most of our population hugging the coast, Australia has a unique relationship with the water. Our beach and surf culture has evolved uniquely from the rest of the world and the sea holds an important place in most Australians hearts. Photographer Mark Tipple has set about capturing unique moments not just from the sand but from underneath the breaks. Tipple combines his documentary photography skills and his surfing background to reveal a hidden and amazing world. Always curious about what he looked like whilst duck-diving under waves, Mark tried several strategies (including helmets, cameras and weight belts) before realising the best approach would be to jump off the board. Tipple’s Underwater Project is the culmination of several years of shoots, capturing the interaction between man and the waves, and the unfolding narrative of everyday nature. There seems a natural connection between photography and surfing. Both rely on certain elements out of your control coming together at the right time in the right combination. Fortunately for us, Tipple has had plenty of luck and caught some amazing shots.
Have you seen The Shining so many times that you exclaim "here's Johnny!" whenever you walk into a room? That's understandable — Stanley Kubrick's adaptation of Stephen King's horror classic is one of the best and most beloved frightfests of all time. It's even about to get a sequel. If you're a super Shining fan, no doubt you've seen Room 237, which dives deep into the many, many theories surrounding the film. But, have you watched the flick forwards and backwards? As started as a fascinating experiment back in 2011, then mentioned in 2012 documentary and even doing the rounds of select festivals afterwards, The Shining Forwards and Backwards is exactly what it sounds like. The film will be played both forwards and backwards at the same time, with one superimposed over the other. The results: well, let's just say some aspects of the movie coincide in an uncanny way thanks to Kubrick's love of symmetry. Experience it for yourself on February 10, with Brisbane cult film buff Kristian Fletcher hosting a screening at Metro Arts' Lumen Room at 7.30pm. Or, if you'd rather just stick with the regular — and excellent — flick, it's playing in its usual format beforehand at 5pm, and at 9.30pm on February 9 as well.
The Gold Coast, with its enviable combination of good weather and beaches, already gives off festival vibes all year round. But the real kicker happens when you add beer to all of that goodness. Add vitamins B (beer) and C (cider) to the vitamin D you cop on the coast with the Crafted Beer and Cider Festival, which takes place for 2021 from 12–9pm on Saturday, September 11. Held at Kurrawa Park in Broadbeach each year, the beer festival will unite more than 40 of Australia's top craft breweries, over 250 different brews, and some good food and live music to line your stomachs and ears. It's as good an excuse as any for a cheeky getaway to the Goldy. Locals like Balter Brewing Company, Black Hops Brewing and Currumbin Valley Brewing will be joining up with visitors from elsewhere in Queensland and interstate, such as Brouhaha Brewery, Heads of Noosa, Soapbox Beer and Gage Roads Brewing Co — and that's but a few of the many beer houses to be represented on the day. More of a cider person? Expect a range of cideries making the pilgrimage to the Coast, too. Food-wise, there'll be food trucks and other street food eats, spanning tacos, wings, toasties, calamari, pizzas and more. As for music lineup, Luca Brasi, Teenage Joans, Electrik Lemonade, Debbies, The Flowers, Pure Milk and Beatniks DJs are among the acts providing the soundtrack to your day. Also on the day's agenda is beer yoga, where you can perform a few downward dogs before you down your beer — it's all about balance, after all. Or, play ping pong, shoot hoops and take part in a beer paddle race.
With names like Pixar and Dreamworks playing king pins in the world of animation, we tend to forget the little guys. From the Academy Award winners and nominees of the Best Animated shorts — watch 2014’s winner Mr Hublot — to our own Brisbane-creations, born at the hands of dozens of local talents, animation is something that has long deserved its own celebration. And QUT’S creative showcase ANtIMATION is just that — three weeks of hip-hip-hooray for all things pixelled. Presenting a huge range of creative work, ANtIMATION highlights the many materials, techniques, and languages that animators tend to utilise when it comes their craft. The work of international artists Philipp Artus (GERMANY), Piotr Duma?a (POLAND), Dustin Grella (USA), Max Hattler (UK), Don Hertzfeldt (USA), jonobr1 + lullatone (USA), Aaron Koblin (USA) and nerdworking (ISTANBUL) will be on show. And from our own haul, there’ll be Igor Coric, Chris Howlett, Jules & Miles, Isobel Knowles & Van Sowerwine, Merri Randall and Georgie Roxby-Smith. There’s a huge world beyond Disney and Pixar, and ANtIMATION invites you to discover just that.
After introducing Australian tastebuds to the double cheeseburger pie — and Tasmanian scallop pies, bangers and mash pies, and chicken parmigiana pies, too — the team at Banjo's Bakery Cafe has launched another culinary hybrid. Pastry is a feature, as usual. This time, though, it encloses layers of pasta, beef mince, tomato, vegetables and cheese. Yes, lasagne pies are now a real thing that exists on the bakery chain's menu. Melbourne's Pie Thief has been doing them since 2019, but now Banjo's is serving up its own version. And, yes, they're exactly what they sound like. The aim: to satisfy your cravings when you just can't bring yourself to choose between a pie and a slice of lasagne. If you're a little indecisive when it comes to choosing what to eat in general, you're probably already a big fan of food mashups that find ways to combine two popular dishes — and you'll likely want to add this one to your must-try list. The lasagne pies have joined Banjo's signature range, alongside the aforementioned other creative varieties. They'll be available from the company's stores from today, Wednesday, May 5, as well as via online click-and-collect orders and Uber Eats deliveries. In NSW, you'll need to head north to Glendale to get your fix. In Victoria, stores are located in Mornington, Traralgon and Mildura. Queenslanders can pick from ten spots, including Darra, Cleveland, Park Ridge and Redcliffe, while pie-loving SA residents can hit up Glenelg — and there's 29 stores in Tasmania. Banjo's Bakery Cafe's lasagne pie is currently on the menu at the chain's stores nationally. To find your nearest location, visit the company's website.
Nick Cave, skateboarding? Nick Cave, skateboarding? NICK CAVE, SKATEBOARDING? Any way you say it, it sounds more like a metaphor than something that happens in real life. But according to Aussie skateboarding company Fast Times, the 57-year-old singer-songwriter is a "good friend and customer". And so, the poet and the skater have teamed up for a next level (and rather odd) merch project: the official Nick Cave skateboard. Rock art illustrator Chuck Sperry, who hails from San Francisco, is the man behind the design. Drawing on 'Nature Boy' for inspiration, a song from Cave's 2004 album Abattoir Blues, Sperry has created a female figure with wild blonde hair surrounded by flowers. Cave's lyrics are included: "She moves among the flowers, she floats upon the smoke, she moves among the shadows, she moves me with just one look." If you've been too busy sitting at home poring over poetry to learn to skate, you could always use it as a pretty striking wall hanging. And the good news for art collectors is that it's a limited edition. Alternatively, you could just settle for the t-shirt. By way of spreading the word on their collaboration, Cave and Fast Times have released a promo video, soundtracked by 'Nature Boy' and featuring some super-slick moves. Via Pitchfork.
Some venues tell you exactly what they're about right there in their name, and Bridge Road Brewers' latest location is one of them. The pop-up watering hole's moniker: 'A Bar Made of Cardboard'. And yes, that label is 100-percent accurate. At this short-term spot at East Brunswick Village in Melbourne, cardboard features everywhere. It has been fashioned into tables and chairs, so patrons will sit on it — and at it. It's been turned into shelves, signs and light fittings as well. In fact, the only things that aren't made of cardboard are the beer taps, fridges and dishwasher, for obvious (and soggy) reasons. The aim: to set up a completely zero-waste bar while Bridge Road Brewers works on opening its second brewery in the same location. Come December this year, it'll be home to a 350-person venue — but, while that's in the works, A Bar Made of Cardboard can welcome in 60 beer lovers inside and out for the next six months. Cardboard designers Boxwars and industrial packaging specialists Kebet Packaging have helped Bridge Road Brewers out with their temporary cardboard digs — and, yes, the whole place has been fashioned to be sturdy, as well as eco-friendly. Thanks to all that cardboard, the venue is entirely constructed from materials that are either recycled themselves — the cardboard is made up of at least 75-percent recycled material, in fact — or can be reused, recycled or composted. "We're opening our first metro brewpub in Brunswick East later this year and we can't wait to be a part of the community, so we decided to give locals a taste of what's to come with a pop-up. However, not just any old pop-up, but a unique one that celebrates the idea of its temporary nature while being mindful of our environmental impact," says Bridge Road Brewers founder Ben Kraus. "A Bar Made of Cardboard will only operate for six months before we open our permanent Melbourne home around the corner, so the space allows us to have a bit of fun and share what we do in Beechworth, all while doing the right thing from a sustainability perspective." If you're keen to head by, the pop-up opens on Friday, April 22, operating from Wednesday–Sunday. Bridge Road Brewers' full range of core and seasonal beers will rotate through the bar's six bar taps, and there's also a wine list that heroes small wine producers from throughout Victoria's High Country. And, an onsite bottle shop will be selling all of the above, plus Victorian spirits as well. In the bar, you can sip the latter as well — aka small-batch spirits and aperitifs which comes courtesy of Barking Owl Gin and Beechworth Bitters Amaro from Provenance's Michael Ryan. And, snacks-wise, Chappy's Chips and Mount Zero Olives feature on the menu, plus there'll be food trucks serving up meals on Friday and Saturday evenings. Find A Bar Made of Cardboard by Bridge Road Brewers at East Brunswick Village, 129 Nicholson Street, Brunswick East from Friday, April 22 — open from 4pm–late Wednesday–Friday and 12pm–late Saturday–Sunday. Images: Kristoffer Paulsen.
Nothing like an award to stir up fresh interest in an established restaurant; a title like ‘Restaurant of the Year’ certainly does have some pulling power. Black Hide Steakhouse by Gambaro, having been awarded that very title (along with Best Steak Restaurant) at the 2014 Queensland Restaurant & Caterers Awards for Excellence on Monday, September 8, was full to the brim at our midweek dinner time visit a couple of days later. The title is yet another feather in Black Hide’s cap, following their receipt of a Good Food Guide Chef's Hat earlier this year. Regardless, Brisbane carnivores don’t need much convincing to visit this already highly regarded steakhouse. The menu, devised by head chef Lukas McEwan (formerly of Sydney’s Rockpool), features Angus, Wagyu and organic cuts of meat (sourced from Stanbroke Beef), which are cooked on the restaurant’s Montague Broiler Grill. It seems to do a good job. We recommend the Wagyu rib eye (note: the price is a bit hefty at $57.50). Though all steaks come with Wagyu fat roasted royal blue potatoes, rosemary and garlic (and your choice of sauce), consider it a garnish. The hand-cut fat chips with aioli ($9.50) are quite special, and if you’re in the market for a decadent extra, the bone marrow with parsley, caper and eschallot salad ($12.90) is hard to overlook. Accompanied by grilled bread, the richness of the marrow is nicely offset by the zesty saltiness of the salad. If you are the type of person for whom too much beef is never enough, precede your main with the steak tartare served with cornichons, chilli, eschallot and crostini ($19.50). Though if you’re after a bit of variety, the share plates deliver. The delicately flavoured beetroot and horseradish cured salmon with celeriac remoulade ($22.50) whets the appetite. Service is attentive and the interior is warm (literally. Possibly even a little hot). Though dimly lit almost to a fault, the atmosphere is very agreeable. This is just as well, as it may take you a little while to polish off your steak. Especially if you’ve selected the 1200g Tomahawk.
It's about to get a whole lot harder for any Queensland driver to get away with using their mobile phone while driving, or for a driver or front seat passenger to fail to wear a seatbelt for that matter — and it's thanks to new state-of-the art safety cameras being installed to detect the illegal behaviour. Starting today, Monday, July 27, the Queensland Government is launching a trial of the phone and seatbelt detection cameras. The test phase will run until Christmas and then, if successful, the cameras could be rolled out across the state permanently. So, how do they work? Well, the cameras will take high-resolution images of the front seat of the car, and those images are then scanned by artificial intelligence to detect folks either using their phones while they're behind the wheel, or not wearing seatbelts if they're driving or sitting in the front passenger seat. The cameras can apparently operate in all conditions, day and night, and regardless of the weather — and they can watch vehicles across multi-traffic lanes, whether installed on overpasses and bridges, or operating from trailers by the roadside. The new technology will be tested across several metro and regional locations, according to the government, with the trial following the launch of similar world-first cameras in NSW. Victoria has just announced that it'll be testing mobile phone detection cameras as well; however only Queensland's cameras will also capture folks who don't wear a seatbelt. During Sydney's six-month trial of the cameras in early 2019 — before they were rolled out permanently in late 2019 — the cameras spied more than 100,000 drivers illegally using their phones. [caption id="attachment_742763" align="alignnone" width="1920"] A photo taken during the NSW camera trial[/caption] Earlier this year, Queensland implemented new penalties for using your mobile phone while driving — with those caught with their device in their hands and being used for any reason, even when stopped at traffic lights or in congested traffic, facing $1000 fines and the loss of four demerit points. That said, the state government will not be handing out any fines to those captured by the new cameras during the trial, or sending photographs to those involved. Rather, they'll be evaluating the effectiveness of the cameras. Still, if you're wondering about privacy concerns, images will only be used to identify mobile phone use and the wearing of seatbelts, and to check the registration status of the vehicle. "Images that do not contain any illegal mobile phone use or failure to wear a seatbelt will be deleted by the system in a short timeframe," the government advises. Queensland's six-month trial of safety cameras starts on Monday, July 27. To find out more, head to the Queensland Government website.
Every evening between now and October 2, Alice Springs will be the brightest place in Australia. Lights will illuminate a 2.5-kilometre stretch of the nearby MacDonnell Ranges, and luminous artwork will be projected onto the city's desert sands — and yes, that's just the beginning of the region's glowing wonders. Both form part of Parrtjima – A Festival in Light, which holds the honour of being the nation's first Indigenous festival of its kind. Showcasing contemporary and traditional Indigenous art, culture and stories using light and sound, it's also Australia's biggest-ever light installation. It is created by the Northern Territory Government and local artists in collaboration with AGB Events (aka the folks that light up Sydney each year for Vivid), after all. Visitors won't just celebrate Aboriginal culture by basking in the glory of a glimmering 300-million-year-old land mass — they'll also play a part in choosing just how the Ranges come to glowing life. An interactive component, called Range of Expression, allows festival-goers to pick their favourite colours and then see them projected onto the vast landscape. Looking down rather than up, Grounded immerses attendees in a sequence of artworks symbolising the return of Indigenous art to the country. The festival also features three light-filled caterpillar installations that tell the Yeperenye Dreamtime story, as well as five illuminated '50s-style skirts covered in watercolour landscape paintings by Alice Springs artists, including Albert Namatjira's granddaughter Lenie Namatjira. And while Parrtjima only brightens up the outback for ten nights, it's hoped that it'll become an annual drawcard. Parrtjima – A Festival in Light runs until October 2 in the Alice Springs Desert Park, Norther Territory. For more information, visit the festival website. Images: James Horan.
January 26 as been given many labels. On a difficult occasion, Survival Day is one of them. Commemorating and celebrating the endurance of Australia's Indigenous population, marking the date involves recognising and paying tribute to the nation's First Peoples in morning ceremonies. In Brisbane, the Benarrawa Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Solidarity Group and Benarrawa Community Development Association will lead a gathering along the banks of the Brisbane River and Benarrawa (Oxley Creek). Meeting at the bronze canoe near Simpsons Playground in Graceville, the event will pay tribute to the original inhabitants of the area, with all Australians welcome to participate. Attendees are asked to arrive at 7.15am for a 7.30am start, and to bring clap sticks, a hat and native flowers, with the posies cast into the river at the end of the ceremony. Also recommended: bringing a rug or chair to sit on. Following the official proceedings, everyone is also invited to stay for a bite and a drink, so don't forget your cold or hot beverage of choice and a plate to share. Top image: Kgbo via Wikimedia Commons.
To criticise a Tarantino film is an undertaking not without its share of reservation. Perhaps even trepidation. The first instinct is self-doubt: “Did I miss something? Was I simply in the wrong mood? Is three hours just the norm now?” After so many hits, there's an almost ‘infallibility’ to the man, a near reverential status through which both fans and critics dismiss any purported shortcomings as either misinterpretations or outright lunacy on your part. There’s no denying Tarantino’s talent – he’s a writer and director of extraordinary vision whose early films in particular command regular repeat viewing. But he is, ultimately, just a man. And men, and their movies, sometimes fall short of perfection. So, then, we come to The Hateful Eight, the opening titles of which declare it 'the 8th film by Quentin Tarantino’ (Kill Bill is counted as just one film for those playing at home). It’s also the second (though presumably not last) western from a director who recently said "you have to make at least three Westerns to call yourself a Western director. Anything else, you're just dabbling". Set in the unforgiving snowy mountains of Wyoming a few years after the Civil War, the film's a slow-burn thriller played out almost entirely in two tiny, cramped locations: a four-person stagecoach and an isolated cabin by the name of 'Minnie’s Haberdashery'. Cast-wise, many of the Tarantino regulars are there, along with a handful of newcomers. Kurt Russell leads the pack as John ‘the Hangman’ Ruth, a ridiculously moustachioed bounty hunter escorting wanted felon Daisy Domergue (Jennifer Jason Leigh) to the gallows. Along the way they happen upon two additional passengers: fellow bounty hunter Major Marquis Warren (Samuel L Jackson) and the soon-to-be local Sheriff Chris Mannix (Walton Goggins). Tarantino’s opening dialogues have become iconic, and this one's so long it comprises the entire first two ‘chapters’ of The Hateful Eight, accounting for almost a full hour of the film. It’s not without its charms, but compared to the unrelenting tension of Inglorious Basterds, or the glorious bastardry of Reservoir Dogs, this feels overblown and indulgent. By far its most compelling character is also its least involved: Daisy, a feral, black-eyed murderess whose wry smile after having her nose broken offers more menace and mystery than the sixty minutes of material that surrounds it. The remainder of the film plays out at Minnie’s, and if nothing else it’s a masterclass in cinematography. Shot on Ultra Panavision 70mm film stock (last used fifty years ago on Khartoum), Tarantino captures astounding depth and detail within an almost impossibly small space. It’s here, too, where we discover the rest of the ‘eight’: the loner cowboy (Michael Madsen), the Confederate General (Bruce Dern), the dandy Hangman (Tim Roth) and the Mexican stablehand (Demian Bechir). Trapped by the blizzard outside that absolutely makes you feel cold, suspicions steadily compound until, inevitably, tensions boil over into a phenomenally violent conclusion. That’s no spoiler, by the way. It’s just Tarantino. There’s still a lot to like about The Hateful Eight. The performances are outstanding, the story’s engaging and it’s peppered with all the usual Tarantino easter eggs (Red Apple cigarettes, anyone?). The score, too, by veteran composer Ennio Morricone is terrific, so unsettling it almost deserves to be christened the ‘hateful ninth’. Like Django Unchained before it, race relations (or the lack thereof) underscore much of the movie's themes, representing a definite politicalisation for the director, whose script offers up lines such as “when n****** are scared, that's when white folks are safe”, later countered with “the only time black folks are safe is when white folks is disarmed”. Ultimately, though, length returns as the film’s principal failing. It’s so long that some cinemas are even showing it with a 12-minute intermission, and it's hard not to escape the feeling that a concerted edit down to 90 minutes would have robbed it of nothing whilst ensuring the wonderful 'slow burn' steered clear of 'sluggishness'. …unless I just missed something? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gnRbXn4-Yis
Google autocomplete results are often unintentionally hilarious and weirdly sad at the same time. But have you ever thought of them as an art form? Google Poetics is a Tumblr blog where users are invited to submit screenshots of their own 'Google poems'. After his generic Google search resulted in the strangely poetic "am I an alcoholic / am I fit to drive/ am I allergic to dogs / tell me, Andriy, am I", Finnish comedy writer Sampsa Nuotio experimented with a few more 'poems' and posted them on Facebook, where they were spotted by Raisa Omaheimo, who convinced him to set up the original Finnish-language version of the blog. Since then, Google Poetics has been expanded into 11 different languages and been featured in the Huffington Post, the Guardian, the Telegraph, and the New Yorker, and it's also inspired a 'googlepoems' page on Reddit. Co-founder Omaheimo says that she saw the poems as a kind of surreal art form, similar to The Situationists or the Fluxus movement. "I'm constantly touched and amused by the vision of a modern human being that these poems paint us," she said in a Huffington Post interview. "Many of us have these moments where we ponder questions like 'why am I single' or 'how big is the universe'. It is in a way extremely comforting to know this to be so. And also deeply amusing." See more of their sublime examples at Google Poetics.
If breakfast is the most important meal of the day and dinner is the tastiest, where does that leave lunch? Working the daily grind often leaves the midday meal as an afterthought. That great life hack of meal prepping is specifically conceived so you don't have to think about what to have for lunch each day — after all, we make enough decisions on a daily basis that one less choice can have a near meditative effect. But if lunch is an afterthought, there are ways to make sure it becomes a highlight of your day. We've teamed up with Yumi's to compile a list of seven easy lunch hacks that will make you look forward to lunch every day. [caption id="attachment_816218" align="alignnone" width="1920"] Mae Mu (Unsplash)[/caption] KEEP YOUR OWN LOAF OF BREAD IN YOUR DESK — AND BRING YOUR OWN SANDWICH FILLINGS There's a reason that the humble sandwich has long been the perfect office lunch for a busy worker with little time to spare. Not only can you hold it in one hand, but it's easy to make, super transportable, and, more importantly, the possibilities are endless — from choice of bread to choice of fillings. You could have a sandwich five days a week and have a different meal every day. Perhaps, though, its greatest strength is also its biggest downfall. How many times have you pre-made a delicious sandwich only to unwrap it at lunchtime and be greeted with a disintegrating, soggy mess? The solution is more simple than you think. Buy a loaf of bread, keep it in your desk and bring in your fillings. You could do this every day or prep it properly, bring in your week's worth of fillings each Monday and stack your sarnie when the lunchtime hunger hits. It's simple, fresh and won't leave you with more mess than meal. STORE YUMI'S DIPS AND VEGGIE BITES AT WORK Getting snacky while working in an office (or 'studio' or 'base' or whatever terminology you choose to use), is hardly an uncommon occurrence. In fact, one of the great joys of parking yourself in a chair all day is — and we speak from experience here — the quick hit of joy that a cheeky snack can provide. We like to keep it classy with crudités, crackers and dip. And with over 20 varieties of dip on offer, Yumi's covers the full gamut of snacktime cravings. We love the creamy avo with sea salt, while the sweet potato and roasted cashew is also a winner. They're versatile, too — you can use them as an alternative spread for that fresh sandwich you've got in your meal plan. If you feel like biting into something, Yumi's veggie bites are a quick easy snack hack. The great range of flavours jazz up just about any savoury plate (not to mention the otherwise sad salad you were probably going to tolerate for lunch). Just pop them in the microwave for 30 seconds and you're good to go. They come in resealable bags, too, making storage — and freshness — a cinch. [caption id="attachment_816227" align="alignnone" width="1920"] Karolina Kolodziejczak (Unsplash)[/caption] BRING YOUR OWN PLATES This might seem a bit extra, but hear us out. Long lunches seem to be a thing of the past — the desk lunch, sadly, is often our only respite from the storm of work. Even if you do go to the effort of taking your lunch out of the Tupperware (or the container you had it delivered in), it's not exactly inspiring when you're staring down at the same crockery every day. A simple solution? Bring in your own. You probably already have your own mug, so it's really just the next step in making your work day that little bit more personal. [caption id="attachment_816238" align="alignnone" width="1920"] Nielsen Ramon (Unsplash)[/caption] ORGANISE A LUNCH SWAP WITH COLLEAGUES Be honest with yourself: how many times have you had the same thing for lunch five days in a row? That Sunday meal prep is a time- and money-saver, sure, but it doesn't actually offer much in the way of variety. Mix it up with an office lunch swap. The benefits of such an arrangement are many and varied — you can connect with your colleagues on a whole new level (that, hopefully, doesn't involve either party exchanging passive-aggressive emails), potentially save yourself time (and money), but, more importantly, it will spare you from eating the same thing day in, day out. If you're looking for a lunchtime shake-up, this could be just the fix you need. [caption id="attachment_816251" align="alignnone" width="1920"] Maddi Bazzocco (Unsplash)[/caption] ADD SOME CRUNCH TO YOUR LUNCH So you've gone for the desk salad. But it doesn't need to be sad — even if it has been sitting in the fridge all day. Spruce up that bowl by adding a bit of crunch. Chopped nuts, grains, and dukkah are go-to additions for when we want to top up a bowl, adding a bit of texture to what could otherwise be a bit of a floppy bore. Nuts and grains also have a number of nutrition benefits, so it's a great way to make that healthy lunch work even harder for your body. Another hot tip: keep a pack of Yumi's Falafels or Veggie Bites on hand, and throw a few in your bowl to take your salad to the next level. [caption id="attachment_816254" align="alignnone" width="1920"] Tetiana Bykovets (Unsplash)[/caption] MAKE A MEAL OF IT — AND HAVE A SQUARE OR TWO OF DARK CHOCOLATE FOR DESSERT We all know that a meal isn't really a meal unless you have dessert. But you don't have to forego the experience just because you're having lunch in the office. The benefits of dark chocolate have been long proven: it's packed with antioxidants, fibre, minerals, and can improve blood flow to the brain as it contains stimulants like caffeine and theobromine. It's not only a great way to end your lunch on a sweet note but it will ensure that you power through the afternoon. [caption id="attachment_816256" align="alignnone" width="1920"] Priscilla du Preez (Unsplash)[/caption] ACTUALLY MAKE TIME FOR A LUNCH BREAK, AWAY FROM YOUR DESK (AND WORK) We're all so busy these days. Busyness is almost like a badge of honour or an ongoing game of oneupmanship that borders on masochism. But we should never be too busy to look after ourselves. Leaving that report to the afternoon isn't going to make that much of a difference in the scheme of things, no matter what the artificial stress of work life tells us. Stepping away from your desk — even just for 15 minutes — has even been shown to improve productivity thanks to the energy and focus recharge that a lunch break can provide, and can also boost your creativity. You'll also be less inclined to have that regular afternoon slump that even the most seemingly untouchable are prone to. No time for the full lunch break? Even a stroll around the block is a great way to get the blood flowing, which will have you ready to tackle that afternoon to-do list. For more healthy lunch hacks, check out the full range of Yumi's falafels, veggie bites and dips.
Extended non-stop flights that almost take an entire day. Airlines specifically for arts, snow sports and craft beer. One brand that specifically focuses on millennial passengers. Planes free of single-use plastic. Air travel is an ever-changing realm, but the industry's latest development might just be its most curious — although it relates to a matter that everyone has an opinion on. The subject of countless stand-up routines, a topic of conversation any time flights come up and a part of the journey plenty of folks dread, airline food is hardly anyone's favourite meal. But United Airlines is testing that idea by releasing its own cookbook inspired by the dishes that it serves up in the air. With coconut soup with sambal oelek chicken just one of the 40 meals featured, the carrier hasn't published a collection of recipes dedicated to economy fare. Rather, the United Polaris Cookbook is based on its business and first-class offerings. The cookbook has been created in collaboration with the airline's executive chefs, as well as those from the Trotter Project — a non-profit organisation started by chef Charlie Trotter to provide opportunities to wannabe culinary stars who mightn't have the means to pursue cooking as a career otherwise. For those eager to fly high in the kitchen, the cookbook is on sale now for US$29.99. Whether the end results really do taste like airline food or something much more gourmet, whipping a few dishes up yourself is certainly cheaper than a business-class ticket.
When Australia started to get excited about Brisbane potentially hosting the 2032 Olympic Games — with the Queensland capital named as the preferred host last month — one important detail stood out. Planning for an event 11 years away is all well and good (and necessary, of course), but the 2020 Tokyo Olympics hasn't yet been held, with the Games postponed to 2021 due to the pandemic. Given that COVID-19 case numbers are still high around the world, there has been much speculation about whether the Tokyo Olympics will go ahead this year, too; however, Japan is currently forging ahead with its plans. Much will likely be different about the event, which is slated to run from Friday, July 23–Sunday, August 8 — and a total lack of overseas spectators is one of the big changes. First reported earlier in March, and confirmed in a statement issued on Saturday, March 20, the five Japanese bodies organising the games — the International Olympic Committee (IOC), the International Paralympic Committee (IPC), the Tokyo Metropolitan Government (TMG), the Organising Committee Tokyo 2020 and the Government of Japan — have decided to exclude international fans from attending both the Olympics and the Paralympics. "Currently, the COVID-19 situation in Japan and many other countries around the world is still very challenging and a number of variant strains have emerged, whilst international travel remains severely restricted globally," the Tokyo Olympics organisers said. "Based on the present situation of the pandemic, it is highly unlikely that entry into Japan will be guaranteed this summer for people from overseas," the statement continued. At present, restrictions on international travellers entering Japan are in place in general. With that in mind, organisers said that "in order to give clarity to ticket holders living overseas and to enable them to adjust their travel plans at this stage, the parties on the Japanese side have come to the conclusion that they will not be able to enter into Japan at the time of the Olympic and Paralympic Games. This conclusion will further contribute to ensure safe and secure Games for all participants and the Japanese public. In line with their principle of safety first for all participants and out of respect for all the parties on the Japanese side, the IOC and IPC announced in today's Five Parties meeting that they fully respect and accept this conclusion." Refunds will be issued to current ticketholders from overseas, who'll be contacted with more information about getting their money back. Tokyo Olympics organisers are yet to confirm capacity levels for the Games, including whether Japanese spectators will be permitted to attend at all, too; however, a decision on the topic is expected in April. For more information about the 2020 Tokyo Olympic Games, which are due to be held from Friday, July 23–Sunday, August 8, 2021, head to the event's website. Images: IOC Media.
Thanks to seminal documentaries such as The Endless Summer, excellent action flicks like Point Break and even the formulaic cheesiness such as Blue Crush, surfing is no stranger to cinemas. Big waves and big screens go hand in hand quite often, in fact, as seen in everything from beach party flicks like Gidget, surf dramas such as Drift, docos including Morning of the Earth and even the animated likes of Ride Your Wave. The next addition to the ever-growing surf movie genre: documentary Girls Can't Surf, which heads back to the 80s and into the backlash by female surfers against the male-dominated industry. Sick of being told that professional surfing wasn't for them — and being considered a gimmick, sideshow and complete afterthought compared to their male peers — a group of women fought back, striving for equal pay and treatment. Yes, this doco features an important story — as told through interviews with pioneering female surfers such as Jodie Cooper, Frieda Zamba, Pauline Menczer, Lisa Andersen, Pam Burridge, Wendy Botha and Layne Beachley. Behind the lens, it's directed by Christopher Nelius, who is no stranger to the waves thanks to 2012's Storm Surfers 3D. With summer now in full swing, the arrival of Girls Can't Surf's trailer couldn't be better timed — although you will have to wait to see the film itself. After being selected as part of the 2020 Tribeca Film Festival, it'll premiere locally at the Perth Arts Festival in January, then hit up Sydney Film Festival's Summer Season and Westpac Openair, before hitting cinemas nationwide on March 11. Check out the trailer below: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rBjcbZla2cA&feature=youtu.be Girls Can't Surf releases in Australian cinemas on March 11, 2021. Top image: Don King
France's dedication to cinema is well-known, from its thriving and prolific local industry through to its commitment to the big-screen experience — and also its status as the home of the world's most prestigious film festival. But which country boasts the largest showcase of French movies outside of the country itself? That'd be Australia, all thanks to the annual and beloved Alliance Française French Film Festival. One of the first film fests on each year's cinema calendar, AFFFF will return in 2023 for its whopping 34th year, once again highlighting the latest and greatest flicks from France that it can find. The full bill always includes notable comedies and dramas from the past year, both award-winners and contenders, and a focus on classic French films — and while it is too early for the festival to reveal its lineup for its next edition, it has announced its dates ahead of program details arriving in the new year. As usual, the event will make its regular capital city stops. So, cinephiles in Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane, Perth, Adelaide, Canberra and Hobart, mark your diaries accordingly. In addition, AFFFF is also heading to a heap of regional locations — some that it has visited in past years, others that are new additions for 2023. Movie buffs in Byron Bay, Parramatta, Rooty Hill, Victor Harbour, Bendigo, the Gold Coast and Margaret River, block out your calendars as well. Wondering what the program might entail? The 2022 lineup is a good guide in terms of the kinds of films AFFFF champions. This year's roster included stunning abortion drama Happening, which also won the 2021 Golden Lion at the Venice Film Festival; the exceptional Petite Maman, the latest film from Portrait of a Lady on Fire's Céline Sciamma; and grand 19th-century Paris-set drama Lost Illusions. Also on the 2022 bill: Murder Party, a murder-mystery with big Cluedo vibes; Full Time, led by Call My Agent!'s Laure Calamy; and documentary The Velvet Queen, with photographer Vincent Munier and writer Sylvain Tesson heading to the Tibetan highlands on a quest to find the snow leopard. ALLIANCE FRANÇAISE FRENCH FILM FESTIVAL 2023 DATES: March 7–April 5: Sydney, NSW March 8–April 5: Melbourne, VIC March 8–April 5: Perth, WA March 9–19: Hobart, TAS March 9–April 5: Canberra, ACT March 15–April 12: Brisbane, QLD March 16–April 5: Byron Bay, NSW March 23–April 19: Adelaide, SA March 29–April 2: Parramatta, NSW March 29–April 2: Rooty Hill, NSW March 29–April 16: Gold Coast, QLD March 31–April 2: Margaret River, WA April 3 and 10: Victor Harbour, SA April 21–23: Bendigo, VIC + encore dates in some cities The Alliance Française French Film Festival tours Australia from Tuesday, March 7–Tuesday, April 25, 2023. For more information, visit the AFFFF website. Check back here on Wednesday, February 1 for the full program.
Fresh from making history as the only city outside of Melbourne to ever host an AFL Grand Final, Brisbane looks poised to land another huge sporting event: the 2032 Olympic Games. While a final decision hasn't yet been made, the International Olympic Committee has just announced that it will enter into "targeted dialogue" with the committee behind the Queensland capital's hosting bid and the Australian Olympic Committee. The move follows a recommendation by the Future Host Commission for the Games of the Olympiad, and will see more detailed discussions about Brisbane staging the games take place. While it isn't guaranteed that the chats between the IOC and Australia's committees will land Brisbane the hosting spot, the former has outlined a number of reasons that Brisbane has been selected to progress to the next stage. They include the city's experience in hosting major international sports events, the advanced nature of its plan, and the proposed focus on existing or temporary venues. Queensland's climate in July and August also weighed in its favour — unsurprisingly — as did the commitment to improving transport infrastructure, Brisbane's lineup of hotels, and the support of the government, the public and the private sector. Also named a factor: "Australia's sporting success throughout modern Olympic history". The IOC specifically referred to the Sydney Olympic Games in 2000, which was the last time the Games were held in Oceania. It also noted that if Brisbane was to emerge victorious, there'd be just a 32-year gap between Australia's most recent hosting slots. The Games were first held on our shores back in 1956, in Melbourne. https://twitter.com/AUSOlympicTeam/status/1364647402960023556 Brisbane's bid includes three clusters of venues — with 21 in Brisbane itself, six on the Gold Coast and three on the Sunshine Coast — and proposes that the Games take place between July 23–August 8, 2032. A new Olympic Stadium, arena and indoor sports centre are mooted in the plan, and a new waterfront Olympic Village would be built in Brisbane, with a second set up on the Gold Coast using existing hotels. If Brisbane is picked, it'll mean that southeast Queensland will host the Olympics just 14 years after hosting the 2018 Commonwealth Games on the Gold Coast. Brisbane has also staged the Commonwealth Games, back in 1982. A decision on Brisbane's Olympic Games bid is expected to be announced over the next year — after Tokyo holds the postponed 2020 Games this year. Paris is on hosting duties in 2024, while Los Angeles will take the torch in 2028. For further details about the International Olympic Committee's announcement, and about Brisbane's bid for the 2032 Olympics, head to the Games' website. Top image: The Department for Culture, Media and Sport via Wikimedia Commons.
In a world of flash floods and rising sea levels, who'd start a family? In his dark romantic comedy, actor and writer Ian Meadows (seen last year in The Coming World and Paper Giants: The Birth of Cleo) explores the funny and terrifying ways an uncertain future can affect Gen X and Y's family planning. He spoke to Concrete Playground about science, working with Sam Strong, and babies in his upcoming play at Griffin, Between Two Waves. So, without giving away any plot spoilers, tell me a bit about Between Two Waves. It's about a climatologist called Daniel Wells who has been approached by the minister for climate change and energy efficiency to move from science to working in policy. He's particularly anxious about the future, and he's quite a withheld, constrained person. He meets a woman who is very much the opposite of that — spontaneous and carefree. If his fault is not being able to live in the moment, then hers is not being able to think about what might happen in the future. They collide, and it works, and they face the idea of a future together with children. The play revolves around this love story, and whether he is able to live in the present or just be completely terrified about a future that might come. I guess it was only a matter of time until someone wrote a romantic comedy about climate change! Yeah totally, the idea was to make it as funny and full of life as possible, because you're dealing with those potentially darker, more serious social and political themes. Earlier in the year, Melbourne Theatre Company had Richard Bean's The Heretic on, a polemic about climate sceptics. Andrew Bolt loved it! Is there any persuading going on in your play? I'm more interested in the human, emotional core of someone who is scared of a potential future. I'll let people make up their own minds. I think Andrew Bolt would probably be less happy with my reading of the climate science. So in terms of getting that onto the stage, how do you write, because you're an actor as well — are you at the desk or are you on the floor improvising and then writing? I love improvising when I can, but with this particular project I've been working on it for quite a while, in different forms. It began as a screenplay that was developed with the assistance of Screen NSW early on, but we could never quite get it up, so Sam [Strong] came on as a script editor on the film script in my last round of development at the NSW FTO [Film and Television Office] a couple of years ago, and when he became artistic director of Griffin, he said, hey, what do you think about this as a play? It had always been a very dialogue-driven, very character-driven sort of film, so I got very excited about that idea. Do you ever feel that there might be a risk of making writing choices based on your comfort zone as an actor? Yeah, that's a really interesting point, because as an actor, you have a script and it's your job to make it work, whereas when you've written something where you're also acting, I could just write something else couldn't I? [laughs] Something easier? And you were part of Griffin Studio last year? Yeah, it was incredible. We'd meet once a week and throw ideas around, which as a writer is excellent, because otherwise you're stuck at your computer. Just being in a room with other great minds is so freeing. We did numerous readings of the play, which is endlessly helpful as a writer, to hear it out loud. There were some great actors: Maeve Dermody, Ewen Lesley, Andrew McFarlane, Susan Prior — great people. I'd go away and do a draft and then we'd do again and we'd do it again and we'd do it again. I had a lot of opportunities … basically, if it's a terrible play, I've got no excuse [laughs] I'll keep that in mind! So then Sam's come on board to direct. How's that process been? It's awesome. Sam and I have been good friends for a while and he dramaturged the thing as a film script, so his imprint is all over it. As a director, there's nothing that he enforces upon anyone or on the script, it's all suggestions — sometimes I'm trying to decipher what it is he's saying! [laughs] I really trust his instinct. He really knows the script and he's been really passionate about driving it forward. Tell me a bit about the style of the piece, it started out as a screenplay… It's a fast-paced, naturalistic style that has these elements of fluidity. You know, I would never suggest it's at the level of a Kaufman or a Gondry, but there's definitely the idea of the space being very fluid; very real situations flowing in and out of a space. It's very malleable, in terms of what's real, what's memory, what's dream. And in a space like Griffin, it's so exciting, there is the possibility to do that in a really visceral way. So that's the idea, we kind of hope that people feel like they're inside the head of this guy, or that they're in this couple's living room. Sometimes with plays about a topical issue, it can be a bit like a dramatic lecture on stage, it sounds like you've managed to avoid that. Well, I hope so. We're really conscious of the fact that there is so much information about climate change around, you know. I started writing around seven years ago and part of the reason was seeing An Inconvenient Truth and since then it's just exploded. So now there's the question of why write it, why continue to put it on? I don't think we've dealt with it on a personal, emotional level. You know, all of my friends at the moment are having babies, they just all are! And yet the stuff that I'm being told by these scientists is really quite scary, so it just feels like it's a really pressing issue for our generation particularly. The idea that our children won't be able to enjoy all the things that we were is terrifying. Between Two Waves plays at the SBW Stables from October 5 to November 17.
Little Hunter, a newcomer to the Melbourne dining scene, has been creating quite a buzz. Their bread made with chicken skin and chicken fat (yes, chicken fat) is gathering somewhat of a cult following already. When they aren't serving up bread from our dreams, curing and smoking meat is their strong point. American-born Gavin Baker is bringing a Josper charcoal oven, one of only three in Australia, to the party and preparing meat like no other. We chat to Gavin about meat, vegetarians and Justin Timberlake. Smoking and curing are big for Little Hunter. Can you tell us a little about both of these processes? Originally smoke was used as a preserving, curing agent. In recent times we have moved beyond this, probably in the past 100 years, and it is primarily used for flavouring. At Little Hunter we make our own bacon by double smoking it in our Bradley Smoker, and we use several different preserving methods. Brines and dry rubs that contain salt are used widely to cure meats, fish and poultry. We also use dry ageing as a curing method. Dry ageing creates a hermetic seal on the meat, allowing it to tenderise from the inside and without risk of contamination. Our New York strip and lamb are hung and dry aged for up to 45 days, to increase tenderness and flavour, and resulting in a superior product. We also use short-term curing on a daily basis. Our Chatham Island Blue Cod is salt cured for 20 minutes before cooking to firm the flesh of the fish, allowing it to hold shape while being cooked. The king fish is cured in a mix of sugar, salt and citrus zest, which adds flavour and firms the fish. Our bar staff also smoke ingredients in our cocktails. We smoke cherries and olives for garnishs in two of our cocktails. What are the benefits from smoking meats? The primary benefit of smoking meats is preservation, as it creates a layer of acidic film that deters micro growth. The secondary purpose is to flavour the ingredient that is being smoked. Speaking of flavour, can you describe the different flavours that you can get from the smoking process? We can get subtle and delicate flavours, for example, using dried herbs to smoke fish. Or more nuanced flavours can come from aromatic elements such as tea, which is used to smoke duck. We can also use pipe tobacco to lightly smoke vegetables. Pronounced flavours come from hickory or other hard woods, which can add a lot of flavour to pork and beef. Depending on what you are looking to do, which could be either complimenting or contrasting flavours, smoking can be used in many different ways to impart flavour. Does smoking affect the texture or mouth feel of the meat, or simply the flavour? Any cooking method affects all of these things, and smoking is no exception. Hot smoking fish imparts flavour but also changes the mouth feel and texture of the fish. Cold smoking fish imparts flavour but leaves the texture almost the same as uncooked fish. We hear you have a very fancy Josper charcoal oven, one of only three in Australia. Can you tell us what benefits this oven gives you over others? The Josper oven is 100 percent wood or charcoal powered (not connected to the wall in any way). It allows us to cook at a controlled burn or temperature for long periods of time. Anything that can be cooked over a fire can be cooked in the Josper oven, giving us a full range of possibilities. It is engineered to conserve heat and in some ways is built like a Tandoor oven, with thick walls. As we are cooking off fire, the Josper imparts different flavour elements that you would not normally get from a traditional grill. The Josper also allows long cooking methods. It has all the benefits of wood and open fire cookery in a controlled environment, to produce superior quality food. Are you a big meat eater yourself? No. My wife and I are primarily vegetarian but I do have a deep respect for the animals and the cookery. I enjoy the process of cooking meat. That's very interesting. As someone who doesn't eat all that much meat, do you think vegetarians would enjoy Little Hunter? The vegetarians that have visited Little Hunter have enjoyed their experiences. Our non-meat-based dishes are produced with the same care as our meat dishes. If you are a conscious diner, vegetarian or otherwise, you have to respect the integrity that goes into the cooking at Little Hunter. We do offer a daily vegetarian main that isn't listed on the menu, and can be requested to our staff. This allows our cooks to be creative. After such career heights like working at The Fat Duck and filming documentaries, what is it that really drew you to this new venture? What are you excited about for Little Hunter? I like building teams, mentoring and fostering creativity, and watching people grow in their roles. I like settling down to cook and Little Hunter allows me to do all these things. What do you want people to walk away with after eating at Little Hunter? A feeling that they have returned to food. I have to ask, what was it like managing Justin Timberlake's restaurant on the Sunset Strip in Los Angeles? If you are looking for a concentrated version of what life is like in LA, then being the executive chef for Justin Timberlake's restaurant on the sunset strip is as close as it gets. It was an A-list hangout. It was a different experience for me, but enjoyable.
When the FIFA Women's World Cup arrived in Australia in 2023, anyone in Brisbane who didn't score a ticket to the local games was able to watch along on the big screen at South Bank. When both Brisbane Lions teams — the men and the women — made their respective 2023 AFL grand finals, the inner-city site also broadcast the action. Next up: checking out both the Olympics and Paralympics, with the South Brisbane precinct again turning into a viewing site for the Paris 2024 games. South Bank's cultural forecourt in front of QPAC — and next to the BRISBANE sign — is becoming a sports-watching hub from Saturday, July 27–Monday, August 12 for the Olympics, then from Thursday, August 29–Monday, September 9 for the Paralympics. Across both periods, attendees can catch the games from 6am–midnight daily, featuring a mix of both live broadcasts and replays. As well as cheering on the competing athletes — including the Matildas — Brisbanites can make the most of pop-ups such as community sporting demonstrations and challenges, other entertainment, plus food trucks providing a bite to eat. Although the telecast is showing 18 hours a day every day across the two periods, you'll need to head along between 4–7pm on Fridays and 11am–7pm for the activations. [caption id="attachment_820189" align="alignnone" width="1920"] IOC, Christophe-Moratal[/caption] Expect the initial Matildas games to be among the replays, given their first three matches are all scheduled for 3am Brisbane time. First, the squad takes on Germany on Friday, July 26. Next up is Zambia on Monday, July 29, then the USA on Thursday, August 1. Not that getting into the Olympics and Paralympics spirit every four years is new in Brisbane, but 2024 sees the Queensland capital embrace the games eight years before hosting them in 2032. Top image: The Department for Culture Media and Sport, Wikimedia Commons.
He played 372 matches for the Sydney Swans, kicked 464 goals, won two premierships, earned the code's highest individual honour (the Brownlow Medal) twice and was even anointed Australian of the Year, and now, Adam Goodes has been immortalised in a three-storey mural on a Surry Hills building. Painted by advertising agency Apparition Media, the towering mural is located on the corner of Foveaux and Crown streets, and diagonally opposite the newly opened Pizza Fritta. It's, fittingly, located in the heartland of Goodes' former footy team and just over a kilometre from its home ground, the SCG. https://twitter.com/sydneyswans/status/1270970147692408834 While, according to The Age, the mural was postponed from February to June because of COVID-19, its appearance now is timely for multiple reasons. Not only does its unveiling coincide with the return of the 2020 AFL season (which kicked off yesterday, June 11), as well as with the end of Reconciliation Week, but it also reflects the current global Black Lives Matter movement. The latter is, in Australia, predominantly focused on ending the systemic mistreatment of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples by police — and Indigenous Australian deaths in custody — but it has also become a bigger conversation about racism in general. At the end of Goodes' highly decorated career, he became the target of merciless booing and was verbally attacked by both spectators and high-profile media figures alike — with the Swans player placed under immense scrutiny for celebrating his Indigenous heritage both on and off the field. He ultimately chose not to play for a period, and then eventually retired, due to the resulting toll of his horrific treatment. It's a topic explored in not one but two documentaries that were released last year: The Final Quarter, which received a standing ovation at last year's Sydney Film Festival, and The Australian Dream, which opened the 2019 Melbourne International Film Festival. The Goodes mural also comes as the racist treatment endured by another high-profile ex-AFL footballer — Collingwood and Melbourne's Héritier Lumumba — has been receiving renewed attention this week. The code's first Brazilian-born player and also a premiership player, Lumumba continues to speak out about prejudice, discrimination and the offensive terms directed his way during his 2005–14 tenure at Collingwood, including about club president Eddie McGuire's comments about Goodes (which are covered in both The Final Quarter and The Australian Dream). Lumumba was also the subject of 2017 documentary, Fair Game, about his experiences. Sydney's no stranger to politically-leaning murals, with both a scathing commentary on Australia's treatment of asylum seekers popping up in Bondi and an Egg Boy mural hitting the city in 2019. The latter was painted by prolific street artist Scott Marsh, who's also known for his satirising of political figures in large-scale murals. His previous hits include Casino Mike and Tony Loves Tony. You'll find the new Adam Goodes mural at the corner of Foveaux and Crown streets, Surry Hills. The Australian Dream is currently available to watch on ABC iView.
Friday, February 25, 2022 mightn't be the day of your daughter's wedding, but it is when that famous movie quote about offspring and nuptials will echo through cinemas once again. Delivered by Marlon Brando in one of his finest-ever performances — which won him a thoroughly deserved Oscar for Best Actor — the line has become one of the all-time great pieces of dialogue. Whether you know why or you've always been meaning to find out, here's your chance. Some films demand a big-screen viewing at least once, and The Godfather is high among them — and, 50 years after it first flickered through picture palaces, the Francis Ford Coppola-directed mafia masterpiece is getting another theatrical run to mark that huge milestone. This really is the gangster flick that has it all, including equally superb performances from Al Pacino, Robert Duvall and James Caan. It isn't considered one of the best movies ever made without good reason. Arriving a few weeks before the feature officially hits the big five-o — it premiered back in March 1972 and released in US cinemas later the same month — this season of The Godfather will also give movie-goers an offer they can't refuse: seeing the flick in a restored version overseen by Coppola's production company American Zoetrope and the film's distributor Paramount Pictures. All three Godfather features got the same treatment, as guided by the legendary filmmaker, who originally directed the movie when he was just 33; however, only the first film is returning to cinemas. Story-wise, if you really are new to it all, the trilogy follows the Corleones — with the first film focusing on Vito Corleone (Brando) and his youngest son Michael (Pacino) as the latter reluctantly (at first) joins the family business. All three movies, including 1974's The Godfather Part II and Coppola's recently re-edited version of 1990's The Godfather Part III, now called The Godfather Coda: The Death of Michael Corleone and briefly released in cinemas back in 2020, will hit home entertainment on Wednesday, March 23, too. And yes, at home, that means you can see Lost in Translation and On the Rocks director Sofia Coppola as a baby in the OG flick and also play Michael's daughter Mary in the third film. Check out the trailer for the 50th-anniversary restoration of The Godfather below: The Godfather 50th-anniversary re-release will hit cinemas Down Under on February 25, 2022.
Dumpster diving found itself well and truly Brooklynised over the weekend, when 20 diners feasted on day-old bread, bruised apricots and super ripe bananas in a old Williamsburg dumpster. Brooklyn-based initiative Salvage Supperclub served up course after course of revisualised foods deemed unworthy for selling — wilting vegetables, semi-stale loaves and old cookies. Held once a month to make a big public statement about sustainability and how much food we throw away for aesthetic reasons, Salvage Supperclub was developed by Josh Treuhaft, an MFA in Design for Social Innovation at New York's School of Visual Arts. Linked to his own graduate thesis, 'Eat Everything', and raising funds for a non-profit, Treuhaft teamed up with chef Celia Lam (Manhattan's Natural Gourmet Institute) to create the entirely vegetarian menu. The pair dropped by Migliorelli Farm, Bushwick Food Coop and Natural Gourmet Institute to collect ingredients — the chipped, bruised and totally edible vegie heroes who would have found themselves in a dumpster anyway. With only 20 spots at the table, the Salvage dining experience was one of NYC's one-to-brag-about tickets this weekend. All proceeds from the $50-a-plate dinner were donated to the US non-profit organisation Culinary Corps. With diners happily seated at a long bench snuggled inside the dumpster, chef Lam served up a dazzling six-course tasting menu on old subway tiles — we're talking rescued root vegetable fettuccine, super ripe banana custard with captured cookie crust — alongside a cheeky illegal champagne cocktail hour. Lam took time to explain to guests the rewards from working with 'spoiled' foods — bruised fruits are better for pureeing, for example. While the stunt might cause many an "Oh, Williamsburg," head shake, Salvage has harnessed that pressing sustainability conundrum for well-off, aesthetically obsessed countries. Just because it's ugly, doesn't mean it's inedible. Via Pixable and Grub Street.
Creatives, makers, business owners and storytellers worldwide were surprised by the announcement last year that SXSW, the legendary festival of forward-thinking, was coming to the southern hemisphere for the first time with SXSW Sydney. Here at Concrete Playground, we were nothing short of delighted. We're all about elevating play — and SXSW gives us the chance to do it on an even bigger scale. So, we're leaping at the opportunity. We've submitted a panel for consideration to be a part of SXSW Sydney — and we'd love your help bringing it to life. Keep reading to get the low-down on our pitch, then sling us a vote on the SXSW website. ALL IN: WHY INCLUSIVE COMMUNITY-MINDED EVENTS ARE THE FUTURE — AND HOW TO BUILD YOUR OWN CREATIVE COMMUNITY Across the last decade, the arts industry has been turned on its head several times over. What's emerged is more inclusive, community-minded events and creative spaces. Local, grassroots parties are pulling crowds and pushing boundaries in spaces often dominated by big-ticket events and artists. Music festivals are evolving to ensure everyone is welcome. And the internet has facilitated the rise of hyper-specific micro-communities. This panel will take a look at the future of the live arts through the lens of this fast-rising, community-driven events scene. We'll be inviting some of the most exciting, forward-thinking curators and tastemakers this country has to offer to take part — from exciting multi-hyphenated talent like SOLLYY and leaders in accessibility like Ability Fest to staunch advocates for creative communities like FBi Radio and Dark Lab. We'll take a look at what the future has in store for live events and how we can take charge in fostering flourishing arts industries around the world. To vote for this panel, follow this link. View this post on Instagram A post shared by Hotter Out est (@hotteroutwest) If you'd be interested in attending our panel, please visit the voting page to show your support. Voting closes at 11.59pm on Tuesday, April 11. SXSW Sydney will take place from Sunday, October 15, to Sunday, October 22.
If you’re living away from home and you’re not much of a cook, chances are you’ve got a couple of go-to takeaway spots and a couple of packs of Mi Goreng when all else fails. But soon, there’ll be a way of ordering a home-cooked meal that’s just as fast and probably way more interesting and healthy. Yourfork is a Sydney-based website where home cooks post their menus and customers can order off them online for pick-up. According to founder Roshan Mahanama, the idea for Yourfork came from his sister-in-law who, after backpacking in the Americas, had a craving for a particular Peruvian dessert. To their amazement, there wasn’t a single Sydney restaurant that made it. "We thought ‘Wow, isn’t that weird that there’s all these restaurants in Sydney and you can’t find this because it’s just not mainstream?’" he said. Roshan and his brother Shanu came back to the idea of an online platform for home cooks in late August this year after selling another business, a food and coffee reordering app that had never really taken off. After spending a month mocking up the website on pieces of paper and setting up a Facebook page to gauge the level of interest in the idea, they realised the demand was pretty big. After the page received over 200 likes in two weeks, the brothers started looking for home cooks who wanted to sign up to the website. As well as providing a platform for aspiring chefs who aren’t ready to take the risk in a fully fledged restaurant, Roshan said that one of the goals of Yourfork was to create a space for niche cuisines that might not fit in with whatever the latest dining trend might be (Mexican, anyone?). Some of the examples on the site include raw food and Egyptian-Indian fusion. “What we realised very quickly was that our Facebook community was telling us what they wanted to see, and it wasn’t stuff you could get in a restaurant,” he said. “From a restaurant’s point of view, they’re not sure if enough people are going to order it so they never make it because they don’t want to lose money. But a mum and dad at home ... they don’t care if one thousand people or two people order it.” Right now, the site is still essentially in beta testing mode, with five chefs ready to go and 45 more signed up and still working on their menus. While the chefs are scattered all across Australia, the majority are in Sydney. Roshan says he’d ideally like to launch the site properly in the next couple of months. As for what he’d ultimately like to see happen with Yourfork? “It’d be really cool if I’m with a bunch of mates, and they don’t know that Yourfork’s my site, and we’re all like, ‘I don’t feel like cooking tonight,’ and somebody goes ‘Oh, let’s Yourfork it.’”
Two robot enthusiasts, Peter Seid and Phu Nguyen, have found a way to smarten up your already intelligent smartphone by turning it into a robot. The Romo robotics platform uses your phone, its apps and their software to perform robotic tasks, like bringing you a drink. According to its designers the Romo is able to 'learn, grow, and change' because users can add new hardware modules. Other Romo functions include turning your smartphone into a 'spy robot', play a 'mixed-reality version' of Mario Kart and execute commands through a drag and drop programming module. The designers behind the Romo have posted the project on crowd funding site Kickstarter, where it has received over $85,000 in seed capital. [via PSFK]
The idea is that you dress in camouflage (see above) or as a zebra — not because sharks don't like zebras, but because the black-and-white stripey look signals poison. Rather than go in for the attack, the nearest great white will either fail to see you at all or avoid you like the plague. Australian company Shark Mitigation Systems (SAMS) worked in conjunction with the University of Western Australia's Ocean Institute to develop the technology. The institute, led by Professor Shaun Collin and Professor Nathan Hart, have been studying the workings of shark sight for years. Among their discoveries are that our predatory friends see in black and white, and that their vision is the sense upon which they depend during the decisive moments leading up to attack. 'Many animals are repelled by a striped pattern, which indicates the potential prey is unsafe to eat,' Collin told the BBC. In initial tests, dummies wearing old school black wet suits were attacked by passing tiger sharks, while those in the stripey numbers were ignored. The onset of summer will see further trials. The impact on the behaviour of great whites remains to be seen. Over the past two years, shark attacks have caused five fatalities in Australian waters and New Zealand suffered its first fatality in over 30 years recently. 'Everyone's looking for a solution, everyone's nervous about going in the water now,' SAMS entrepreneur Craig Anderson said. However, Ali Hood, conservation director for the UK's Shark Trust, pointed out that, 'To suggest that "everyone's nervous of entering the water" is rather strong . . . Sadly, a great number of the fatalities attributed to sharks occur in avoidable circumstances'. She suggested that, relative to the growth in the masses of people engaging in water sports, the number of shark attacks has not increased. SAMS technology has also been applied to stickers, which are said to transform surfboards, water skis, kayaks and underwater air tanks into shark deterrent objects. This weekend, SAMS makes an appearance on National Geographic's documentary, Australia's Deadliest: Shark Coast. [via Grind TV]
They promised to turn the humble act of enjoying a pint into something that could make a difference, and they've delivered. Now, after amassing around $37,000 through a successful crowdfunding campaign, and then brewing a beverage that will help support the Great Barrier Reef, The Good Beer Co.'s maiden beer is coming to bottleshops around Australia. First stop: Queensland. The Great Barrier Beer is a Queensland-brewed beer designed to raise funds for one of Queensland's natural wonders, after all. In addition to being able to order the brew online and find it at a range of pubs, restaurants and other booze-serving establishments (including in New South Wales, with more there and in Victoria to follow), you'll now find it at 1oo BWS stores around the Sunshine State. And if you're wondering why that's a big deal, keep reading. As Australia's first social enterprise beer company, The Good Beer Co. is on a mission to match nice drinks with nice deeds. The company aims to pair the nation's top craft brewers with worthy causes, as the Great Barrier Beer demonstrates. It's brewed in Bundaberg by the local legends at the Bargara Brewing Company, and it does more than increase awareness. The Good Beer Co donates 50% of the profits of every beer sold to the Australian Marine Conservation Society, so expanding the number of places it's available is a massive step. That's not the end of their efforts, however. Another thirst-quenching Great Barrier Beer will soon be a-brewing courtesy of Bargara Brewing Company — and to get to that point, though, The Good Beer Co. is asking for your help again. This time, there's a choice of three different options, each backed by top chefs from around Queensland, that you can also vote for. Of course, whether you prefer a Kölsch, a blonde-style brew or a cider, supporting a good cause and helping save a natural icon is the real winner. For more information about The Good Beer Co, including a list of Great Barrier Beer stockists, visit their website. To support their next beverage, check out their new crowdfunding campaign.
