Ten years ago, Jordan Peele had just premiered his now-iconic sketch comedy series with Keegan-Michael Key. Key & Peele was exactly three episodes in on this exact date back in 2012, in fact, and was still eight months away from professing its love for Liam Neeson. Today, Peele has an Oscar to his name for Get Out, directed two of the best horror movies of the past decade thanks to that unnerving standout and the equally exceptional Us, and had a hand in bringing everything from BlacKkKlansman and the ace latest Candyman flick to Hunters and Lovecraft Country to our eyeballs. And, he's just dropped the trailer for his third big-screen directorial effort, Nope. That's a glorious name for what to looks to be a gloriously eerie film — based on the initial sneak peek, at least. When a trailer has Get Out star and Judas and the Black Messiah Oscar-winner Daniel Kaluuya ask "what's a bad miracle?", things get creepy quickly. The setup: the Haywood ranch is proudly run by the only Black-owned horse trainers in Hollywood (played by Kaluuya and Hustlers' Keke Palmer), whose connection to show business dates back to the very birth of cinema. But their remote patch of inland California soon becomes home to a disturbing discovery — and the fact that everyone spends a fair amount of time either looking up in horror or running away from something chilling in the sky says plenty. As with all of Peele's celluloid nightmares so far, the less you know going in, the better. That said, the trailer does a fantastic job of teasing all of the unsettling imagery that the filmmaker is about to get lodged in your brain, including fields of colourful inflatable tube men waving in the breeze. Steven Yeun (Minari) also stars in what's already the must-see horror movie of the year — and the cast also spans Michael Wincott (Veni Vidi Vici) and Brandon Perea (The OA) — although film fans will need to wait till July to see how Peele's latest horror epic turns out. Check out the trailer for Nope below: Nope will release in cinemas Down Under on July 21, 2022.
When Hercule Poirot returned to cinema screens in Murder on the Orient Express, the infamous Agatha Christie-penned sleuth was always going to hang around. Hollywood loves a franchise, and, on the page, the fictional Belgian detective has featured in more than 80 tales. Accordingly, a sequel to the Kenneth Branagh-starring and directed movie was always inevitable. A recreation on a train? Well, that wasn't quite as expected. Finnish Railways aren't just ushering eager puzzle-solvers into a carriage for a few hours of escape room fun, however. They're getting them onboard for a 13-hour, 800-kilometre-plus trip from Helsinki to Rovaniemi, complete with a 14-room setup built by Finland's InsideOut Escape Games. As the passengers journey towards the capital of Lapland, they'll navigate mysteries, scour the train for clues and put themselves in Poirot's shoes — all while the game is live-streamed, with the viewing audience also able to influence the action as it's happening. Before you go searching for your monocle and pipe, clearing your calendar for December 13 and setting off for Scandinavia, seats on the Escape Train will be filled via a competition that's only open to Finnish residents. If you don't fall into that category and you'd rather solve puzzles somewhere warmer, start crossing your fingers that something similar happens for the next Poirot flick, Death on the Nile. Via Lonely Planet.
No matter how many times you let them up on the couch, how will your pet truly know you love them unless you've got their furry little face emblazoned on your togs and beach towel? Well, you might soon be able to turn that slightly weird dream into a reality, thanks to a Sydney company called Petflair and its range of customisable swimwear. Currently funding on Kickstarter, the project will allow devoted pet owners to upload an image of their animal and have it splashed across one of Petflair's colourful swimsuit designs. It isn't all indulgence either — Petflair has been created to support local rescue and re-homing charity Pound Paws, who aim to encourage Australians to adopt from shelters and pounds. So not only will you get to spend the summer swanning around with your pooch, kitty, bunny or bird printed on your swimmers, but you'll be doing it for an excellent cause. The team's designed swim briefs for guys and a trio of women's one-pieces, all crafted from durable Italian fabrics, as well as a beach towel and a canvas beach bag. They've even got some nifty sticker sets, if, for some reason, you want a slightly more subtle homage to your four-legged mate. If after reading this you've already taken out your credit card, you can donate to Petflair's Kickstarter campaign up until October 12. At the moment they need to raise $5000 to reach their goal of $15,000.
When November and December hit, one sale tends to follow another. Black Friday, Cyber Monday, Christmas, Boxing Day: bargains usually await for all four. So, after Jetstar discounted a heap of fares for Black Friday, of course the Australian airline is backing it up with Cyber Monday specials, this time with fares from $35 for domestic trips and beginning at $149 if you're holidaying internationally. You only have two days, until 11.59pm AEDT Tuesday, December 3, to get booking — or not even that long if tickets are snapped up earlier. The cheapest route within Australia is Sydney to Byron Bay and Ballina, which is where the $35 price comes in. Overseas, that $149 fare will get you from Perth to Singapore. As always, prices obviously vary depending on where you're flying from and to, but other domestic options include Melbourne to Launceston from $40, Sydney to Gold Coast from $50, Brisbane to Melbourne from $75 and Cairns to Brisbane from $84 — plus Adelaide to Gold Coast from $94, Adelaide to the Whitsunday Coast from $114, Darwin to Sydney from $144 and Perth to Adelaide for the same price. With fares to Fiji, New Zealand, Vanuatu, Bali, Japan, Hawaii, Thailand and South Korea also covered, overseas bargains include Melbourne to Nadi from $179, Gold Coast to Auckland from $182, Sydney to Port Vila from $199, Perth to Phuket from $205, Adelaide to Bali from $222, Cairns to Osaka from $249, Brisbane to Seoul from $269, Sydney to Honolulu from $282 and Brisbane to Tokyo from $339. You'll be travelling within Australia from mid-January to mid-June 2025, and from late-January to mid-October 2025 if you're going global. The caveats: all prices apply to one-way fares; checked baggage is not included, so you'll want to travel super light or pay extra to take a suitcase; and dates vary according to the route. If you're a Club Jetstar member, you can score even more discounts, starting with Sydney to Byron Bay and Ballina from $29. Helped by its Black Friday and Cyber Monday sales, Jetstar expects to sell 12-million-plus fares for under $100 and 21-million-plus for less than $200 in 2024. Jetstar's 2024 Cyber Monday 'fare frenzy' sale runs until 11.59pm AEDT Tuesday, December 3 — or until sold out prior. Feeling inspired to book a getaway? You can now book your next dream holiday through Concrete Playground Trips with deals on flights, stays and experiences at destinations all around the world.
Everybody loves treehouses. Don't let anyone tell you that timber structures in branches are just for kids — living in your own sky-high hideaway amongst the greenery is an urge that you never grow out of. Thankfully, from plane-shaped buildings to entire apartment blocks to Australia's finest treetop spaces, there's no shortage of spots to climb up to. And while they all come with great views, Italy's latest addition to the fold is taking the concept up a few notches. Located in the Dolomites, the two Pigna treehouses overlook the alpine range from their lofty spot — and look like they've always been there. Suspended ten metres above the ground, and measuring eight-and-a-half metres in height and six in width, the cosy, three-level holiday homes are built to resemble pinecones, using larch shingles made from wood from Central Europe's Alpe-Adria region. Inside, those spending the night will find 360-degree vantages over the gorgeous scenery, a living area with a kitchenette, and a top-floor bedroom complete with a skylight. Nestled into fir trees, the treehouses are accessible by individual bridges, with every aspect designed to provide "a journey to discover the sounds, smells and scenery of nature." The project, which was finished this year, was originally conceived by architect Luca Beltrame as part of the ArchTriump competition in 2014. Via Dezeen. Images: DomusGaia / Malga Priu Ugovizza / Luca Beltrame + Laura Tessaro.
If you thought having an extra day off to celebrate the Queen turning another year older is about as good as it gets, think again. The Salisbury Hotel's taking the long weekend up a notch with free burgers. Head on down to the family and dog-friendly pub between Friday, October 4 and Monday, October 7 to celebrate the extra day you're not in the office. The kitchen will be slinging 100 free burgers per day over the weekend. That's a total of 400 free burgs up for grabs. The pub's also just undergone a spiffy renovation, which it's only revealing to the public this week. So, you can check out the new lounge, gaming room, events space and spacious beer garden — which is where you'll most likely be spending most of your time sinking brews and tucking into your free feed. All you need to do to get in on the action is RSVP for your free burger here, which we suggest doing ASAP.
Screw self-lacing Nikes, everyone knows the real legacy of Back to the Future II was the hoverboard. Since the film's 1989 release, the race has been on to create one by 2015, and with the fateful date just one year away, everyone's obviously getting a little antsy. Cue cruelly convincing star-studded hoverboard announcement. The video, which surfaced just a matter of hours ago, is a "real-life" demonstration of a hoverboard from a supposed tech company called HUVr Tech. Featuring the likes of Moby, Tony Hawk and none other than Christopher Lloyd himself, the product gets a glowing endorsement from all including a 'heartwarming' moment when Doc almost cries. Now, the more important question: why would they mess with us like this? Nerds across the world have joined forces to fact check the video's claims, and as much as we all want it to be true, it just isn't. It's been discovered that the 'main technician' is actually an actor called Nelson Cheng, and in a huge faux pas, the costume designer Lauren Biedenharn listed the job on her resume as a commercial for Funny or Die. Add to this the fact that HuvrTech.com was only listed as a domain in November last year, and it has some fairly dubious legalese — “the inclusion of any products or services on this website at a particular time does not imply or warrant that these products or services will be available at any time” — and the outcome looks pretty bleak. Best case scenario: it's the start of a viral marketing campaign for Back to the Future IV. Worst case: it's an ingenious publicity stunt engineered by Moby in an effort to stay relevant. Either way, they have a lot to answer for. Now firmly into his middle age, Tony Hawk spends his days pulling sick ollies on fictional devices and breaking the hearts of everyone who once played Pro Skater on PS1. The modern Marty McFly? Moby being 'hip' and 'young' and 'with it'.
Last year, you ate copious amounts of burgers, and to balance it out, bunches and bunches of kale. Your beer got craftier than ever before. You wanted to know more about where your food came from, so you chatted to farmers and ate locally-sourced produce. Instead of extensive menus overloaded with choice, you opted for simpler, cleaner and more expertly-prepared dishes. You kept food trucks doing the rounds. You learnt more about Korean cuisine. And you decided that food tastes better when you share it. So, what's in store for 2015? We're expecting sustainability and seasonality taken to extremes, with hearty broths and micro-seasonal menus; the decline of kale; the rise of roots; veggie-fuelled desserts; cheaper lobster; more restaurant swaps; and epic, multi-sensory dining experiences, thanks to the wonders of neurogastronomy. Here are eight trends to look out for. VEGETABLES IN DESSERTS If only your mama had thought of this when she was struggling to get those Brussels sprouts down your recalcitrant, pint-sized throat. Pretending that vegetables aren't vegetables at all, but actually dessert, is one surefire way to crank up your five-a-day tally. In countries like Vietnam, where beans, lotus root and the like frequently feature in sweet treats, this isn't a new thing. But we're only just getting on the healthy yet tasty dessert bandwagon. Parsnip's been the main contender in Australia so far, thanks to Three Blue Ducks' chocolate with smoked parsnip and Four in Hand's parsnip ice cream with matching chips. RESTAURANT AND BAR SWAPS It seems that chefs and restaurateurs the world over are growing increasingly restless. Rather than keeping their gastronomical discoveries to their local clientele, they're keen to share them across regions and even hemispheres via swaps. Thousands of Melbournians got lucky (or greedy) when Heston Blumenthal announced he'd be bringing his Fat Duck to town, while Denmark's Noma has just opened its doors in Tokyo for a two-month stint. The trend is picking up at bar level too, with the Rook and Black Pearl doing an exchange in May last year. BROTH The more finite the Earth's resources are starting to look, the less we want to waste. In ancient times, when frugality was a necessity rather than an eco-conscious choice, the humble broth was master. Concocted out of animal bones and veggie scraps, it turned mere leftovers into a comfort food feast. Today, broth is the logical extension of our continual move towards sustainable food production. What's more, only Thai restaurants can compete when it comes to names. A restaurant in Melbourne has already jumped on the inevitable: Brothl, while in New York, there’s Brodo. Bring on the broth in 2015. AFFORDABLE LOBSTER After years of exclusivity, the lobster is at last stepping off its high horse and coming down to the street. Heading up the new egalitarian approach in Sydney is Burger Liquor Lobster, which has popped up for summer in both Paddo and Manly, waving $15 lobster rolls and lobster popcorn in front of our seafood-craving faces. The crustacean is getting affordable in London, too, where new trendy hangout Burger and Lobster is selling 2000 lobsters per day across six shopfronts. HATTED CHEFS OPENING CASUAL DINERS This trend, which comes direct from Paris, represents the latest in the growth of premium dining in a casual atmosphere. Hatted chefs are expanding beyond their illustrious premises into bistros, where they're making high-end gastronomy accessible to a mid-range crowd. In late 2013, the team behind the Bentley and the Monopole opened an eatery in Potts Point’s once-bohemian Yellow House. Then, last year, chef Mark Best of Marque brought his cooking to (more of) the people with the opening of Pei Modern in both Sydney and Melbourne. MICROSEASONAL MENUS 'Seasonal produce' and 'paddock-to-plate philosophy’ are the well-established catch-cries of many an Australian eatery. It looks like they’ll be taken even further in 2015 with a trend towards microseasonal menus. These promise fresher and more interesting cuisine than ever before, with dishes changing not with each shift of the earth's axis, but with every passing day. The alterations are ever-so-slight and subtle, and entirely dependent on available ingredients. Sydney’s Q Dining is getting in early. UGLY ROOT VEGGIES Kale's been more ubiquitous than cuts to the arts over the past year or so. But we’re not sure how much longer it's going to fare, given the rise and rise of ugly root vegetables. We're not talking about the good old potato, but its numerous more exotic-sounding and tasting (if not especially good-looking) cousins. As mentioned, parsnips have been sneaking their way into dessert menus, but then there's the likes of celery root and kohlrabi. Sydney's Yellow is already onto it, with a dish made up of beef tartare, kohlrabi, smoked curd and rye featuring on their tasting menu. The good news is that you, too can get started — pick up your own ugly veggies at Harris Farm for half-price. NEUROGASTRONOMY Did you know that on average, a pink strawberry dessert tastes ten percent less sweet on a black plate than it does on a white one? Or that, if you drink a single malt whisky while surrounded by real grass and birdsong, it tastes more herbaceous? Try it, on the other hand, around red lighting and curved furniture and it'll seem sweeter. Starting to get what 'neurogastronomy' means? We now have scientific proof that all of our senses — rather than our tastebuds alone — influence how we perceive flavour. A professor at Oxford University by the name of Charles Spence is obsessed with studying this phenomenon. Spence and a bunch of fellow experts have been developing an intense multisensory dining experience, which combines textures, colours, aromas and temperatures, having previously worked with the likes of Ferran Adrià and Heston Blumenthal. Image credits: Speed Bump Kitchen, jane boles via photopin cc
It only took three years for Wynnum Fringe to evolve from a three-day festival to an almost three-week run. Returning in 2023 for the fourth time, the event is sticking with that extended setup. It's easy to see why, not only because the fest keeps drawing crowds to Brisbane's bayside — with 36,000 people heading along in 2022 — but also thanks to the jam-packed lineup it keeps curating. This year's includes Shrek-inspired burlesque, ABBA sing-alongs, Daryl Braithwaite and a ferris wheel for starters, plus Robert Forster taking to the stage, a dog celebration, Will Anderson and Jimeoin doing comedy sets, and pop-up bars as well. Running from Wednesday, November 15–Sunday, December 3, 2023's lineup of shows and events includes that sultry — and wholly unofficial — take on everyone's favourite animated ogre franchise, plus a corresponding burlesque and drag parody of The Simpsons. Still riffing on beloved pop-culture staples, Wynnum Fringe is staging the latest season of Speed: The Movie, the Play, which brings the 90s action film into IRL in the name of comedy. Sweden's most-famous music group earn a tribute via free community choir The Wynnum Takes It All — singing, yes, a version of 'The Winner Takes It All'. As for Braithwaite and Forster, they sit alongside Diesel, Sarah McLeod, Marcia Hines and Rhonda Burchmore in what's clearly a stacked list of Australian talent taking to the stage. To hear 'The Horses' echo, you'll want to head to the closing Rock the Bay event, which also features Hines and The Bamboos. The comedy bill not only includes Anderson and Jimeoin, but Dave Thornton and Geraldine Hickey as well. Laughing is part of seeing Ancient Greece-set comedy GODZ, too, while the Wynnum Fringe Comedy Gala is back for a one-night-only stint of giggling. After opening ceremony yana marumba (Walk Good) kicks off 2023's festival, attendees can look forward to an adults-only magic show, silent disco walking tours, Chocolate Starfish doing Meatloaf's Bat Out of Hell, Massaoke Oz getting everyone belting out songs and Cheap Fakes playing the Pulp Fiction soundtrack. Or, there's a club devoted to Broadway tunes, a dose of Shakespeare in 60 minutes and a Bluey and Bingo experience — plus What Would Dolly Do?, which is about worshipping Dolly Parton. For hanging out between shows, the garden hub returns to George Clayton Park, which is where Wynnum Fringe's spiegeltent will sit — and a ferris wheel, food trucks and bars. It's also the site of Puppypalooza, complete with dog-focused markets, dog competitions, dog photography and everyone bringing their pooches along.
If a Finnish railway line can immerse passengers in a Murder on the Orient Express-style escape room, then a British hotel can take inspiration from the iconic novelist behind the famous mystery tale. More than that, it can do so while keeping with the transport theme — with Bertram's Hotel in Devon turning a double decker bus into an Agatha Christie-inspired home away from home. There's no puzzle to solve, other than wondering why someone didn't think of the idea earlier. Instead, visitors can relax in a place that's been decked out to feel like a 50s Christie book. Floral decor, a retro record player, a cocktail station, two sleeping spaces and shelves filled with novels all feature. Of course, the latter includes the author's work, with posters celebrating her efforts and titles found elsewhere throughout the cosy abode. Self-contained with a kitchen and bathroom, and sleeping five guests in total, Bertram's Hotel is located in a scenic field near the village of Harltand. And although its setting means that stumbling upon a real-life mystery is rather unlikely, you will spy plenty of animals, namely five grazing alpacas, plus everything from pygmy goats and donkeys to chickens and ducks. There's also two fishing lakes in close proximity. As for the concept, the unique spot takes its name and design from one of Christie's books: 1965's At Bertram's Hotel. The novel features the author's other well-known sleuth — Miss Marple — taking a holiday at the titular establishment and coming across a case, of course. While the hotel in the book isn't in a two-level red bus, the text features one on its cover. Images: Sykes Holiday Cottages.
It seems like only yesterday that we were freaking out over their Indiegogo campaign. Now, Australia's first cat cafe has officially stolen the hearts of the nation, raised sufficient funds, and set up a home on Queen Street, Melbourne ahead of their launch early next month. If a week or two is simply too long to wait, here's a teaser of what's to come. Meet Sherlock, Lotti, Lynx, Lopez, Waldo, and Braveheart — aka your new furry best friends. All adopted from the Geelong Animal Welfare Society, these beautiful bundles of pure happiness are the first cats to call the cafe home. Having only been in the city a mere day or two, Cat Cafe Melbourne have posted a little information about each on Facebook ahead of their upcoming launch. Pictured above is the youngest — and in our opinion, best named — kitten Braveheart. Not only is he the cutest little thing we've ever seen, he's also a bit of a battler. At just five months old, he's already suffered a bad infection that led to his right eye being removed. As the cat cafe owners rightfully point out, at least now "he gives a great wink!" From youngest to eldest, this is Lynx. A sedate seven-year-old, he's the type to snuggle up and relax with after a big ol' lunch. "He won't put up with the young ones," the Cat Cafe claim. "If you pick him up beware! He gives a big hug and smooches your face. You may require help to remove him." Then there's Lotti. Though she looks a whole lot like Braveheart, she's a little older and apparently gets a bit jealous of the attention afforded to others. "She is very demanding for affection ... and has an amazing purr that will melt your heart," the owners say. Of course the best thing about this place is that there's just too many cats to keep track of. Lopez, Waldo and Sherlock are the rest of the bunch that are currently slinking around the unopened space, but you won't know too much about them 'til you meet. Cat Cafe Melbourne doesn't have an official opening date yet, though the owners have stated it will be sometime in early July. The cats will also be separated from the official cafe space due to food safety regulations — no one wants a hairball in their latte, after all. If you want to jump in and have a play after your coffee, it'll cost you $10 for the first hour, then $5 for every additional 30 minutes. Stay tuned for an update on their opening, it's bound to be the purrfect cure to your winter blues. All photos via Cat Cafe Melbourne.
The Gold Coast Film Festival isn't the first film fest to marvel at the sight of sun, surf and sand on the big screen. Thanks to a surf film retrospective at the Brisbane International Film Festival over a decade back, it isn't the first to do so in southeast Queensland, either. But it is the perfect spot for big waves to get rolling in a cinema, as the just-announced 2023 GCFF program celebrates with a dedicated strand of flicks that'll serve up that very experience. This isn't the first time that the Gold Coast's annual film fest itself has embraced the ocean, of course — its 2022 lineup included a session of Blue Crush, for instance — but there's no such thing as too much sea-obsessed cinema at this event. So, 2023 attendees can look forward to Big Wave Guardians, which focuses on surfing in Hawaii; The Road to Patagonia, about ecologist Matty Hannon's efforts to surf the west coast of the Americas while travelling by motorbike; Big vs Small, with big-wave champion surfer Joana Andrade and world-champion free diver Johanna Nordblad in the spotlight; and Birth of the Endless Summer, which steps behind iconic surf documentary The Endless Summer. GCFF's latest curated collection of movies spans further, including three world premieres, three Australian premieres and 15 Queensland premieres across Wednesday, April 19–Sunday, April 30 at HOTA, Home of the Arts and other GC venues. Making its Sunshine State debut is opening night's Polite Society, about a martial artist-in-training endeavouring to save her sister from an arranged marriage — and a hit at this year's Sundance Film Festival. Bookending the other end of the fest is doco The Last Daughter, also in a Queensland first, about Indigenous director Brenda Matthews' experience being taken from her family as a toddler, growing up with white foster parents, then being returned to her parents. Also, big-name TV gets a look in via Netflix's Sweet Tooth, which is previewing its first two episodes of season two ahead of its long-awaited streaming debut on Thursday, April 27. Elsewhere on the lineup, Aussie cinema receives a showcase complete with must-sees Sweet As and The Survival of Kindness — both hits on the international film festival circuit, with the former an outback-set coming-of-age story written and directed by Indigenous filmmaker Jub Clerc (The Heights), and the latter hailing from acclaimed director Rolf de Heer. There's also thriller Monolith, about a journalist chasing a conspiracy, plus documentary The Giants about the life of environmental activist Bob Brown. And, the fest also continues its Local Filmmaker Focus, screening a trio of titles from Gold Coast talent. Hits and standouts from far and wide are another big highlight of GCFF's 2023 selection, which is where the Oscar-nominated EO, a portrait of a donkey, comes in — as do Cannes 2022 Best Actress winner Holy Spider, the same fest's Best Screenplay recipient Cairo Conspiracy, and the fittingly cinema-obsessed I Like Movies. If you can only see a handful of flicks at the festival, make sure that the stunning The Inspection is one of them, as based on filmmaker Elegance Bratton's true tale about being a gay Black man who joined the marines. Film lovers can look forward to the return of short film fest SIPFEST within the broader GCFF program as well, which'll screen 14 titles at HOTA's outdoor stage. Plus, among the industry-focused events sits the Screen Industry Gala Awards at Warner Bros Movie World, aptly, plus the GCFF Women in Film Lunch in the QT Gold Coast's Ballroom. The 2023 Gold Coast Film Festival runs from Wednesday, April 19–Sunday, April 30 at HOTA, Home of the Arts and other venues on the Gold Coast. For more information and to buy tickets, visit the festival website. Sweet Tooth image courtesy of Netflix.
Following a Golden Globe haul earlier this year, Donald Glover's series Atlanta has landed an Australian premiere. Heading to the newly minted SBS Viceland channel on Tuesday, February 28 at 9.30pm, the award-winning series will be shown in double episodes weekly. Even better, the entire series will be available on SBS On Demand from the same date. Created, co-written, and produced by Glover, also known as artist Childish Gambino, Atlanta follows the life of Princeton dropout Earn Marks (Glover) and his cousin Alfred 'Paper Boi' Miles (Brian Tyree Henry). The series sees Earn supporting his two-year-old daughter and managing his rapper cousin trying his luck at breaking into the music industry. The series took out two Golden Globes in January, with Glover landing Best Actor in a Television Series – Musical or Comedy, and Atlanta taking out Best Television Series – Musical or Comedy. Atlanta is one series we think you should catch up on after the Golden Globes. Read the whole list here.
High-rise hotels and the Gold Coast go hand in hand; however, slumbering at great heights isn't the only way to stay at the tourist-friendly spot. The area is also home to plenty of motels, which come with their own low-key (and lower to the ground) charms — and, thanks to a new startup, they're getting an art-fuelled makeover. Meet Golden Ticket Motel, which wants to turn the Goldie's heritage motel rooms into highly Instagrammable experiences; think: Sugar Republic and the Museum of Ice Cream, but you can kip there. Beginning as a three-month pilot, it enlists artists to deck out motels, turning them into the kind of space that you'll want to snap copious amounts of pictures of. 'Art you can sleep in' is the official spiel, and it fits. The first venue doing the honours is Surf Street Motel in Mermaid Beach, with one room given a revamp by Gold Coast artist Dion Parker. Big, colourful, flower-filled designs feature heavily, as set against black walls. The makeover covers the brightly hued quilt and curtains, statement walls complete with a velvet centrepiece that's designed to look like flowing hair, and florals throughout the bathroom. No, you haven't stayed in a motel quite like this before. If that sounds like your kind of place for an evening, bookings are open for visits from May, starting from $235 per night. As well as soaking in the eye-catching interior design, you'll also be just a five-minute walk from Nobby Beach — because no GC stay is ever really complete without some surf, sun and sand, obviously. The pilot run is supported by a City of Gold Coast creative tourism grant — and if it goes well, the aim is roll out the concept to other Goldie motels. So, you might soon have more places to spend a night in. "The vision for Golden Ticket Motel is to create a unique overnight tourism product for the Gold Coast in collaboration with local artists during a time when there are limited exhibition opportunities for working artists in the area," said Golden Ticket Motel founder Lucy Fisher. "The Gold Coast is blessed with historic motels that should be celebrated, and I wanted to create a product that encourages motel visitation without any outlay from operators and introduce a new audience to this style of accommodation." "Ultimately, the aim is to build Golden Ticket Motel into a thriving creative tourism business based on the Gold Coast that works with artists and accommodation providers to create playful and unique overnight art experiences." Golden Ticket Motel's first pop-up at Surf Street Motel, Mermaid Beach, is available to book for the next three months. For more information, head to the Golden Ticket Motel website.
Whisked from her idyllic farm with the promise of a job cooking for a high-level government official, it is only when Hortense Laborie (Catherine Frot) gets to Paris that she learns the position will actually involve being the private chef for French president Francois Mitterand. She has a moment of faint surprise, but only a moment. The job offer is a bolt from the blue, but she knows she's up for it. Based on the true story of the first woman to be the president's chef, Haute Cuisine alternates between Hortense's time in the palace and a later spell as the inscrutable but beloved head chef on an Antarctic research station. In a clunky plot device at odds with the rest of the film's unhurried feel, an Australian journalist (Arly Jover, doing a deplorable accent) is making a documentary about the station and tries to unravel the enigma of Hortense, including why she left her high-profile role for such an unlikely and isolated outpost. Not unlike last year's similarly foodie-friendly Step Up to the Plate, Haute Cuisine is almost defiantly low-key, offering little in the way of revelation but instead opting for a detailed, quiet character study and a wealth of lovingly filmed food preparation scenes. Initially feeling isolated in her position, Hortense finds herself ill at ease in the rarified surrounds of the Elysse palace, all cavernous rooms and chilly stylishness. She is unsure of the tastes of who she is cooking for, is eyed suspiciously from the chefs in the much larger public kitchen and has running battles with bean-counting bureaucrats who can't understand the time and money she pours into sourcing the finest truffles and foie gras. Eventually she does meet Mitterand (played with sparkly eyed verve by Jean d'Ormesson, making his film debut at age 86) and the pair bond over the heartfelt, rustic food of his childhood. Working with the timid but capable sous chef Nicholas (Arthur Dupont) she becomes a favourite of the ageing president, only increasing the jealousy of her male counterparts. Haute Cuisine is a small story but it is an interesting historical vignette, and it is to the film's credit that it does not overstay its welcome a minute.
Remember when your mum told you that it's what's on the inside that counts? At the Australian Interior Design Awards, that's definitely the case. Returning for 2021, the country's premier interior design gongs reward excellence in hospitality, installation, residential, workplace, retail and public design, as well as residential decoration — and it has just revealed its lengthy (and obviously eye-catching) 2021 shortlist. A word of warning for those who like their interiors swish, plush, luxurious and stylish all round: you're going to want to live in or visit all of the places vying for this year's awards. Thankfully, with plenty of bars and restaurants in the running, the latter is definitely possible. In Sydney, in the hospitality field, the likes of Harbord Hotel, Ciccia Bella, Sydney Tower and Atomic Beer Project are among the spots vying for glory. Well, for a shiny prize and plenty of recognition to go with their shiny interiors, to be exact. Melbourne's Farmer's Daughters, Poodle Bar and Bistro, First Love Coffee, Hero at ACMI, Byrdi, Citizen Snack Bar and Next Hotel also rank among the places in the running, while Brisbane's Industry Beans and Ping Pong Thai Restaurant also made the cut. In South Australia, Never Never Distillery and Hotel Indigo join the places in contention. [caption id="attachment_803565" align="aligncenter" width="1920"] First Love, Rebecca Newman[/caption] The list goes on — both for bars, cafes, restaurants and hotels, with 33 places in contention in total, and throughout the awards' other categories. A whopping 190 places have made it through to this stage across all fields, which means that there is no shortage of strikingly deigned new, revamped and refurbished places demanding your attention around around the country. After the event went virtual in 2020 — handing out its gongs via a virtual broadcast — this year's winners will be announced in-person at a dinner the Hyatt Regency Sydney on Friday, September 3. For the full Australian Interior Design Awards 2021 shortlist, head to the AIDA website. Top image: Sydney Tower, Robert Walsh.
Great news, movie buffs: when the Melbourne International Film Festival rolls around each year, it doesn't just let Melburnians who can dedicate their spare hours to the full fest experience join in the fun. MIFF Play, the event's digital offshoot, broadens the event's audience nationally — and, to the delight of cinephiles who can't hop between the Victoria capital's cinemas across August, the digital leg is returning for another spin in 2023. For the fourth year running, that's fabulous news both for Melburnians who still have normal life to attend to, and for film buffs interstate — a move sparked by the fact that in 2020, when MIFF first made the leap to streaming the fest in a big way, it enjoyed its biggest audience ever. In 2023, MIFF Play will be available from Friday, August 18–Sunday, August 27, and with a diverse array of titles. Price-wise, you can either pay as you watch or grab a MIFF Play flexipass. Either way, your couch awaits. The lineup includes the animated Blind Willow, Sleeping Woman, which adapts Haruki Murakami's short stories; Keeping Hope, a documentary about Sweet As' Mark Coles Smith confronting an event from his past with a view to helping other young First Nations men in the Kimberley; Autobiography, about a housekeeper with a sinister boss; All the Colours of the World Are Between Black and White, which received the Berlinale's Teddy Award; and 20,000 Species of Bees, another prize-recipient in Germany, this time for lead performance. Or, the highlights also span Frederick Wiseman's A Couple, one of the master documentarian's rare dramatic features, focusing on the Tolstoys; Riddle of Fire, which has been garnering The Goonies and Stand by Me comparisons; witchcraft and revenge in 19th-century Chile in Sorcery; and Béla Tarr's 2000 drama Werckmeister Harmonies, a slow-cinema great, will has just scored a new 4K restoration. Your usual streaming queue can wait for these ten days, obviously.
It kicked off more than four decades ago with one of the best horror movies ever made; however, the Halloween franchise has been through quite a few ups and downs over the years. Clocking up ten follow-ups and 11 movies in total so far, the slasher series has delivered excellent and terrible sequels, veered into remake territory, both killed off and brought back its heroine, and completely erased parts of its own past several times. But, like its mask-wearing villain Michael Myers, it always finds a way to go on. Since 2018's Halloween, that's been especially great news — with the Jamie Lee Curtis-starring, Jason Blum-produced 11th flick in the franchise proving a smart, thrilling horror delight, and ranking second only to the movie that started it all. Indeed, the film was such a success that two more sequels are set to come from the same team (aka Blum, writer/director David Gordon Green and co-scribe Danny McBride): Halloween Kills and Halloween Ends. Originally, Halloween Kills was due to hit screens this year, in October — when else? — but, as announced earlier this year by franchise creator John Carpenter, it moved back its release to October 2021. Although fans won't be able to make a return trip to Haddonfield until then, and have another encounter with Curtis' spirited Laurie Strode and her lifelong nemesis, too, a new teaser for the film has just dropped to help fill the gap. It's a brief clip — following a first, also short teaser that was released back in July — but it's suitably eerie. In voiceover, Strode tells us that "next Halloween, when the sun sets and someone is alone, he kills". The sneak peek then shows Myers picking up his mask and doing what he's done in oh-so-many movies so far. Cue the iconic, Carpenter-composed theme music, obviously. Check out the latest Halloween Kills teaser trailer below: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TgWlruoQoLI Halloween Kills will release in Australian cinemas on October 15, 2021.
You've filled your house with their minimalist designs and homewares, and dreamed of living in their flat-pack homes and tiny pre-fab huts. MUJI fans, your love affair with the Japanese home goods giant isn't over yet. Next on the retailer's agenda is their own range of hotels, with sites slated for Shenzhen in China and Tokyo in Japan. Construction on a retail and hotel complex in Tokyo's Ginza began in June, working towards a 2019 completion for the 13-floor building. It'll be comprised of three levels below ground, and ten — including a two-floor penthouse — above. Seven storeys will feature shops, including MUJI's global flagship store, while five will boast their first Japanese hotel. Concept and interior design managed by MUJI-owning company Ryohin Keikaku. The Tokyo digs will join a previously announced location in Shenzhen, which is reported to include 79 rooms spanning five different types of accommodation. A store and cafe are also planned for the Chinese hotel, as are recycled wooden interiors and spaces filled with plenty of MUJI furniture. Yes, your travel bucket list just notched up two more entries. Via Dezeen. Images: Mitsui Fudosan Co Ltd
For the second time in as many movies, Lady Gaga is caught in a bad romance in House of Gucci. Yes, she's already sung the song to match. The pop diva doesn't belt out ballads or croon upbeat tunes in this true-crime drama, unlike in her Oscar-nominated role in A Star Is Born, but she does shimmy into a tale about love and revenge, horror and design, and wanting someone's everything as long as it's free. Eschewing the earthy naturalism of her last film performance and tapping into her famed on-stage theatricality instead, she's perfect for the part of Patrizia Reggiani, aka Lady Gucci, aka the daughter of a trucking entrepreneur who wed into one of the world's most prestigious fashion families, helped unstitch its hold on its couture empire, then went to prison for murder. She's exceptional because she goes big and lavish, and because she knows that's the type of feature she's meant to be in: a soapy spectacle about money and power that uses its depiction of excess as an interrogation technique. Complimenting Gaga for nailing the brief — for acing it so dazzlingly that she's sauntering down her own catwalk as most of her co-stars virtually watch from the floor — gives House of Gucci a tad too much credit, though. Ridley Scott's second film in mere months following The Last Duel, and his third in a row to examine wealth and influence after 2017's All the Money in the World, this fashion-world saga skews large, lush and luxe with each choice, too, but doesn't land every sashay with quite the outsized lustre of its crown jewel. If House of Gucci's veteran director was picking an outfit instead, he would've chosen a killer gown, then wavered on the accessories. Some of his other decisions gleam, as seen in the movie's knowingly maximalist and melodramatic air. Others prove fine, like its jukebox-style soundtrack of 70s and 80s bangers. A few moves are so cartoonish — Jared Leto's ridiculousness, and the Super Mario-style accents sported by almost everyone on-screen — that they play like cheap knockoffs. The story itself is a standout, however, as adapted from Sara Gay Forden's 2001 book The House of Gucci: A Sensational Story of Murder, Madness, Glamour, and Greed. When Patrizia meets law student Maurizio Gucci (Adam Driver, Annette) at a 70s-era party, mistakes him for a bartender, then realises who he is, it sparks a rollercoaster of a relationship — starting with Maurizio being disinherited by his father Rodolfo (Jeremy Irons, Love, Weddings and Other Disasters) for their marriage. Still, the newest Gucci knows what she wants: a place in the family's dynasty. She isn't the lone cause of the Guccis' unfolding, thanks to Rodolfo's brother Aldo (Al Pacino, Hunters), his penchant for watering down the brand and tax evasion, and his wannabe-designer son Paolo (Leto, The Little Things), but she's the Lady Macbeth pushing Maurizio to seize the company by any means. And, because the reason that House of Gucci even exists was written in news headlines over a quarter-century ago, she's behind Maurizio's killing in 1995. "I don't consider myself a particularly ethical person, but I'm fair," Patrizia offers partway into the movie, a moral code that still sees her order his hit after their divorce — helped by a TV psychic-turned-pal (Salma Hayek, Eternals), because that's the kind of tale this is. Interviewed in 2016, Patrizia called herself "the most Gucci of them all", an idea that Scott and his screenwriters Becky Johnston (Arthur Newman) and Roberto Bentivegna (short El otro lado) don't ever give Italian-lilted voice to, but still use as their basic pattern. In the sartorial realm, Gucci might stand for high-end indulgence, but House of Gucci sees both the allure and the cost of the brand reflected in Patrizia's status-hungry actions. Lust — for power, popularity, money, standing and sex all included — might be the soapiest vice of them all. Blunt, pulsating and pumping through the hot-blooded Patrizia's veins, it's House of Gucci's signature emotion, although the other deadly sins also get a whirl. No exaggerated account of life, love and the one percent's lavishness lacks in greed, pride, wrath, envy, gluttony and sloth as well, including this one, but there's nothing like unfettered desire to keep a narrative bubbling. Scott's film is positively ravenous for more, as its protagonist is at every turn. Nothing is too much for Patrizia in her quest to inhabit a life she once only fantasised about, and there's little that House of Gucci won't do to convey and embody that appetite. But all that glitters isn't always gold, or diamond-sharp, or even entertainingly gaudy, including for the picture itself. With Scott's regular cinematographer Dariusz Wolski on lensing duties, House of Gucci looks like a glitzy dream that slowly loses its glamour, and by design. Its largely Milan-set staging and obviously Gucci-heavy costuming expresses the same feeling — whether or not Paolo is urinating on silk scarves and Aldo is peddling fakes. But those pasta-sauce ad accents just play cheap and easy from the outset, and everything about Leto's prosthetic-laden, safari suit-wearing, hammed-up performance does the same. Both quickly overstay their welcomes, not that either is ever welcomed at all. Calling them knowing gags, purposefully camp flourishes or pointed parodies would be far too generous, even given the feature's gleeful soap-opera tone, overt eat-the-rich sentiments and clear awareness that it's a piece of true-crime pageantry. Thank the pop-culture gods for Gaga, then, as legions of her Little Monsters have for more than a decade. Another movie from the past year, the unshakeably misguided Joe Bell, had a character liberally sing her praises — but, surpassing even A Star Is Born, House of Gucci is her silver-screen powerhouse. Donning wiggle dresses, voluminous hair and a slinkily savage attitude, she's both lively and alive to everything happening in Patrizia's story and Scott's film alike. Whether posed opposite Driver's restrained turn as Maurizio or Pacino's also-big effort as Aldo, her presence improves her co-stars' work in every scene they share, too. Hers is an investment performance, with Scott entrusting almost everything that hits the mark in House of Gucci to his leading lady's go-for-it glow — and treating audiences to a bona fide movie-star show that Gaga couldn't wear better if it was sewn on.
Not content with becoming a fixture on Australia's roads, and possibly taking to the skies as early as next year, Uber is now hitting the water at one of the country's greatest natural features. If you've always wanted to cruise the Great Barrier Reef by submarine, now you can now book one via the Uber app. No, this isn't a joke — but it's definitely a marketing stunt. Aptly named scUber, the new service — which will be available between Monday, May 27 and Tuesday, June 18 — is a collaboration between Uber and Queensland's state tourism body. Of course, diving down deep via scUber is incredibly pricey at $3000 for two people. But if you're particularly flush with cash and have always dreamed of seeing the reef this way, now you can. According to research by Tourism and Events Queensland, plenty of people have this exact experience on their bucket list. Your big stack of bills gets you a trip to the southern Great Barrier Reef's Heron Island from May 27, or to north Queensland's Agincourt Reef off the coast of Port Douglas from June 9. You'll be picked up from your location by Uber, naturally — although you'll need to be in Gladstone, Cairns, Palm Cove or Port Douglas. Then you'll be taken by helicopter to either scUber destination, where you'll jump inside the submarine and dive under the water for an hour. Afterwards, you'll head back to your original pickup spot. The submarine actually holds three people — someone who knows what they're doing will be going down with you. They'll take you deep, down to 30 metres, where 180-degree views await. Obviously, there are a few other drawcards: you don't have to learn how to dive or get a license, and you won't get wet. Uber will also be partnering with Citizens of the Great Barrier Reef as part of scUber, donating $100,000 to the protection and conservation organisation, as well as the equivalent value of every scUber ride purchased. And, in conjunction with Tourism and Events Queensland, it's giving away a scUber package complete with flights and five nights accommodation — which is open to eager folks not only from Australia, but from New Zealand, the USA, Canada, the UK and France too. You'll need to enter by 1.59pm, Australian time, on Monday, June 1. scUber will be available from Monday, May 27 to Tuesday, June 18 in Gladstone, Cairns, Palm Cove and Port Douglas. For more information, visit scUberqueensland.com. Images: Tourism and Events Queensland.
If you've been defiantly nursing a waterlogged iPhone 4 until that ever distant contract renewal day, Apple have some new toys for you. On Tuesday in San Francisco, Apple announced the arrival of two new iPhones: the iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus — alongside the new fandangled Apple Watch. You'll be able to preorder both models for an undoubtedly exorbitant fee on September 12 (Canada's looking at prices ranging from $649 to $949, so Australian phones will be pretty pricey), with the Apple team assembling the troops to start shipping on September 19. So what's the go this time around? Here's what to expect from the new features of the iPhone 6 and iPhone Plus: Watch cat videos at a higher res Watching Maru get stuck in cardboard boxes has never looked so fly on an Apple device. While the iPhone 5s has a screen resolution of 1136 x 640 pixels, the iPhone 6 has a screen resolution of 1334 x 750. But the formidable iPhone 6 Plus will have a resolution of 1920 x 1080 pixels, so Maru's escapades will practically live in your hand. Avoid the dreaded square butt pocket Both new iPhones are thinner than ever, so jean pocket outlines have seriously declined. Following the iPhone 5s, which sat at 7.6 mm thick, the iPhone 6 will be 6.9 mm thick and the iPhone 6 Plus will be 7.1 mm. Raise that Phablety screen size with pride Now Phablets are cool, right 'Droidlovers? The iPhone 6 will boast a 4.7 inch screen, while the Plus gets into tabletty territory with a 5.5 incher. Android users are all: Enjoy a battery that lasts longer than Guardians of the Galaxy Possibly the best feature. Best. Feature. The iPhone 6 will sport a battery with up to 14 hours of 3G phone calling. That supercharged iPhone 6 Plus will crank it up to 24 hours of 3G calling. Leave your chargers at home! (Don't). Don't even Photoshop those travel snaps The new iPhone cameras have a resolution of eight megapixels and focus at twice the speed of the iPhone 5S, so you'll be taking Ansel Adams-worthy photos without blinking an eye. The new iPhones can also capture video in 1080p high definition quality. Top. Notch. Bondi Beach's free wifi might actually work The new iPhones' wifi connections will be three times faster, whether Bondi can keep up with that is another slow, slow kettle of fish. Cut, copy and paste without binning your phone There'll be actual buttons for cut, copy, paste on the keyboard. Slam dunk. Pay for beers with your phone The biggie for Apple, the whole pay-with-your-phone thing has been tested here and there but never present in an iPhone outside of cardless cash. With the new Apple Pay fingerprint-run feature, you'll be able to go jogging without jingling. Playing Candy Crush on your phone will look epic Sporting a sweet, sweet 64-bit chip A8 processor (just go with it), the new iPhones will be able to make handheld games look like they're supposed to. Just not Bioshock for mobile, don't even. Go landscape to portrait without looking like a noob Apparently they've fixed it. We'll see about that. Your phone's so big the power button's on the side THE POWER BUTTON. IS ON. THE SIDE. The iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus can be preordered from September 12 (or you could just save $700). For more Mactastic news, check out the features of the Apple Watch over here. Via Elite Daily.
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 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.
Spent too much time watching that animated TV family that's not The Simpsons? Know too many tidbits about Seth MacFarlane's hit series? Do you recite Family Guy lines in your sleep? If so, Heya Bar has the moment that you've been waiting for — and the way to make your obsession a little more lucrative. The latest edition of their Two for Trivia night focuses on Peter, Lois, Meg, Chris, Stewie and Brian Griffin, plus all the things that have made the show an enduring favourite. Expect tickets, gift vouchers and lucky door prizes for your efforts — and those all important bragging rights.
In the ultimate blend of gastronomy and performance art, dynamic duo Sam Bompas and Harry Parr are about to host the most intimate of Valentine's Day parties. The jelly-lovin' brains behind wobbling, edible houses of parliament and the lava-powered barbecue, Bompas and Parr are about to host a whisky tasting — an anatomical whisky tasting, in which guests are invited to taste 25, 30 and 50-year-old whiskies from the bodies of people born the same year the good stuff was casked up. Poured onto the natural contours of 25, 30 and 50-year-old performers, the whiskies will naturally react to the body heat and surface saltiness of each human, bringing out different flavours within each spirit. So you'll taste a 25-year-old single malt from a 25-year-old body — a predicted contrast to a 50-year-old scotch from a 50-year-old body. After you've slurped the smoky goodness from their body, the performer will then spin tales of their life story — they've been alive as long as that whisky has, so you'll add a bit of context to the matured mouthful you just downed. And any bored hesitation you have to hearing their life story, remember, you just drank whisky from the small of their back. They earned it. You'll have to book an airfare to enjoy Bompas & Parr's sensory experiment; the tastings are being held in collaboration with culture journal The Gourmand on February 14 at Shoreditch's Ace Hotel in London. Via Londonist.
Sixteen films in, the Marvel Cinematic Universe shows no signs of stopping, with eight more already in the works. Add their growing list of television series, the comics they're all based on, plenty of merchandise and an Australian gallery exhibition, and Marvel mania is difficult to escape. In fact, soon you'll be able to sleep in a hotel dedicated to the company's caped crusaders. Disney has announced that Disneyland Paris will become the home of the world's first Marvel hotel, reimagining an existing site into a superhero-themed wonderland. The park's Disney's Hotel New York will become known as Disney's Hotel New York – The Art of Marvel — and yes, we do think that a Parisian place with New York in its name has the potential to be confusing, but that's not likely to stop Avengers fans. Details are currently thin on the ground; however the hotel will feature nods to everyone from Iron Man to Spider-Man — and we're hoping some of the brand's female superheroes too. And, in what's shaping up to be a great time to be a pop culture fan, the news comes hot on the heels of another huge Disney hotel, with a Stars Wars-theme site slated to debut as part of Walt Disney World's new 360 vacation concept in Orlando. Image: Disney/Marvel via Disney Parks Blog.
Between the third and fourth seasons of True Detective, five years passed. Thankfully, you likely won't have to wait as long for your next dose of the hit HBO series. After the latest batch of episodes, aka True Detective: Night Country, proved such a success since arriving in January 2024 — including becoming the most-watched season of the show ever — the US network has already renewed the series mere days after the recent six-episode run ended. Presumably, it'll be another case of new season, new cops, new case, as the series has been delivering since 2014. And whether or not you believe that time is a flat circle — and everything we've ever done or will do, we're gonna do over and over and over and over again, too — watching yet another round of instalments in this sleuthing thriller will become a reality again. While the main characters have changed in each of the show's seasons so far, season five will have something in common with season four: the return of Tigers Are Not Afraid filmmaker Issa López. She wrote and directed every one of Night Country's episodes, and now has a new multi-year deal with HBO. "Issa Lopez is that one-of-a-kind, rare talent that speaks directly to HBO's creative spirit. She helmed True Detective: Night Country from start to finish, never once faltering from her own commendable vision, and inspiring us with her resilience both on the page and behind the camera," said Francesca Orsi, Executive Vice President, HBO Programming, Head of HBO Drama Series and Films, announcing the news. "From conception to release, Night Country has been the most beautiful collaboration and adventure of my entire creative life. HBO trusted my vision all the way, and the idea of bringing to life a new incarnation of True Detective with Casey, Francesca and the whole team is a dream come true. I can't wait to go again," added Lopez. True Detective: Night Country followed Liz Danvers (Jodie Foster, Nyad) and Evangeline Navarro (Kali Reis, Catch the Fair One) as they delved into an icy mystery in the town of Ennis in Alaska. When eight men on an arctic research station disappeared without a trace, the franchise's latest duo were charged with discovering what's going on, including wading through plenty of eeriness — even though they'd worked together before and don't get along. The show's fourth season also featured Finn Bennett (Hope Gap), Fiona Shaw (Andor), Christopher Eccleston (Dodger), Isabella Star LaBlanc (Long Slow Exhale) and John Hawkes (Too Old to Die Young) in front of the camera. Each season of True Detective tells its own tale, starting with the Matthew McConaughey (The Gentlemen)- and Woody Harrelson (White House Plumbers)-led first season in 2014 — and then followed by Taylor Kitsch (Painkiller), Colin Farrell (The Banshees of Inisherin) and Rachel McAdams (Are You There God? It's Me, Margaret) starring in season two. Mahershala Ali (Leave the World Behind) and Stephen Dorff (The Righteous Gemstones) took over in season three. There's no word yet on who might do the honours in season five. Check out the full trailer for True Detective: Night Country below: Season five of True Detective doesn't yet have a release date, but we'll update you when more details are announced. True Detective: Night Country streams via Binge in Australia and Neon in New Zealand. Read our review.
If you go to sleep thinking of cuddling baby animals in the hope you'll wake up next to one, your dreams might be about to come true. Sydney's Taronga Zoo have released their plans to build a new 58-room "eco-resort" right in the middle of the zoo. Evidently building off the success of the zoo's Roar and Snore — a pretty amazing overnight stay at the zoo, which involves camping in tents and seeing the animals after dark and early in the morning — this new initiative, the Taronga Wildlife Retreat, will create a new immersive overnight experience for visitors to the zoo. They'll stay in "luxury pods" within the proposed Australian Habitat section of the zoo, which will supposedly be surrounded by native fauna and animals. There will be koalas, wallabies and platypus. I repeat: koalas, wallabies, platypus. The plans for the retreat, which have just been lodged with the NSW Department of Planning and Environment, look set to cost upwards of $44 million. And while the aim is to support conservation by educating and inspiring visitors (many of whom will be international), critics are questioning whether that money wouldn't be better spent on improving conditions for the animals at the zoo. An environmental impact statement still has to be put together, so we'll see how this plays out. Via The Sydney Morning Herald
Taylor Swift's latest Down Under era might be over for now, after the pop superstar brought her Eras show to Australia at the end of February, but the still-touring performance will live on via Disney+. The Mouse House's streaming platform will be home to a new version of the Taylor Swift: The 'Eras' Tour concert film from Friday, March 15, complete with extra songs — and this iteration of the flick, aka Taylor Swift: The Eras Tour (Taylor's Version), just scored a trailer. Swifties have known that the blockbuster movie was hitting Disney+ since February, and that it will feature five extra tunes, including 'cardigan' and four acoustic tracks since then as well. Now, the streaming service has unveiled a sneak peek at what it's calling "the concert film in its entirety for the first time", which teases 'Maroon' among the quartet of additional acoustic tunes. You might be dubbing the new version of the flick reason enough to don your friendship bracelets in your lounge room. If your wildest dreams have been about getting in on Taylor Swift's Eras tour since it was first announced, then this is gorgeous and enchanted news — and if you missed out on tickets to the live shows, consider it the next best thing. Look what the world made Swift do: turn her current massive tour into a movie that's also proven a smash, taking in over $260 million at the worldwide box office. The film offers a money-can't-buy view of the 'Shake It Off', 'We Are Never Getting Back Together' and 'Bad Blood' musician's gig, working through her entire career so far by playing tracks from each of her studio albums in a three-hour, ten-act spectacular. [caption id="attachment_922251" align="alignnone" width="1920"] Trafalgar Releasing[/caption] The IRL Eras Tour kicked off in March 2023 in the US, then headed to Mexico and Brazil. Japan and Australia — both around the Super Bowl — as well as Singapore, France, Sweden, Portugal, Spain, the UK, Ireland, The Netherlands, Switzerland, Poland, Italy, Germany, Austria, Canada and a return to the US are all on the itinerary in 2024. "The Eras Tour has been a true phenomenon that has and continues to thrill fans around the world, and we are very excited to bring this electrifying concert to audiences wherever they are, exclusively through Disney+," said Disney CEO Bob Iger, when he announced the film's impending arrival on the service. Check out the trailer for Taylor Swift: The Eras Tour (Taylor's Version) below: Taylor Swift: The Eras Tour (Taylor's Version) will stream via Disney+ from Friday, March 15, 2024. Read our review. Images from Taylor Swift: The Eras Tour (Taylor's Version): © 2024 Disney Enterprises, Inc. All Rights Reserved.
Everyone knows the protocol. You walk into the carriage, give everyone a passing acknowledgement as you look for a seat, then promptly settle in with your iPhone for the journey ahead. It doesn't matter if you don't have anyone to text. Your number one priority here is avoiding eye contact and blocking out the obnoxious, stinking presence of your fellow passengers. Now researchers in Queensland are seeking to undo all these social codes we've carefully put in place. Prepare yourself — they want us to actually talk to each other. Currently in its initial trials Train Yarn is a texting app developed by Tiago Camacho from the Queensland University of Technology. Using your phone's GPS data, the app only works on Brisbane's train network, and seeks to randomly connect you with your fellow passengers. With each user staying relatively anonymous, the app works in a similar way to Chatroulette: the infamous go-to platform for strangers' genitals on demand. Admittedly, the app developers have thought of these possible downfalls and maintain faith that the anonymity of the service will keep the messages clean (for some reason we can't totally figure out). However, it does help that the platform only supports text. At the very least we'll be saved from the dick pic the teenage boy vandalising the back of your seat was invariably going to send. Similar projects have been carried out around the world with mixed success. Last year, Virgin America implemented an online chat system for use on its domestic flights. Identified by seat number, passengers could chat to each other or send out messages to the whole plane. According to the Daily Mail it had some pretty amazing outcomes. It's hard to say if the same technology will take off on trains. After all, planes are the only mode of transport where we're cut off from our smartphones — in a way we're forced to interact with each other. Nonetheless the makers of Train Yarn stay optimistic. "Research has shown that while most people think they would rather sit in solitary than talk with a stranger, when tested, people who conversed with someone had a more positive experience than those who kept to themselves," said lead researcher Tiago Camacho. It's a nice, if not somewhat utopian vision that's definitely worth a go either way. The app is available for free download now, but beware — QUT will be watching your conversations for research purposes from July 3-16. We know it's hard, but try to fill it with something other than sexts and complaints. Via Brisbane Times.
Wonder Woman. Ghostbusters. Annihilation. Hollywood has come a long way since the film days of yore, when female characters were under-represented and over-sexualised. Hasn't it? Well, maybe not quite. The costuming in this year's Tomb Raider reboot isn't quite as pervy as in the 2001 original, but outside of that there isn't much improvement. Certainly, things aren't different enough to really warrant a remake – or to catch the franchise up with the momentum of progressive feminism. This new film sees a young, broke Lara Croft (Alicia Vikander, replacing Angelina Jolie) follow in the footsteps of her mysteriously deceased adventurer father, crossing land and sea to find out what happened to him. Vikander does her best as the butt-kicking, braid-flicking protagonist – her guts and grizzle were enough to make me ponder my own laughable levels of fitness. That said, the fact I found myself thinking "grrrl you are ripped" about a zillion times gives you an indication of how little else there is to latch onto. Turns out a kick-ass heroine isn't enough to counteract crap writing. The dialogue in Tomb Raider is horribly stilted, so much so that the film's villain sounds like a parody of himself. If you had a dollar for every cliché out of his mouth – or for every time someone says something along the lines of "that's not the type of Croft I am – you'd easily have enough to cover the cost of your ticket. Despite what the writers might think, you can't just take a sub-par line of dialogue and repeat it until it becomes a zinger. The film's plotting, meanwhile, plays like a lazy mix of tropes from Raiders of The Lost Ark and The Hunger Games, with the moody origin story vibes of Batman Begins thrown in. Director Roar Uthaug doesn't manage any of it particularly well, although there are – spoiler alert – a lot of scenes where Vikander struggles in bodies of water, and they're all convincingly shot (I wrote the word "STRESSFUL" several times in my notes). The film also fails to take advantage of its strong supporting cast. Kristin Scott Thomas is chronically underused, while Nick Frost shows up all too briefly to deliver one of the movie's only genuinely funny moments (as opposed to its many unintentionally funny ones). At least the producers thought to cast someone other than a generic Hollywood white guy as Lara's partner in crime. Sadly, Daniel Wu's Lu Ren is relegated to the background in no time, and only pops up when required by the plot. The best bit of the entire Tomb Raider ordeal? To be honest, it was the very attractive promo men swinging around ropes in the foyer before the media screening. When that's the case you know you've got a dud on your hands. Our advice: give this flick a miss. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8ndhidEmUbI
As well as giving popular culture some of its most beloved characters of the past few decades, the Harry Potter franchise has also conjured up a whole heap of astonishing critters. The Boy Who Lived himself studied them at Hogwarts, all thanks to textbook Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them. Then, to the joy of Potter-loving muggles everywhere, that tome became an actual IRL text in 2001. Every Wizarding World fan knows that that book followed the original Harry Potter novels in making the leap from the page to the screen, resulting in a first film in 2016, then 2018 sequel Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes of Grindelwald and also 2022's Fantastic Beasts: The Secrets of Dumbledore. But if you're more interested in the actual fantastic beasts than a movie plot spun around them — and in natural history in general — exhibition Fantastic Beasts: The Wonder of Nature has you covered. First announced in 2020, then premiering at London's Natural History Museum, this is all about critters that fly, scamper and scurry through the Harry Potter and Fantastic Beasts realm on the page and screen; however, it's also about real-life creatures, specimens and artefacts, too. The exhibition combines beasts from the natural world, the mythical world and the Wizarding World, and was always slated for an international tour. Next, it's Australia's turn to see it, with the showcase displaying at Melbourne Museum from Friday, May 19–Sunday, October 8. Visitors to Fantastic Beasts: The Wonder of Nature will see legendary beasts placed alongside specimens and historic objects, while also venturing through elements from cinema's last two decades. Unsurprisingly, there'll also be a hefty focus on Newt Scamander, the Wizarding World's famed magizoologist as played Eddie Redmayne (The Good Nurse). Whether you're a Melbourne local or now planning a visit, you'll see items from the Natural History Museum's scientific collections, custom-made Wizarding World models, props from the flicks and original artworks from Bloomsbury Publishing. You'll also wander through a celebration of real-life scientists trying to understand the planet's animal inhabitants. In London, the exhibits included a tiger, a Galápagos marine iguana and a giant oarfish (the planet's longest bony fish) alongside an Erumpent horn and the dragon skull from Professor Lupin's classroom. Patrons were also able to compare the camouflage tactics of a jaguar to those of the Demiguise. Fantastic Beasts: The Wonder of Nature will display at Melbourne Museum from Friday, May 19–Sunday, October 8. Head to the exhibition's website for further details. Images: Trustees of the Natural History Museum London.
He lived there. He spent his last moments there. In between, he recorded music, played small gigs, and based his studio and record label there, too. We're talking about Paisley Park, the house formerly known as Prince's private and creative sanctuary. Only a few hundred people have had the privilege of entering — but now, the compound that shares its name with one of his songs is open to the public. Six months after his tragic passing, the multi-talented musician's siblings have allowed the first tours of the massive mansion 30 minutes outside of Minneapolis, Minnesota; however not everything has gone according to plan. Until the local Chanhassen City Council meets in December to consider zoning issues and safety concerns, the midwest site is only open on a limited basis — currently on October 6 to 8, and 14. It is hoped that people will be able to celebrate his life, musical output and legacy at the 65,000-square-foot complex on a more regular basis after the council meeting. Fans that have stepped through the doors of the Prince-focused equivalent of Elvis Presley's Graceland so far have not only wandered through the main floor of the site (which was built in the mid '80s), or spied the recording and mixing studios where Prince recorded, produced and mixed many of the iconic tracks we all know and love. They also reportedly spotted an urn containing the late performer's ashes, plus his personal office, with his belongings untouched since he was last in the room. The rest of Paisley Park also boasts Prince's private NPG Music Club, as well as the massive soundstage and concert hall where he not only rehearsed for tours, but also held exclusive private events and concerts. Thousands of artifacts from Prince's personal archives are also display. If you've ever wanted to feast your eyes on his concert outfits, awards, musical instruments and artwork — or rare music and video recordings, concert memorabilia, automobiles and motorcycles — you'll find them here. According to Prince's sister Tyka Nelson, "opening Paisley Park is something that Prince always wanted to do and was actively working on." While the lyrics of his 1985 song advised that "admission is easy, just say U believe and come 2 this place in your heart", ticketing — which is still on sale now — costs either US$38.50 for a 70-minute self-guided tour, or US$100 for a longer, more extensive VIP experience within what we're hoping are purple-coloured walls.
They helped bands like the Rolling Stones become famous, but no one can remember their names. Funny, insightful and deeply moving, 20 Feet From Stardom is a film about the backing vocalists behind some of the biggest bands in the music industry. Fortune Avenue have 3 double passes to give away. Enter now to win.
Start your engines, RuPaul's Drag Race Down Under fans — come Saturday, July 30, the Australian and New Zealand version of the hit series will return to Stan in Australia and TVNZ OnDemand in New Zealand for a second season. RuPaul is back playing host, of course. Michelle Visage and Rhys Nicholson also return as judges, too. And, based on the just-dropped trailer, the challenges are taking the whole Down Under part extremely seriously. Well, one challenge is. Just as everyone in Australia will start paying an extra dollar for their Bunnings sausage sizzles — a price increase that NZ has been spared — Drag Race Down Under is throwing some snags on the barbie. Yes, there's a sausage sizzle photo shoot, as well as all the puns that you'd expect. Obviously, it looks glorious. Competing for the title of 'Down Under's Next Drag Superstar' this time around: three contenders from Aotearoa and seven from Australia. Aubrey Haive hails from Timaru in NZ, and will be representing the country alongside Spankie Jackzon from Palmerston North and Yuri Guaii from Auckland. In the Aussie contingent, Brisbane's Beverly Kills, Adelaide's Kween Kong and Newcastle's Molly Poppinz will be doing the honours alongside Sydney's Faúx Fúr, Hannah Conda, Minnie Cooper and Pomara Fifth. This fierce roster of queens will don eye-catching outfits, navigate plenty of dramas and vie for glory — and endeavour to follow in the footsteps of Kita Mean, who took out RuPaul's Drag Race Down Under's first season. The second season's lineup of celebrity guests hasn't been revealed, however, after 2021 saw Kylie Minogue, Dannii Minogue and Taika Waititi all pop up. If you're a fan, you already know the show's format, which spans fashion challenges, workroom dramas and lip sync battles aplenty. If you're a newcomer to all things Drag Race, you'll watch these new Australian and NZ competitors work through a series of contests to emerge victorious, and join the likes of Mean and US contenders Jinkx Monsoon, Sasha Velour and Sharon Needles in being crowned the series' winner. Before it made the leap Down Under last year, the US version of RuPaul's Drag Race had already been on the air for more than a decade, first premiering in 2009 — and wholeheartedly embracing its mission to unearth the next drag superstars ever since. The original US series just aired its 14th season this year, so this is a program with proven longevity. It has also spun off international iterations before, including in the UK — where it's also hosted by RuPaul — plus in Thailand, Holland, Chile and Canada. Check out the Ru Paul's Drag Race Down Under season two trailer below: RuPaul's Drag Race Down Under will return for a second season in 2022 on Stan and TVNZ from Saturday, July 30.
Fans of Donald Glover, excellent television or both, rejoice: after a four-year gap between its second and third seasons, Atlanta is a mere month away from returning to our screens. The show's creator, co-writer, sometime-director, star and all-round driving force has been more than a little busy since we last saw him play Earnest 'Earn' Marks — cancelling and rescheduling Australian tours, playing Coachella, voicing Simba in the photorealistic remake of The Lion King, dropping albums and making Guava Island with Rihanna, and that was all before the pandemic — but now the wait for new episodes of his exceptional TV series is almost at an end. Get ready to be all about that Paper Boi again — and all about Glover as Earn, obviously. If you're new to Atlanta, it follows Princeton dropout Earn after he returns home to the titular city, then starts managing his cousin Alfred's (Brian Tyree Henry, Godzilla vs Kong) rap career. The 30-something also has an on-again-off-again relationship with Van (Zazie Beetz, The Harder The Fall), with the pair sharing a daughter, which throws up complications on a regular basis After a phenomenal second season which ranked among the best things on TV back in 2018 (as the show's first season did in 2016, too), Atlanta's third season looks set to follow Earn and Alfred/Paper Boy on tour in Europe — based on its teaser trailer. And yes, that means it's still tackling the ins and outs of its characters lives, including the daily reality of being Black in America today, while examining race, money, relationships, parenthood, art, music and trying to get by on the road on the other side of the world. Lakeith Stanfield (Judas and the Black Messiah) also returns as Darius, Alfred's righthand man, with Atlanta also boasting one of the best casts on television. [caption id="attachment_843677" align="alignnone" width="1920"] Matthias Clamer/FX[/caption] After season two gave us the marvel that was the Teddy Perkins episode, it's basically impossible to guess what Glover has in store for his on-screen alter ego and his pals, and for viewers, this time around — but, when Atlanta's third season starts streaming in Australia via SBS On Demand on Friday, March 25, it'll be a definite must-see. That said, the good news keeps coming with the bad theses days, with Atlanta set to follow in Stranger Things' footsteps. We're not talking any storyline similarities, which truly would be wild. Instead, it's been announced that Atlanta also only has one more season left after its upcoming batch of episodes, so it'll end with season four — which is set to also air in 2022, arriving sometime during spring Down Under. Check out the trailer for Atlanta's third season below: Atlanta season three will start streaming via SBS On Demand from Friday, March 25.
Among all of the dream jobs that everyone wishes they had, picking the globe's top stretches of sun, surf and sand sits up there with taste-testing new gins and trying out every bar and eatery in Tokyo. That particularly proves true whenever a new list of the world's best beaches is revealed — although, Australians can always pretend by heading to one of the high-ranking spots on our own shores. In FlightNetwork's just-announced lineup of the planet's best beaches, which ranks 50 idyllic locations, four Aussie spots made the cut. And, in news that will come as no surprise to anyone, the Whitsundays' Whitehaven Beach came in at number two. It's the latest accolade for the picturesque Queensland favourite, after it was named TripAdvisor's best Aussie beach earlier this year. Hyams Beach in New South Wales' Jervis Bay also made the top ten, placing eighth, while Western Australia was responsible for the country's other two top spots — with Lucky Bay at 18th and Turquoise Bay at 29th. If you're wondering which coastal oasis beat them all to first place, that'd be Grace Bay Beach in Turks and Caicos. A British Overseas Territory situated around 1,000 kilometres from Miami in the North Atlantic Ocean, it boasts warm Atlantic waters, its own barrier reef and sunny weather approximately 319 days of the year. The picks were made by more than 600 travel journalists, editors, bloggers and agencies, aka folks who work in the travel and beach trade, and therefore know their stuff. Among their other selections, Anse Lazio in Seychelles, Pink Sands Beach in the Bahamas, Navagio Beach in Greece, Baia Dos Porcos in Brazil, Playa Paraiso and Hidden Beach in Mexico, and Trunk Bay in the United States Virgin Islands all rounded out the top ten. Thinking about taking your own trip to Whitehaven Beach? Check out our Outside Guide to the Whitsundays. Via: FlightNetwork. Image: Damien Dempsey via Wikicommons.
You've filled your house with their minimalist designs and homewares, and dreamed of living in their flat-pack homes and tiny pre-fab huts. MUJI fans, your love affair with the Japanese home goods giant isn't over yet. Next on the retailer's agenda is their own range of hotels, with sites slated for Shenzhen and Beijing in China, and Tokyo in Japan. In fact, the Shenzhen location will open on January 18, featuring 79 rooms, a new two-level concept store, and a diner and library for hotel patrons. Guests can expect MUJI's usual minimalist aesthetic — think recycled wooden interiors and spaces filled with plenty of the brand's furniture — plus interior walls and courtyards repurposed from the pillars and walls of traditional Chinese houses. It'll be joined by the Beijing establishment on March 20, while construction on a retail and hotel complex in Tokyo's Ginza began in June, working towards a 2019 completion for the 13-floor building. It'll be comprised of three levels below ground, and ten — including a two-floor penthouse — above. Seven storeys will feature shops, including MUJI's global flagship store, while five will boast their first Japanese hotel. Concept and interior design managed by MUJI-owning company Ryohin Keikaku. https://www.instagram.com/p/BcwNRpDjCEJ/?taken-by=muji_global Images: Mitsui Fudosan Co Ltd / Ryohin Keikaku Co.
Rachael Archibald’s current exhibition Carnate (in-pinking) on show at Paper-Thin is a tactile, textured, surreal wonderland — after all, that's kind of her thing. But the most intriguing point of difference is that Paper-Thin is a gallery that exists solely online. It's a unique new exhibition platform for digital artists who work on the threshold between material and virtual. You’ll have to install a few plugins to enter the gallery, but when you do, it’ll feel like the new-age art version of the Windows '98 3D maze screensaver. You can check out Archibald’s work from the comfort of your couch (or sneakily from work when your boss is distracted) as well as the work of fellow digital artists Alan Resnick, Hunter Jonakin, Daniel Baird and Haseeb Ahmed and Hugo Arcier. At this virtual gallery, you can stroll through the surreal white gallery space (using the forward and back arrows) and interact with the displays in a way they would never allow at the NGV. Check out Paper-Thin here.
Gauchito Gil is Argentina's Robin Hood. As such, it seems fitting that Australia's own Malbec Day has been borrowed from the South American country, where the majority of the world's malbec comes from. If this day is a donation from the grape god, it's one we're happy to accept. After a successful six years, Gauchito Gil is once again bringing Malbec Day to Brisbane with a four-hour wine bonanza at the Valley's Lightspace on Sunday, April 7. The event comes from the organisers of the Pinot Palooza and Mould cheese festival, and mirrors the free-reign tasting set up. Your $60 ticket includes a wine glass, and from there you'll be able to move around, sampling over 60 Australian, French and Argentinian malbec varietals. Other events have been known to get a little boozy, so to soak up all that wine there will be top-notch empanadas from five local restaurateurs — who'll be vying for the prestigious Golden Empanada award. It really doesn't matter if you know everything there is about malbec or if you don't know much at all, because Malbec Day is about education and celebration of the Argentine grape. And what better way to celebrate than with an bottomless glass of wine?
First, there were cat cafes, the cosy spaces where sipping a coffee and getting friendly with some cute felines go hand-in-hand. Next came pooch and pint sessions, where taking your doggo for a drink is heartily encouraged. While pubs that welcome puppers aren't all that rare in general, one US watering hole is taking all of the above concepts, combining them and turning it into their own animal haven. The end result is Fidos, an Oregon establishment calling itself the world's first dog tap house. With the words "Eat. Drink. Adopt." emblazoned on its walls, Fidos is part craft beer tap room, part foster home for shelter dogs, with the ultimate goal of rehoming the canines within its confines. Located outside of Portland, it encourages patrons to come in for a beverage and a bite — and, like a cat cafe, they'll will be able to play with the puppers — then take a new four-legged buddy home with them. Opening back in January, but holding a grand launch on February 13, Fidos boasts 40 rotating taps, a room dedicated to interacting with the doggos — which are provided by Oregon Friends of Shelter Animals — and dog videos playing on the onsite TVs. Events such as art shows and dog training demonstrations are planned, in an environment that's all about having a few drinks, celebrating man's best friend, and supporting dog and animal charities. For more information, visit www.ilovefidos.com. Via PR Newswire.
"Texting is tacky," proclaims filmmaker/artist/writer Miranda July. "Calling is awkward. Email is old." So she's come up with a brand new way to communicate in the 21st century: an app called Somebody. Here's how it works. You send your friend a message, but rather than going directly to their phone, it goes to the Somebody user in closest proximity. This individual delivers the message, in person. Hence, the app facilitates all the instantaneity of modern digital communication, as well as a dose of good, old-fashioned face-to-face contact. As the Somebody site quips, it's 'half-app/half-human'. It's also a public art project. July first came up with the concept in March 2014 and developed it with the help of designer Thea Lorentzen and a team from StinkDigital, along with support from Miu Miu. The app and an accompanying film — the eighth commission in Miu Miu's Women's Tales series — premiered on August 28. https://youtube.com/watch?v=iz13HMsvb6o "Somebody is a far-reaching public art project that incites performance and twists our love of avatars and outsourcing — every relationship becomes a three-way," states the official site. "The antithesis of the utilitarian efficiency that tech promises, here, finally, is an app that makes us nervous, giddy and alert to the people around us." Your messages don't have to be restricted to words — your messenger can also follow actions and directions (i.e. dance, hug, cry and so on) — as long as they're game. If the timing isn't right, the recipient can decline involvement. Plus, the sender can select from a variety of potential messengers by previewing photos and performance ratings. When there's a lack of users in the vicinity, the message can be floated until someone turns up. July will speak publicly about Somebody at New York City's New Museum on October 9, and the app will be progressively launched throughout the Northern Hemisphere over Spring. Right now, hotspots are in action at the Los Angeles Country Museum of Art; Yerba Buena Center for the Arts, San Francisco; the Portland Institute of Contemporary Art; the Walker Art Center, Minneapolis; and Museo Jumex, Mexico City. It's in these places that you're likely to find a high concentration of Somebody users. If you want get the trend happening here in Australia, get the ball rolling and download the app for free from the Apple store. Image: Miranda July and Miu Miu.
Few designers working today create pieces so idiosyncratic and fanciful they may as well be art. One is Romance Was Born, the Australian label started in 2005 by Anna Plunkett and Luke Sales. So it's perfectly fitting, really, that for this year's Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week Australia, they're smashing out a full, multi-sensory exhibition that is more guided acid trip than runway show. Collaborating with them on Reflected Glory is artist Rebecca Baumann, a technicolour master of her own with a practice spanning kinetic sculpture, photography, performance, digital animation and installation. She also happens to have won a Visual Arts SOYA the same year Plunkett and Sales won for fashion. Together, they're translating the never-boring design of Romance Was Born into a truly unwearable work of art, opening at Carriageworks on April 8. The promo video, released this morning by Carriageworks, shows the exhibition will be a kaleidoscope that plays off the unique light and space of the industrial venue. "We're really inspired by nightclubs and lighting and the feeling of when you see something sparkling in all its glory [and] it just has this fully beautiful, uplifting feeling," says Plunkett. Don't expect mere retrospective or showcase; the exhibition represents a completely new approach for the duo. "It's not like a collection of work; it's kind of just one big work, so the whole thing just feels like one immersive experience," says Sales. Reflected Glory opens at Carriageworks on April 9 and runs until May 11.
The What We Do in the Shadows franchise shows no signs of dying, with the American TV comedy spinoff from Taika Waititi and Jemaine Clement's hilarious movie still going strong. But one part of this saga did say goodbye, with fellow television sitcom Wellington Paranormal running for four seasons between 2018–2022. Been missing its comic take on Cops? It's now living on with a companion podcast. Back before Wellington Paranormal initially arrived, Waititi described it as "Mulder and Scully but in a country where nothing happens". With the brand-new podcast — which is called The Wellington Paranormal Podcast — the actors behind those fictional New Zealand police officers are chatting through the show. So, get ready to spend time with Karen O'Leary (Red, White & Brass) and Mike Minogue (My Life Is Murder), who played officers Karen O'Leary and Mike Minogue, as they dive into the making of the hit series. On TV, O'Leary and Minogue were Wellington's trusty paranormal investigators, with help from the always-eager Sergeant Maaka (Maaka Pohatu, Our Flag Means Death) and Officer Parker (Tom Sainsbury, Loop Track). That meant not only trying to keep the city safe from not only vampires and werewolves, but also from ghosts, aliens and more, in a show that was equally funny and silly — and never afraid to enlist familiar faces. As podcast hosts, O'Leary and Minogue will also be bringing in guests, including Pohatu and Sainsbury. Other actors will also feature, plus writers and directors, with exactly who else will be popping up left as a surprise. Listeners can tune into the end results from Thursday, November 23, with new episodes available weekly, via Apple Podcasts, Spotify and other podcast apps. Definitely present from the get-go: O'Leary and Minogue's familiar banter. "Karen and I are excited to be bringing this podcast to our fans all around the world. They'll both be thrilled," said Minogue about The Wellington Paranormal Podcast. "We're looking forward to dissecting each episode as well as talking to both the people who created the show, and celebrity fans who, correctly, think Wellington Paranormal is the greatest thing to ever appear on screen." The Wellington Paranormal Podcast starts streaming from Thursday, November 23, with new episodes available weekly, via Apple Podcasts, Spotify and other podcast apps.
For one week only, Bleeding Heart will play host to Die Empty, an interactive exhibition and art group organised by English artist Samantha Yallope with the purpose of shedding light on some of Brisbane’s best up-and-coming artists. On Friday, June 28, the opening night kicks off at 5pm, with live entertainment and a licensed bar (under 18s are asked to attend with a chaperone). Curious about the name? This is what Samantha had to say on the Die Empty website: “A friend of mine told me about a book he read that had a profound effect on him (The Accidental Creative by Todd Henry). The last two words of the entire book were ‘die empty’, as in ‘live full, die empty’. We had a chat about how we might die empty. He writes and I paint, so the conversation mostly revolved around release through creative self expression and it’s place in society.” In this sense, the works on display at Die Empty are the result of a cathartic release — emotions poured onto canvas, expressing the inner desires and distresses of each artist. Die Empty is by no means a title of ill omen, but rather the result of releasing bottled up emotions into art and the satisfaction afterwards of no longer holding onto inner turmoil. If this sounds interesting to you, do yourself a favour and head to Bleeding Heart Gallery this Friday. The followings artists will have work on display: Samantha Yallope Katie Lee Gretch Joy French Hendrix Travis Carla Benzie Rita Rose Steve Falco Jamie Yallope Jason Gorman Oliver Strauss
Last time that Australian actor-turned-director Damon Gameau brought a new project to the country's big screens, drought was blighting the country, the nation had just sweltered through its hottest summer on record, and severe storms were popping up with frequency in Sydney, Melbourne and Brisbane. That was back in 2019, and eco-conscious documentary 2040 couldn't have felt timelier as a result. It explored how the country might change — and how it might adapt to tackle climate change — in the space of just 21 years, and found welcoming audiences at festivals locally and overseas, and in cinemas in general. Now, Gameau is back with a similar project. Given the wet and wild weather conditions of the past week in Queensland and New South Wales, his latest film also arrives at a time when the environment and the changing climate are firmly on everyone's minds. This time around, however, he's going shorter — in the doco's length, and in terms of how far ahead he's looking to the future. With documentary short Regenerating Australia, Gameau ponders how the nation could look in 2030, but only if we start transitioning to a fairer, cleaner, more community-focused economy now — and putting in place changes inspired by the country's residents. Produced in partnership with WWF-Australia, the 17-minute film is poised as a news bulletin on New Year's Eve 2029, looking back at everything that's been achieved over the decade prior. And if you're wondering where Gameau came up with the answers, Regenerating Australia is based on a four-month interview process with a diverse range of Aussies, who all offered their thoughts, hopes and dreams on what they'd love to see happen. As the just-dropped trailer shows, the short is constructed from fictional news reports and press conferences — but real-life high-profile journalists, politicians, business leaders and citizens such as Kerry O'Brien, Sandra Sully, Gorgi Coghlan, Patrick Abboud, Larissa Behrendt and David Pocock all feature. Headed to the big screen like 2040 before it — and also Gameau's That Sugar Film before that — Regenerating Australia will premiere in Sydney on Friday, March 4 at UNSW Roundhouse, complete with a Q&A afterwards. It's then doing the rounds of cinemas across the country on a one-night basis, also accompanied by Q&As with expert panelists and live entertainment from local artists. Also, all revenue from adult ticket sales will go direct to participating First Nations speakers and local artists, while under-18s get in free. Check out the Regenerating Australia trailer below: Regenerating Australia premieres at on Friday, March 4 at UNSW Roundhouse, Sydney, before touring the country throughout March, April and May. For further information, head to the film's website.
You've gotta love it when people solve problems that you didn't even know you had. At the moment, you're probably just wearing regular shoes that anyone could buy in any old store. Soon, you could be stepping out in electronic sneakers, complete with inbuilt flexible LED screens and eight embedded sensors for maximum personalisation. Yep, you'll never don the same kicks as someone else ever again if New York-based fashion-tech startup Vixole has their way (or, you'll actually wear the exact same shoes, but no one will be able to tell). The company is currently running a crowdfunding campaign for what they're calling "the world's first customizable mid-top E-sneakers", with three different models available. So how do they work? Well, whether you select the basic, the plus or the OLED, you'll be able to deck out your Vixole Matrix shoes with thousands of designs, animations and even photos via your smartphone — or "design, code, or remix your sneaker", as Vixole puts it. Each item of footwear features a LED screen built into its surface and wrapped around the back of the shoe, and is then covered by composite half transparency material to make it waterproof and even capable of withstanding snow, apparently. You'll be able to strut your stuff in them for eight hours before they'll need recharging on a wireless pad for two hours to power back up. Then there's the plus model, which has been dubbed "the shoe from the future". Motion sensors collect data about your movements and change the design of your shoes accordingly, while sound sensors do the same by interacting with whatever music you might be playing. They even include a sensor that can communicate with other Matrix wearers, exchanging contact details just by touching the tips of your sneakers. And, they'll link up with your phone to act as a navigation tool (vibrating on either your left or right shoe to let you know which way to go), or notify you when you're getting a call (again, by vibrating). The limited-edition OLED version does all of this, and boasts a high-resolution colour display, rather than a monochrome one. In the rapidly evolving age of wearable technology, smart sneakers might just be the next big thing. If you're keen on pairing some with your Snapchat snap-taking specs, solar-powered clothes, vibrating leggings and VISA payment rings, you can pre-order a pair via Indiegogo from US$225 (and yes, they ship worldwide). The manufacturing process is slated to start in January 2017, with the shoes delivered from June. Via Digital Trends.
Next time that someone hands you a $50 note, you can be forgiven for thinking that it looks a little different — a new range of pineapples have just been released into circulation. Australia's banknotes have been getting a makeover since September 2016, when a different $5 note started doing the rounds. It was followed by a revamped $10 in 2017 and now a sparkling fresh $50, which hit the streets on Thursday, October 18. The upgraded design celebrates inventor David Unaipon, who was also the country's first published Aboriginal author, as well as Edith Cowan, Australia's first female member of parliament. They're both recognised in several ways on the new notes, with not only their portraits displayed prominently, but with microprint featuring excerpts of Unaipon's book Legendary Tales of the Australian Aborigines, plus Cowan's maiden speech to the Western Australian Parliament. [caption id="attachment_694389" align="aligncenter" width="1200"] Reserve Bank of Australia via Flickr[/caption] As well as changed artwork (albeit keeping the same colour scheme as old notes), the new $50 boast the same improved security features as the new $5 and $10 notes, which are largely aimed to stop counterfeiting. A clear window running from top to bottom is the most obvious, and contains a number of features such as a reversing number and flying bird. The note also includes microprint, as well as a patch with rolling colour. And, in great news for the vision-impaired, the new series of legal tender has a tactile feature to help distinguish between different denominations. According to the Reserve Bank of Australia, the $50 is the most widely circulated Aussie note, so expect to see quite a bit of this shiny pineapple. As happened with the other denominations, the rollout will happen gradually, as will the withdrawal of old $50s — which you can obviously still keep using. While some issues occurred when the new $5 and $10 note hit, particularly with cash-handling machines like ATMs, the RBA has consulted with banknote equipment manufacturers, retail organisations and financial institutions to minimise problems. And as for the other two values of Aussie banknotes, the revamped $20 is due in 2019 and then the new $100 in 2020. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ci9SMlO3Sow
It's been five years since the Yeah Yeah Yeahs last album, and a few more than that since you belted out the lyrics to 'Gold Lion' in your high school bedroom or beat-down first car. Admit it: everyone wanted to be Karen O at some point in their lives. Now, this phenomenal queen of indie rock has once again proven how swoon-worthy she really is. Not only has she made a debut solo album full of lo-fi love tunes, she's previewing the entire thing online now ahead of its release. We're not going to be offended if you leave us now to listen to it. Streaming as part of NPR's First Listen program, the soon to be released Crush Songs is far from the indie anthems and general kickassery of her time as lead singer of the Yeah Yeah Yeahs. Instead, it draws heavily on the work she's done for film soundtracks in recent years. From the uplifting style of 'All is Love' in Where the Wild Things Are to the delicate ukelele-backed 'Moon Song' from Her, Karen O's solo work has drawn surprising comparisons to the likes of Juno-famous Kimya Dawson. Although this is the singer's first solo album, Crush Songs was actually recorded way back in 2006 and 2007. A deeply personal collection of stories, Karen O recorded these songs in private aside from her work with the Yeah Yeah Yeahs. Drawing on the album's appropriate name, the songs explore the singer's fears she'll never find love because she has too many crushes. Officially released on September 9 in the US, Crush Songs will also feature original drawings and hand-written lyrics from the legendary singer. Even if you're a die-hard fan of her work in the Yeah Yeah Yeahs, this is worth a listen. All in all, it's nice to know that even bona fide rock legends once scribbled people's names in little hand-drawn hearts. Via NPR. Stream the whole album here.
In Stay of the Week, we explore some of the world's best and most unique accommodations — giving you a little inspiration for your next trip. In this instalment, we take you to the heart of Beechworth, Victoria, and honey country. We've teamed up with Maker's Mark and Beechworth Honey to offer a totally exclusive Concrete Playground Trips deal to stay at The Hive Apartment and enjoy the fruits of their new partnership: The Gold Rush Cocktail, a symphony of pure Australian honey and the bold flavours of bourbon. Celebrate the coming together of liquid golds for a cocktail that's rich in character and richer in history. If Beechworth looks like your ideal historical stay then head to Concrete Playground Trips, where you'll find our travel deal – including two night's stay at The Hive Apartment, a bespoke Makers Mark x Beechworth Honey gift pack (complete with everything you need to make a Gold Rush cocktail), an exclusive honey tasting experience and a dining voucher. WHAT'S SO SPECIAL? You can't get closer to the centre of Beechworth than The Hive Apartment. Owned and operated by Australian honey powerhouse Beechworth Honey, The Hive Apartment is your opportunity to explore historic Beechworth and stay in a piece of Australian history. The apartment is located in one of the most historic buildings in Victoria — originally built in 1856, it was actually the original residence of the bank manager of the Bank of New South Wales. Beechworth played a significant role in the Australian gold rush in the 1800s. Beechworth Honey pays homage to the town's gold rush past with a look to preserve the future. Stay in what was once the "Gold Office" where mined gold was stored and where a new liquid gold now calls home: honey. There are nods to honeybees everywhere from the bespoke breakfast basket (with a selection of Beechworth Honey samples) to bee-themed furnishings and gold elements throughout. THE ROOMS The self-contained apartment is situated on the first floor, providing an impressive outlook across Beechworth's two main streets, its historic buildings and its original architecture. It features a fully equipped kitchen and spacious dining and living room. You can look out over the Beechworth skyline from the comfort of the generous living room, cook up a feast in the kitchen and enjoy a meal in the dining room or on the couch while you take in a movie for a chill night in. The apartment can accommodate up to six guests across three bedrooms. The spacious king room offers a lovely light-filled space with windows on two sides overlooking Beechworth's iconic clock tower. The queen room offers its own private ensuite while the third bedroom is made up of two single beds, perfect for a family weekend away. The renovated master bathroom creates a sense of modern luxury, a place to relax and unwind from a day of exploring Beechworth's impressive sights. FOOD AND DRINK While guests can enjoy the homey Beechworth breakfast basket and kitchen amenities, there are also quaint cafes and rustic bistros footsteps from the apartment. Grab a meal at the historic Tanswell's Commercial Hotel — one of the earliest hotels opened in Beechworth and the first two-storey building in town. The menu is packed with local suppliers' produce, so guests can enjoy the best of what the local area has to offer. There's also a range of local wines, beers and spirits on offer to enjoy with your meal or alternatively to take away from the bottle shop — located in the pub's old safety deposit box. Another local favourite is The Ox and Hound Bistro, a relaxed and intimate spot along the main street that also heroes local produce. Chef (and owner) Sean Ford has stacked the menu with rustic French and Italian bistro classics including chicken liver parfait, goat cheese souffle, fettuccine with wild rabbit and the signature honey pannacotta — with cinder toffee, fresh honey and a lemon curd ice cream. Beechworth is also a small wine-producing region with local wineries producing fine examples of chardonnay and shiraz as well as some Italian varietals like sangiovese and nebbiolo. If beer is your preferred beverage, Beechworth is also home to one of Australia's oldest breweries: Billson's, founded in 1865. Settle in for lunch, a drink and a tour of the historic brewery site. [caption id="attachment_898228" align="alignnone" width="1920"] Beechworth, Gavin Green[/caption] THE LOCAL AREA The historic town of Beechworth is a treasure trove of iconic insights into the world that was. Visitors can follow the life and times of infamous bushranger Ned Kelly, starting at the Beechworth Historic Courthouse and Law Library — built in 1858 and in continuous service for 131 years — where the committal trial of Ned Kelly took place. Then move on to the HM Prison Beechworth — which held Ned Kelly as well as many of his sympathisers — and finish at the Beechworth Lockup where prisoners awaited trial. History enthusiasts will delight at the Burke Museum — named for the famous explorer and former Beechworth Superintendent of Police Robert O'Hara Burke — relive the Whatsapp of the past at the Telegraph Station, or pick up some bits and pieces at Dow's Pharmacy — a time capsule with over 4000 original items in its collection from the 19th and early 20th centuries. The Hive Apartment is located 300m meters from The Beechworth Honey Shop. Discover the wonderful world of Australian honey at Beechworth Honey's flagship store. With over 40 Australian single-varietal honey to taste, a working bee hive and a self-guided educational tour, your mind and tastebuds will be blown. The Beechworth Honey Shop is open 7 days, 9.00am–5.30pm — our Trips package includes a bespoke honey tasting at the iconic Beechworth Honey Shop. Don't forget to pack your walking boots as there's a range of walks, cycle tours and lookouts only a stone's throw from the apartment. The Beechworth Gorge is a popular walking, bike riding and driving loop with views to the Woolshed Valley and across the township. A little further afield, you can climb the 545-metre summit of Mount Pilot to enjoy 360-degree views of the surrounding countryside. THE EXTRAS The Hive Apartment is the perfect location from which to go back in time and explore Australia's Gold Rush era. And what better way to enjoy the stay than with a cocktail that celebrates the combination of two liquid golds the Maker's Mark and Beechworth Honey's Gold Rush cocktail? Book our Trips package and the Beechworth team will be on hand to ensure you have the sweetest and smoothest stay, from the private entrance and free parking to the bespoke honey breakfast package. Feeling inspired to book a truly unique getaway? Head to Concrete Playground Trips to explore a range of holidays curated by our editorial team. We've teamed up with all the best providers of flights, stays and experiences to bring you a series of unforgettable trips in destinations all over the world.
