Update Wednesday, August 23: Voyages Indigenous Tourism Australia has added a third nightly sound and light show so that more people can experience Wintjiri Wiru. You can learn about Wintjiri Wiru Twighlight via the Voyages website. A luminous three-dimensional cultural storytelling experience featuring one of the world's largest daily drone shows has been unveiled at Uluru. Across two shows each night, with Uluru setting a showstopping backdrop, Wintjiri Wiru tells the local Aṉangu community's Mala story through the use of verbal storytelling (both in English and the Aṉangu people's local Pitjantjatjara language), light displays, lasers, sound and a massive fleet of more than 1000 drones. Folks heading to the Northern Territory for Wintjiri Wiru's sunset dinner will kick off the experience with canapes curated by Mark Olive showcasing native Australian ingredients. Also on the agenda: taking in the immense beauty of Uluru and Kata Tjuta from the new sustainable viewing deck as the sun disappears below the horizon, and sampling creamy crocodile pies, pepper beef and truffle burgers, and cocktails made with Beachtree Organic Koala Gin. From there, attendees are taken on an immersive journey through a story that's been passed down for thousands of years. Voyages Indigenous Tourism worked directly with a group of ten senior community members from the Kaltukatjara (Docker River) and Uluru Aṉangu groups to create a show that tells the Mala ancestral story accurately and respectfully. "We are Aṉangu and we have one of the oldest continuing cultures on earth. This chapter of the Mala story has been passed to us from generation to generation. Our ancestors walked this Country, carried this story and shared this story through inma, our songs and our ceremonies," says Rene Kulitja, on behalf of the Aṉangu Consultation Group. "We have held hands with Voyages to create Wintjiri Wiru together. From the beginning, Voyages has been working together with the Aṉangu Working Group — talking together, listening together and creating together." The impact upon the environment and the local communities were also closely considered. No concrete was laid in the creation of the viewing platform, allowing it to be removed one day if needed; the movements of local wildlife were carefully monitored, including special consideration given to a local group of endangered desert skinks; everyone involved in the project undertook extensive cultural training lead by Aṉangu; and Indigenous-owned and -run law firm Terri Janke and Company was enlisted to oversee the project. When asked about Voyages' goals, Resort General Manager David Harper responded: "creating opportunities for Indigenous Australians through cultural tourism." Wintjiri Wiru now forms somewhat of a trio of experiences available to visitors surrounding Uluru — joining Bruce Munro's immersive Field of Light and starlight-lit fine dining experience Tali Wiru. The launch also coincides with the debut of Bruce Munro's latest installation Light Towers at Kings Canyon, forming a Red Centre light trail with the aforementioned attractions, as well as the yearly luminous Alice Springs festival Parrtjima — A Festival in Light. Tickets for the Wintjiri Wiru sunset dinner are available for $385, while you can nab a spot at Wintjiri Wiru after dark for $190, or $95 for children. For more information on Wintjiri Wiru, head to the Ayers Rock Resort website. Images: Getty Images for Voyages Indigenous Tourism Australia. Aṉangu share the Mala story, from Kaltukatjara to Uluru, through a drone, sound and light show designed and produced by RAMUS. 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.
Well, Sydney suggested it — and for some reason, Transport for NSW has obliged. The city's newest ferry will be named Ferry McFerryface. Proving that the bizarre legacy of Boaty McBoatface will live on for some time, the people of Sydney have decided that names of suburbs and notable Australians aren't the way to go. The government authority threw to the public for suggestions for the new fleet of ferries last year and, of the 15,000 submitted, Ferry McFerryface was one of the most popular submissions. Ferry McFerryface is the last ferry in the new fleet of six to be named, and joins other (more cordially named) vessels named after individuals who have contributed to Australian society like ophthalmologist Fred Hollows, heart surgeon Victor Chang and obstetrician Catherine Hamlin. McFerryface doesn't quite have the same reverence as its counterparts, but the internet, I guess. This new fleet will serve inner city routes and service Watsons Bay, Cockatoo Island and the new Barangaroo wharf. The new ferries will have Wi-Fi on-board, greater disability access and space for bikes. Transport for NSW also plans to acquire four more ferries to service the Parramatta River.
In any other year, the songs of the summer are those that have been heard blaring from car windows, festival stages and nightclub speakers. While we've had a few songs take on this energy despite the circumstances ('Blinding Lights', 'Heat Waves' and 'WAP' to name a few) for most of the year, it's just been us and our Spotify accounts. Now, as we head into what we are all hoping to be an action-packed, smoke-free and dance floor-heavy summer, it's the perfect time to refresh your summer playlist. Here are ten tracks you may have missed this year that are bound to give you those summer warm and fuzzies, primed and ready to soundtrack your road trips, bushwalks and pool parties. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WmsvhQNuO-E GOLDEN VESSEL: MIDWEST Dive headfirst into the feeling of a summer road trip with this track of the latest Golden Vessel album colt. Each song on the album is primed for stares out of a car window, which the creative force behind the project Maxwell Byrne seemed to know, releasing it alongside a road trip-themed visual album titled eyes on the road. 'Midwest' encapsulates this the best. As soon as the first note hits and Byrne's deep baritone vocals kick in, you can see the trees passing by your window, stereo up, snacks on hand. The gentle instrumental plays off the persistent bass to create a sense of forward momentum. It's an anthemic ode to hitting the road with your crush and, while we may not be able to drive across the midwest right now, it's the perfect time to take to the road and explore regional Australia. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oc50wHexbwg KHRUANGBIN: TIME (YOU AND I) Like their music, the cover of Khruangbin's fourth studio album Mordechai explodes with colour. They're a group built on bringing forward the brightest and bounciest sounds of past generations into today. The highlight of the album is 'Time (You and I)', an easygoing soundtrack fit for any summer occasion. Sunshine exudes from every second of its five and a half minute run time. Over a smooth disco-heavy instrumental Khruangbin come to the conclusion that nothing is perfect and everything comes to an end, but that's ok. They're along for the ride, one full of baselines and dance floors. Towards the end of the track, the band recite the phrase 'that's life' translated into various languages. Turkish, Korean, Hebrew — it's universal. We're all here living our lives, just trying our best to have fun. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JPgPHTZsGbU LIL SPACELY: STILL TRAPPIN' (FEAT. ELIJAH YO) 2020 was a landmark year for Australian hip hop. Artists like The Kid Laroi, Onefour, Sampa the Great and Tkay Maidza saw overseas success previously unseen in the local scene. The area undoubtedly leading the pack has been Western Sydney, catching the attention of US rap superstars and international record labels. Among it all, Lil Spacely, one of the area's rising stars, released 'Still Trappin', a sonic victory lap for Western Sydney. Bursting at the seams with sunshine, the track's beat glistens as Spacely tells us of his come up, ambitions and his love for his hometown of Blacktown. The track's biggest pitfall is that it was released during a winter lockdown. There couldn't a song more suited to a summer party — and luckily we have all summer to enjoy it. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yr_1pDBL0uc BIG DOG: FIGHT IT NOW 'Fight It Now' is the debut single from Sydney band Big Dog. Written during the devastation of the 2019/20 bushfire season, the song conceals a thread of climate anxiety under rich guitars and gentle melodies. Wrapped in warm Australiana reminiscent of Paul Kelly or The Go-Betweens, the track is filled with nostalgic energy. This warmth softens the blow of its cautionary lyrics, warning of future smoke-filled summers without immediate climate action. Musically, 'Fight It Now' conjures feelings of sitting on your porch on a balmy afternoon, but, lyrically, it's a sombre reminder of the country's climate crisis, and as a new summer begins with more extreme weather events, the song remains as relevant as ever. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TUVcZfQe-Kw DUA LIPA: LEVITATING Dua Lipa's Future Nostalgia was created for late nights and bustling dance floors, two things that seemed like distant memories throughout the majority of 2020. Despite this, the album managed to blaze a global trail of feel-good pop energy. Any of the singles from the 80s-tinged dance-pop album could fit snuggly into your summer playlist (especially as dance floors and nights out return across the country) but 'Levitating' is the most joyous of the bunch. The anthemic chorus, punchy bassline and Dua Lipa's electric vocals radiate fun. It's overflowing with the energy we've been missing in 2020 and everything we're hoping 2021 will be. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1ej2BiNFFgM STEVAN: WARM True to its name, 'Warm' is a sunny slice of bedroom pop. Wollongong artist Stevan lays his heart on the line over twinkling synths and a subtle bass groove. Sporadic drums run through the song providing momentum. Completing the wholesome summertime energy of the track is the video, starring Stevan and his new best friend Tilly, a blue heeler cross border collie, and their adventures checking off classic summer bucket list activities: exploring the beach, hanging out at the park and eating rainbow Paddle Pops. Whether your partner in crime is human or dog, 'Warm' will help fill you with adventurous and heartfelt energy you're in need of this summer. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tw0zYd0eIlk PHOEBE BRIDGERS: KYOTO Phoebe Bridgers' take on the world struck a chord with many this year, with the singer going from underground singer-songwriter to Grammy-nominated Tik Tok sensation. Her music is effortlessly relatable and realistically bleak without ever slipping into overbearingly sad. She approaches topics like loneliness and anxiety with a sense of humour and wit. In a difficult year full of isolation, this perspective was comforting. 'Kyoto' served as Bridgers' breakout hit and an endearing ballad that refuses to get tired. Its bright guitars and horn section are contrasted by the track's dark lyrics of travelling through Japan while dealing with persistent calls from your ex. In Bridgers' world, just like in real life, everything can get pretty overwhelming, but we'll get through it all if we just don't take ourselves too seriously. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VhS5MB9cLY8 BANOFFEE: TENNIS FAN (FEAT. EMPRESS OF) A typical element of the Australian summer is the Australian Open. The sight of an international tennis star out on a sweltering Melbourne day is as engrained in the fabric of this time of year as much as an icy pole or overcrowded swimming pool. Banoffee's 'Tennis Fan' builds itself around a series of tennis samples from umpire calls to balls being struck. Somehow, she weaves the samples into a metaphor for social anxiety and loneliness, lamenting on not being invited to a tennis match or the movies. It's layered songwriting, but, most of all, the song's a fun summer bop filled with dance grooves and high school nostalgia. With 'Tennis Fan' and its subsequent album Look At Us Now Dad, Banoffee marked herself as one of Melbourne's most exciting young artists and the queen of the tennis court, no matter what her crush says. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bdvxzc7FLow THE AVALANCHES: MUSIC MAKES ME HIGH Throwing back to their classic 2000 album Since I Left You, 'Music Makes You high' throws together an eclectic collection of samples in the process of building a kaleidoscopic collage of sound. Through the magic of The Avalanches, it bottles the energy of being in a buzzing crowd hanging on every note of the music. It's the sound of a packed 1am DJ set at Freda's or an overflowing side stage, late afternoon at a music festival. The song's distant crowd noises, energised dance groove and 1980s disco sample transport you to possibly the closest thing to a dance floor many of us experienced this year. Like so many great Avalanches tracks, 'Music Makes You High' takes pieces of music history and compresses them into three minutes of joy. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=osz9DyfbjyQ FLEET FOXES: SUNBLIND Fleet Foxes returned in 2020 with their sweetest, most assured album yet. In many ways, it felt detached from the year's doom and gloom, preoccupied with its own journey of growth, as lead singer Robin Pecknold reckons with life and growing older. Of all the songs on the record, 'Sunblind' feels the most in touch with the year we've had. Partnered with triumphant instrumental, Pecknold sings of finding comfort in the works of late musicians (Bill Withers, John Prine, Jeff Buckley) and in nature, specifically water. While it may not have been intentional at the time of writing, when he sings "but I'm loud and alive, singing you all night", it's a perfect soundtrack to riding off into 2020's sunset. Everything may not be perfect but we're moving forward into brighter days. Listen on Spotify below. https://open.spotify.com/playlist/23TLh9PrnatiOBetr1PuNL?si=P0ohy4QnToGrceEJmvNR2g
When the COVID-19 pandemic began, life as we once knew it changed suddenly, and everything started to feel like something out of a horror or sci-fi movie set in a post-apocalyptic future, films about contagions, outbreaks and infections all became go-to comfort viewing. We flocked to visions of situations similar to our own, even if only slightly, to help us cope with the existence-shattering shift we were all going through. Accordingly, Contagion proved eerily prescient, while I Am Legend and 28 Days Later mirrored the empty streets — and, yes, everyone was watching them. Next came the spate of flicks that were shot during the pandemic and responded to it. Think: opportunistic fare such as Locked Down and Songbird, neither of which proved memorable. Movies and TV shows will be ruminating upon life in the time of COVID-19 for years and decades to come, obviously; however, the highlights so far have rare. Add Station Eleven to the certain-to-keep-growing pile, but thankfully as one of the very best examples. Indeed, it's unfair to clump this haunting end-of-the-world miniseries in the same group as almost anything else that's emerged since the pandemic began, other than Bo Burnham's exceptional comedy special Inside. As also proved the case with Y: The Last Man when it reached streaming queues in 2021, Station Eleven's narrative actually predates our current predicament. Its nine-episode run now sits on Stan in Australia and Neon in New Zealand, available to watch in full, after its story first garnered a devoted following on the page. And, it taps into something far deeper than obvious observations about being stuck at home with your significant other for longer than either of you had ever considered, and having to scramble to buy toilet paper when the supermarket shelves are bare. The focus of this excellent show, and of Emily St. John Mandel's 2014 book before it: how art and community all play immeasurable parts in helping humanity process and navigate existence-shattering traumas, and to find a path out the other side. That's a sentiment that might sound mawkish and self-evident when described in a mere sentence, but nothing about Station Eleven ever earns such terms. [caption id="attachment_841063" align="alignnone" width="1920"] Parrish Lewis/HBO Max[/caption] Here, it all starts with a flu that swiftly proves more than just the usual sniffles, coughs, aches and pains. This one spreads lightning fast, too, and strikes down its unlucky victims heartbreakingly quickly. For eight-year-old Shakespearean actor Kirsten (Matilda Lawler, Evil), the chaos descends during a tumultuous opening-night performance of King Lear led by Arthur Leander (Gael García Bernal, Old). In the aftermath, she's stuck traipsing around snowy Chicago with Jeevan (Himesh Patel, Don't Look Up), who she has just met — and then sheltering in his brother Frank's (Nabhaan Rizwa, Mogul Mowgli) high-rise apartment. That's really just the beginning of this multi-layered narrative, which also jumps forward 20 years to survey Kirsten's (Mackenzie Davis, Happiest Season) adult life. There, she's a key part of a travelling theatre troupe who performs Shakespeare to the outposts of survivors it passes on its annual route — and she's spent almost her entire existence adjusting, like the rest of the planet, to this new normality. Still, while two decades might've passed and little may now resemble all that passed for routine before the flu, the earth remains an anxious and fraught place. So when a mysterious man, known as The Prophet (Daniel Zovatto, Penny Dreadful: City of Angels) to his army of child followers, shows up at one of the Travelling Symphony's stops, Kirsten is immediately and understandably suspicious. [caption id="attachment_841060" align="alignnone" width="1920"] Ian Watson/HBO Max[/caption] Station Eleven's narrative isn't just about one woman, the men who help her as a child and the other that threatens her status quo as an adult. As well as continually fluttering backwards and forwards between Kirsten's younger and older exploits, it dives into the experiences of others connected to her story in various ways. Before the flu, Miranda Carroll (Danielle Deadwyler, The Harder They Fall) devoted her spare time to writing and illustrating a graphic novel about feeling lost and adrift in space, for instance — and that text, which shares the show's name, is part of the series' broader contemplation of art, tragedy, trauma and dealing with our feelings in general. Premiering late in 2021, just as Omicron started sweeping the world, Station Eleven might've seemed blighted by unfortunate timing. Nonetheless, it's the ideal show for right now. Shot with a soft grey-blue sheen like it's unearthing watery memories, it cuts close to home but always plays like a beacon of hope — and an ode to endeavouring to make it through, come together and make a difference however one can. It's impeccably acted, with the broader cast also spanning Orange Is the New Black's Lori Petty, Veronica Mars' Enrico Colantoni, Arrested Development's David Cross, Veep's Timothy Simons, Succession's Caitlin FitzGerald and Little Joe's David Wilmot. It's meticulous and expressive with every shot, and perfects the feeling of simultaneously trying to get by and daring to dream about something other than weathering a pandemic. Rich and layered and cathartic, this is a dystopian disaster tale not just about merely surviving, but about truly enduring. In a sea of pandemic tales — those made before COVID-19 and since — Station Eleven is a lyrical, heartfelt and character-driven apocalyptic musing with an immediate difference. Check out the trailer below: Station Eleven is available to stream via Stan in Australia and Neon in New Zealand. Top images: Ian Watson/HBO Max.
Rumours are fun, but knowing which bands are confirmed to play at Australia’s premier music festival is even better. The lineup for Splendour in the Grass was fed to early risers on Thursday morning via the Triple J Breakfast Show, quashing some rumours, verifying others and turning Coachella, Prince and holographic Tupac into nothing but distant memories. Generally regarded as Australia's biggest winter music festival, Splendour originated in 2001 at Belongil Fields outside of Byron Bay. The 2010 and 2011 festivals were relocated to Woodford, Queensland due to Byron Bay area restrictions, but this year's festival will return to its spiritual home. The three day festival, which this year takes place July 27-29, has a history of legendary line-ups, with past festivals including music greats like Kanye West, The Strokes and PJ Harvey. Tough acts to follow, but 2012's list won't disappoint. Headlining the 2012 festival will be Jack White, Bloc Party, Smashing Pumpkins, At The Drive-In and The Shins. Feast your eyes on the full lineup below and start saving your coin (is anyone still reading this anyway?). The lineup for Splendour in the Grass 2012: Jack White, Bloc Party, Smashing Pumpkins, At The Drive-In, Lana Del Rey, Azealia Banks, The Shins, Hilltop Hoods, The Kooks, Gossip, Miike Snow, Dirty Three, 360, Tame Impala, Explosions In The Sky, Ladyhawke, The Afghan Whigs, Missy Higgins, Wolfmother, Metric, Kimbra, Mudhoney, Band Of Skulls, Spiderbait, Django Django, Gypsy & The Cat, San Cisco, Last Dinosaurs, Electric Guest, Muscles, Angus Stone, DZ Deathrays, Howler, Lanie Lane, Wolf & Cub, Fun., Big Scary, Michael Kiwanuka, Seekae, Friends, Yacht Club Dj's, Bertie Blackman, Jinja Safari, Blue King Brown, Youth Lagoon, Pond, The Beautiful Girls, Yuksek, Tijuana Cartel, Ball Park Music, The Rubens, Ben Howard, Bleeding Knees Club, Zulu Winter, The Medics, Shihad, Hypnotic Brass Ensemble, Husky, Kate Miller-Heidke, Father John Misty, Emma Louise, Chet Faker, Here We Go Magic, Parachute Youth, Mosman Alder, The Cast Of Cheers, Gossling, Beni, Sampology (AV/DJ show), Canyons (DJ Set), Nina Las Vegas, Danny T, Alison Wonderland, Nice and Ego (AV/DJ show) Flume, Gloves, Luke Million, Harris Robotis, Alley Oop. Festival dates: Friday 27, Saturday 28 and Sunday 29 July. For more info check the Splendour in the Grass website. Words by Hannah Ongley and Anya Krenicki
Some movies sport monikers so out of sync with their contents that someone really should've had a rethink before they reached screens. Uncharted is one of them, but it was never going to switch its name. The action-adventure flick comes to cinemas following a decade and a half of trying, after the first Uncharted video game reached consoles in 2007 and the journey to turning it into a movie began the year after. Accordingly, this Tom Holland (Spider-Man: No Way Home)- and Mark Wahlberg (Joe Bell)-starring film was fated to keep its franchise's title, which references its globe-trotting, treasure hunting, dark passageway-crawling, dusty map-coveting storyline. But unexplored, unfamiliar and undiscovered, this terrain definitely isn't — as four Indiana Jones films to-date, two National Treasure flicks, three Tomb Raider movies, 80s duo Romancing the Stone and The Jewel of the Nile, and theme park ride-to-screen adaptation Jungle Cruise have already demonstrated. Uncharted mightn't live up to its label, but it is something perhaps unanticipated given its lengthy production history — a past that's seen six other filmmakers set to direct it before the Zombieland movies' Ruben Fleischer actually did the honours, plenty of screenwriters come and go, and Wahlberg once floated to play the saga's hero Nathan Drake rather than the mentor role of Victor Sullivan he has now. That surprise? Uncharted is fine enough, which might be the best likely possible outcome that anyone involved could've hoped for. It's almost ridiculously generic, and it sails in the Pirates of the Caribbean flicks' slipstream as well, while also cribbing from The Mummy, Jumanji and even the Ocean's films. Indeed, it borrows from other movies as liberally as most of its characters pilfer in their daily lives, even nodding towards all things Fast and Furious. It's no worse than the most generic of its predecessors, though — which isn't the same as striking big-screen gold, but is still passable. The reasons that Uncharted just hits the barest of marks it needs to are simple and straightforward: it benefits from Holland's charms, its climax is a glorious action-film spectacle, and it doesn't ever attempt to be anything it's not (although reading a statement of intent into the latter would be being too generous). It also zips through its 116-minute running time, knowing that lingering too long in any one spot wouldn't serve it well — and it's as good as it was going to be given the evident lack of effort to be something more. While you can't make a great movie out of these very minor wins, they're all still noticeable pointers in an okay-enough direction. Getting audiences puzzling along with it, delivering narrative surprises even to viewers wholly unfamiliar with the games, asking Wahlberg to do anything more than his familiar tough-guy schtick, making the most of the bulk of its setpieces, providing the product of more than just-competent direction: alas, none of these turn out. In a film that acts as a prequel to its button-mashing counterparts, Holland plays Drake as a 20-something with brother issues, a vast knowledge of cocktail histories that's handy for his bartending gig, an obsession with 16th-century Portuguese explorer Ferdinand Magellan and the gold he might've hidden, and very light fingers. Nate's elder sibling dipped out of his life after the pair were caught trying to steal a Magellan map as orphanage-dwelling kids, in fact, which Sully uses to his advantage when he first crosses his path in a New York bar — and, after some convincing, Nate has soon signed up to finish the quest he's been dreaming about since childhood. Naturally, this newly formed duo aren't the only ones on the Magellan treasure's trail. The wealthy Santiago Moncada (Antonio Banderas, The Hitman's Wife's Bodyguard) is descended from the explorer's original financiers and boasts a hefty sense of entitlement, while knife-wielding mercenary Jo Braddock (Tati Gabrielle, You) and enterprising fortune-hunter Chloe Frazer (Sophia Ali, India Sweets and Spices) are each chasing a windfall. It's telling — and farcically blatant — that Uncharted begins with Nate hanging upside down. He's suspended from a train of freight trailing out of a plane, but the visual message is instant and obvious: yes, Holland also plays Spider-Man. Actually, the film doesn't ever ask him to stretch his talents beyond everything he's already immensely famous for, going for a 'Peter Parker, but make him a thief with a heart of gold' setup. Still, he's as entertaining and charismatic as the part demands, and lifts the routine script by The Wheel of Time's Rafe Lee Judkins and Men in Black: International duo Art Marcum and Matt Holloway purely by his presence. Holland hasn't had a great time of late beyond the Marvel web, with the also long-troubled Chaos Walking proving flat-out awful, and Cherry failing to set streaming alight; however, if Uncharted leaves a lasting imprint, it's wondering how much better its star could fare with if he had more than a by-the-numbers screenplay to work with. A worthy lead, underperforming material, a general unwillingness to take any risks: that's a problem that's plagued too many movies about too many connect-the-dots treasure hunts well before now. Thankfully, Uncharted's eagerness to just get on with its story helps significantly — breezing by rather than loitering on its chest of illogical twists and turns, and, Wahlberg aside, never giving its one-note supporting characters too much of the spotlight. Also, when that aforementioned eye-catching finale arrives and puts the whole archaeology-meets-swashbuckling idea to nice use, the picture almost justifies its existence. X doesn't ever quite mark the spot with Uncharted, and the history of bringing video games to the movies still sinks more often than it swims, but there's just enough that gleams here to be watchable. It's a film with a few shiny coins in its bag, rather than a whole bar, cavern or ship of riches.
It's been almost two years since Stranger Things last graced our streaming queues, and left everyone wondering what might've become of Hawkins' beloved police chief Jim Hopper (David Harbour, Hellboy). Just when the Netflix series is set to return for its fourth season hasn't yet been announced, but the platform knows that its viewers are all waiting eagerly — and, to keep us occupied, it has started teasing new glimpses at the long-awaited next batch of episodes. The platform initially provided a sneak peek at Stranger Things season four back at the beginning of 2020, which now seems like a lifetime ago. Given that things didn't seem to end too well for Hopper at the end of the show's third season — all thanks to the mind flayer, the Russian lab below Starcourt Mall and that pesky gate to the Upside Down — that initial glimpse picked up after the third season's Russian-set post-script. That said, while it did resolve the big cliffhanger, it also only ran for 50 seconds. This time around, the two new (and also brief) clips look backwards — and Eleven (Millie Bobby Brown, Godzilla vs Kong) is the focus. Both sneak peeks take place in Hawkins Laboratory, with the first peering at security camera footage, and the second listening on as Dr Martin Brenner (Matthew Modine, Operation Varsity Blues: The College Admissions Scandal) performs tests on kids with special abilities. The latter video then works its way down a corridor to a door marked with the number 11, and then shows a quick look at Eleven's face. So, it seems that as well as hopping over to Russia, Stranger Things is headed to the past. It's worth remembering that, when the platform announced the show's renewal for a fourth season back in 2019, it did so with the catchphrase "we're not in Hawkins anymore". We'll have to wait to see what that all means for its cast of characters — including not only Hopper and Eleven, the latter of which was last seen leaving town with Joyce (Winona Ryder, The Plot Against America), Will (Noah Schnapp, Hubie Halloween) and Jonathan (Charlie Heaton, The New Mutants), but also for Mike (Finn Wolfhard, The Goldfinch), Dustin (Gaten Matarazzo, The Angry Birds Movie 2), Lucas (Caleb McLaughlin, Concrete Cowboy), Max (Sadie Sink, The Last Castle), Steve (Joe Keery, Spree) and Nancy (Natalia Dyer, Things Seen & Heard). Check out the two new Stranger Things season four teasers below: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uRIpYFIlg5U https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ILwLN6hV-X8 Stranger Things season four doesn't currently have a release date — we'll update you when Netflix announces its plans. Top image: Stranger Things season three.
When caped crusaders team up on the page or the screen to battle a threat to the world or galaxy, there's probably no such thing as too many superheroes. For audiences, however, the Marvel Cinematic Universe has been testing exactly how many spandex-heavy capers get everyone switching off. It hasn't been stretching the limits specifically to answer that question; Disney has just been releasing a hefty amount of Marvel movies and TV shows. If you've been feeling MCU fatigue as a result, the Mouse House hears you. Going forward, fewer new Marvel films and television series will arrive each year. "We've been working hard with the studios to reduce output and focus more on quality — that's particularly true with Marvel," advised CEO Bob Iger on Disney's second-quarter earnings call on Tuesday, May 7. "We're slowly going to decrease volume and go to about two TV series a year, instead of what had become four — and reduce our film output from maybe four a year to two or a maximum three," Iger continued. [caption id="attachment_925151" align="alignnone" width="1920"] ©Marvel Studios 2023. All Rights Reserved.[/caption] The move comes in what's set to be a quieter Marvel year in cinemas anyway. Picture palaces in 2024 are only welcoming Deadpool & Wolverine, which releases in July. The streaming slate might be busier, after Echo hit Disney+ in January — and with WandaVision spinoff Agatha: Darkhold Diaries, plus the animated Eyes of Wakanda and Your Friendly Neighbourhood Spider-Man, yet to get air dates — but there'll definitely be fewer MCU tales hitting screens in total. In contrast, 2023 was huge Marvel for viewers, with Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania, Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 and The Marvels on the big screen, plus Secret Invasion, Loki and What If...? on screaming. 2022 was also massive, thanks to Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness, Thor: Love and Thunder, Black Panther: Wakanda Forever, Moon Knight, Ms Marvel and She-Hulk: Attorney at Law. And in 2021, Black Widow, Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings, Eternals, Spider-Man: No Way Home, WandaVision, The Falcon and the Winter Solider, and the first Loki and What If...? seasons all dropped. [caption id="attachment_899279" align="alignnone" width="1920"] Photo by Jessica Miglio. © 2023 MARVEL.[/caption] Marvel has already floated spacing out its releases so that its schedule in cinemas and on streaming isn't as jam-packed, and then pushed back a few titles during 2023's Hollywood strikes. Now, it's sticking to a strategy that Marvel Studios President Kevin Feige told Entertainment Weekly about last year, saying that "the pace at which we're putting out the Disney+ shows will change so they can each get a chance to shine". Right now, audiences will see Captain America: Brave New World and Thunderbolts on the silver screen in 2025 — the first in February and the second in May. The new Pedro Pascal (The Last of Us)-, Vanessa Kirby (Napoleon)-, Joseph Quinn (Stranger Things) and Ebon Moss-Bachrach (The Bear)-starring Fantastic Four is also dated to arrive next year, in July. 2025 is meant to welcome Blade back to the screen, too, as led by Moonlight and Green Book Oscar-winner Mahershala Ali, but that'd make four films in one year. So, if Iger is sticking to three movies or less in a year, that could change. From there, just two new Avengers flicks are locked in with release dates at the moment, one in 2026 and the other in 2027. On the small screen, Daredevil: Born Again is due in 2025, while Ironhart, Marvel Zombies, Wonder Man and Vision Quest don't yet have dates. From Marvel's upcoming slate, only Deadpool & Wolverine has a trailer — check it out below: For more information about Marvel's upcoming slate of films and TV shows, head to the company's website. Images: Disney.
The shock of unkempt hair, the Irish brogue, the misanthropic attitude: there's no mistaking Dylan Moran for anyone else. It was true in beloved British sitcom Black Books, when his on-screen alter ego abhorred mornings, ate coasters and claimed that his oven could cook anything (even belts). And it's definitely true of the comedian's acerbically hilarious live shows. Moran is no stranger to Australia and New Zealand, but if you haven't guffawed at his bleak wit live, he's coming back in 2023 to give you another chance. As always, expect the kind of deadpan gags, wine-soaked insights and blisteringly sharp one-liners that've kept him in the spotlight since 1996, when he became the youngest-ever winner of the Edinburgh Fringe's Perrier Award. [caption id="attachment_729089" align="alignnone" width="1920"] Andy Hollingworth[/caption] From mid-April to late May, Moran will tour Down Under with his latest show We Got This, bringing his grumpily lyrical musings on love, politics, misery and the everyday absurdities of life to 11 Aussie cities and four spots in NZ. Kicking off in Hobart and ending up in Auckland, this marks his first full standup show since 2019's Dr Cosmos, which also came our way — and was available to stream earlier in the pandemic, too. Given this tour's title, it's hardly surprising that Moran will be reflecting upon these chaotic times. That might sound like a standard comedy gig these days, but nothing about Moran's comedy is ever standard. "We are bruised. We are fucked up. We are all sore," he said, announcing the tour. "It's not just the pandemic. It's the times and how we've got through it." As well as his stint as the world's worst bookshop owner in Black Books, Moran has popped up in films such as Notting Hill and Shaun of the Dead, should you been keen to get watching (or rewatching) before his new gigs. Nabbing tickets early is recommended — his shows usually sell out quickly. DYLAN MORAN 'WE GOT THIS' 2023 DATES Wednesday, April 19 — Wrest Point Entertainment Centre, Hobart Thursday, April 20 — Princess Theatre, Launceston Friday, April 21 — Hamer Hall, Melbourne Tuesday, April 25 — Thebarton Theatre, Adelaide Thursday, April 27–Friday, April 28 — Canberra Theatre, Canberra Saturday, April 29 — Civic Theatre, Newcastle Tuesday, May 2 — HOTA, Home of the Arts, Gold Coast Thursday, May 4–Friday, May 5 — QPAC Concert Hall, Brisbane Monday, May 8 — Perth Concert Hall, Perth Thursday, May 11 + Monday, May 15 — State Theatre, Sydney Saturday, May 13 — Town Hall, Wollongong Saturday, May 20 — Isaac Theatre Royal, Christchurch Monday, May 22 — Regent Theatre, Dunedin Tuesday, May 23 — St James Theatre, Wellington Thursday, May 25 — Auckland Town Hall, Auckland Dylan Moran's 'We Got This' tour will head around Australia and New Zealand in April and May 2023. Ticket pre-sales start at 11am on Thursday, October 13, with general sales from 9am on Tuesday, October 18. For more information, head to the tour website. Updated November 25.
The building on Charlotte Street has seen many lives. Once a light engineering factory, then a telecommunications warehouse and now home to Frogs Hollow, named for what the area was called back when it was a hotbed for debauchery, with brothels, opium dens and boarding houses across the original red-light district in Brisbane — and a little swampy, hence the name. Frogs Hollow is the brainchild of co-owners and industry veterans Peter Hollands (The Gresham) and Nick Winter (Biànca Restaurant, The Gresham, Mjølner), with the drinks curated by Thiago Silva (Black Pearl, Captain Melville, and Mjølner). The venue retains its historic brick facade and brings in elements of cowboy culture with its old wine barrels, saddle-topped bar stools, cowboy hats everywhere, a wagon wheel hanging from the ceiling above the bar and a lot of country music. Despite what you might be thinking based on that description, this is all done very tastefully and there's not a yeehaw in sight. Behind the bar, you will find an extensive collection of over 400 whiskies with sips from Australia, America, Ireland, Scotland and beyond. If whisk(e)y isn't your drink of choice, there's an impressive selection of gins, rums, tequila, mescal, beer and Aussie wines. The cocktail menu changes periodically, so you'll have to go in and ask the talented team to create the perfect concoction for you.
UPDATE, December 17, 2022: Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery screened in cinemas from Wednesday, November 23–Tuesday, November 29, then streams via Netflix from Friday, December 23. Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery opens with a puzzle box inside a puzzle box. The former is a wooden cube delivered out of the blue, the latter the followup to 2019 murder-mystery hit Knives Out, and both are as tightly, meticulously, cleverly and cannily orchestrated as each other. The physical version has siblings, all sent to summon a motley crew of characters to the same place, as these types of flicks need to boast. The film clearly has its own brethren, and slots in beside its predecessor as one of the genre's gleaming standouts. More Knives Out movies will follow as well, which the two so far deserve to keep spawning as long as writer/director Rian Johnson (Star Wars: Episode VIII — The Last Jedi) and Benoit Blanc-playing star Daniel Craig (No Time to Die) will make them. Long may they keep the franchise's key detective and audience alike sleuthing. Long may they have everyone revelling in every twist, trick and revelation, as the breezy blast that is Glass Onion itself starts with. What do Connecticut Governor and US Senate candidate Claire Debella (Kathryn Hahn, WandaVision), model-slash-designer-slash-entrepreneur Birdie Jay (Kate Hudson, Mona Lisa and the Blood Moon), scientist Lionel Toussaint (Leslie Odom Jr, The Many Saints of Newark) and gun-toting, YouTube-posting men's rights activist Duke Cody (Dave Bautista, Thor: Love and Thunder) all have in common when this smart and savvy sequel kicks off? They each receive those literal puzzle boxes, of course, and they visibly enjoy their time working out what they're about. The cartons are the key to their getaway to Greece — their invites, in fact — and also perfectly emblematic of this entire feature. It's noteworthy that this quartet carefully but playfully piece together clues to unveil the contents inside, aka Glass Onion's exact modus operandi. That said, it's also significant that a fifth recipient of these elaborate squares simply decides to smash their way inside with a hammer. As Brick and Looper also showed, Johnson knows when to attentively dole out exactly what he needs to; however, he also knows when to let everything spill out. Claire, Birdie, Lionel and Duke share something else: they're all considered "disruptors" by tech mogul Miles Bron (Edward Norton, The French Dispatch), form part of his inner circle and get together annually for one-percenter vacations on his dime. He's behind their unexpected packages and their latest lavish getaway, which takes them not only to a picturesque private island, but also to a sprawling mansion decked out with a glimmering dome he actually calls a glass onion. Also in attendance is Miles' former business partner Andi Brand (Janelle Monáe, Antebellum), with whom nothing ended well, which gives the trip a skin of tension. And, there's the cravat-wearing Blanc, who couldn't be a better addition to the guest list — Miles has corralled this distinctive cohort for a weekend-long whodunnit party, after all. Blanc doesn't quote Sherlock Holmes and proclaim "the game is afoot" in Glass Onion, as he did the first time around, but it is. Several are. Miles wants his visitors to solve his own faux murder, but soon there's a real death slicing into what's meant to be a fun jaunt. Everyone is a suspect, because that's how this setup works. The Southern-drawled Blanc's presence proves mighty handy, swiftly segueing into "world's greatest detective" mode. No one needs him to glean the murder-mystery fundamentals, though. As told with an initially more linear narrative, little is what it seems on this swanky, intricately crafted vacation, including among the mostly high-achieving but secretly spatting group. And yes, as the bickering and backstabbing gets bloody — and the fast-paced story keeps unfurling — everyone has a motive. The Knives Out films can be enjoyed as pure on-screen rounds of Cluedo of the most entertaining kind, and as self-aware, affectionate and intelligent detective puzzles in the Agatha Christie mould. With their sharpness, mischievousness and effervescence, they easily show up the author's most recent page-to-screen adaptations, aka the clunky latest Murder on the Orient Express and Death on the Nile. Johnson also has the keenest of eyes for ensuring that every inch of every frame and every detail in every set entices and teases, with impressive help from his now six-time cinematographer Steve Yedlin, The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power production designer Rick Heinrichs and returning costumer Jenny Eagan. His whodunnit flicks get viewers gleefully playing along, lapping up surprises and thrills. And yet at the same time, they have audiences happily sitting back for the ride as both Johnson and the never-more-delightful Craig do their best. Everyone's doing stellar work in Glass Onion, especially the killer cast. This is the latest of many, many starry crews with a murderer in their midst —see also: fellow 2022 releases Bodies Bodies Bodies and See How They Run — and it's superbly compiled, including Jessica Henwick (The Gray Man) as Birdie's exasperated assistant, Madelyn Cline (Outer Banks) as Duke's girlfriend and a heap of genre-adoring cameos. As a sweep-you-long feature, the film serves up the sheer pleasure of watching its actors play their parts with such aplomb, and also benefits from fleshing out its characters before there's a body count. There needs to be such meat on this movie's bones, and more than merely one-note pawns on its board, because getting biting and blistering — and also being timely and topical — is another of the series' ongoing highlights. A more-cash-than-sense billionaire making a mess? The entitled, privileged set doing anything for money, and to uphold their status and lifestyles? Yes, the Knives Out franchise is eating the rich again, this time on a The White Lotus-esque holiday. Accusations zip around Glass Onion with frequency, potency and a sting, but no one can accuse Johnson of just repeating himself. As an early reference to Bach's 'Fugue in G minor' nods at, this is an onion of a flick that stacks its layers atop each other to create something new, and shines in a different way with each one. Also, where plenty of sequels to successful pictures rinse and repeat, this instead builds a fresh game out of similar but never identical pieces. A case in point: the decision to set the movie in May 2020, when the pandemic is all that most people were thinking about, and lockdown life was far, far removed from international travel, pool dips and cocktails with a view. That choice brings more sight gags, like Birdie's pointless mesh mask, but more importantly it lets the film dice up its targets with more force. They're squabbling and slaying in luxury while everyone else was staring at their own four walls for months on end, and doesn't this new gem cut them up for it.
Vintage images of bygone eras are always fascinating to admire as it provides a window into the life of a different time and place and highlights the stark differences in culture 100 years makes. These photographs of Paris in 1914 are particularly enchanting not only because they go back to the denouement of the peaceful and reformatory Belle Epoque, with these Parisians unknowingly on the cusp of two devastating world wars, but also because they appear in colour. These were the sort of inspiring settings that influenced legendary writers such as Hemingway, F. Scott Fitzgerald and Gertrude Stein. The vibrancy of the images add character to the scenes laid out and provide a more accurate depiction of what the streets of Paris were really like during this period. These photos poignantly capture the original iconic Moulin Rouge cabaret before it was tragically destroyed in a fire a year later, the pizzazz of a troupe of performers in period costume assemble, average Parisians in the streets, iconic buildings and theatres, as well as a one-legged soldier standing beside a cannon.
When the clock struck midnight on December 31, 2019, this year began in a familiar fashion. All around Australia, beverages were raised in cheers to the next 12 months. But as we all know by now, 2020 hasn't delivered what anyone hoped for. If there has been a silver lining to this tough year, however, it has been the renewed focus on supporting local businesses. As well as spending more time at home, shopping local, eating local and sipping local have all been on the agenda. And that has been essential for two Queensland drinks companies, Brisbane's Aether Brewing and Far North Queensland's Mt Uncle Distillery. They've been forging ahead and doing what they do best — and what their local fans love — even under the most trying of circumstances. Queenslanders have certainly shown them both affection, with Aether and Mt Uncle picked as the Sunshine State's favourite tipples during the BWS Local Luvvas initiative. Aether's brews and Mt Uncle's Botanic Australis Gin will now receive an extra helping hand with getting both products stocked in more BWS stores. And we've spoken to the masterminds behind the two drops about their dream jobs, their love of making top-notch drinks and the importance of homegrown support. WHEN YOUR PASSION BECOMES YOUR JOB With Mt Uncle Distillery based on a farm in the Atherton Tablelands, head distiller and director Mark Watkins doesn't just spend his days making the most of FNQ's sultry weather — he also makes drinks perfect for those tropical climes, too. Indeed, his love of the region's climate is one of the reasons he is doing what he does today. "Given the inability to grow grapes up here, I decided to put my wine science degree to use and make rum," he explains. Watkins started his distilling journey before his studies, as a teenager. "Needless to say, I was popular with my mates," he notes. But when he dived into the botany side of his degree, he "fell in love with Australian native plants, and had the drive to pursue the production of the quintessential Australian gin" — which is where the concept of Botanic Australis began. For Aether's Dave Ward, his move into brewing arose out of a completely different field — fly-in fly-out jobs building gas plants. Meeting and working alongside his now-former business partner, they both realised that "FIFO wasn't exactly the life we wanted to live forever, and the thought of owning a brewery really just fit with what we wanted," he advises. The fact that Ward already had a lifelong passion for brewing and beer helped, unsurprisingly. Ward credits that affection for yeasty beverages, and for making them, to his father. "It is one of my earliest memories as a child, brewing with dad and his friends — the exploding bottles in the laundry, the dodgy stouts from extract and some pretty awful beer," he explains. "Those memories have stuck with me my whole life, and fuelled my love of brewing and great beer. I home-brewed on and off for most of my adult life, and eventually I found my life in a position where I was able to live my dream." GETTING CREATIVE — AND LOCAL Obviously, it takes more than just a fondness for a frothy beverage to make it in the drinks industry. As Ward advises, "brewing for me is an expression of creativity". He's now at the point where, when he's "on the brew floor or designing new beers, it comes naturally" — but he admits that getting to that point required hard work. "The real challenge started when I started studying and I realised that I knew nothing about beer. The more I learnt, the more I wanted to know, and the more I realised that my lifetime wasn't going to be enough for me to learn everything I need to be the brewer I want to be," he says. Perhaps it shouldn't come as a surprise, then, that when asked to describe a great beer, Ward notes that it "isn't a style, or a flavour, or even a taste". Rather, he sees it as "the ability to make a beer for everyone". At Mt Uncle, Watkins has a firm view of what makes a standout spirit, too. For him — like much of his approach to his work — it reflects his location. While it'd be hard not to love distilling gin in such scenic, relaxed and leafy surroundings, Watkins can't separate his tipples from his home base. "A great spirit should reflect the environment that creates it," he tells us. In practical terms, that means that Mt Uncle sources or grows all of its ingredients locally. It's a great source of pride to the distillery, with everything in its products either stemming from around the distillery or from a stone's throw away. ADAPTING TO TOUGH TIMES WITH HOMEGROWN SUPPORT In Mt Uncle's case, you could say that what goes around comes around — in a positive manner, of course. "We are a very small business and times recently have been quite trying," Watkins says, referring to this pandemic-afflicted year. "Local support is essential and a massive part of our business' DNA. If it wasn't for our local fan base we would not be here." For Ward, the embrace of Brisbane's beer community has been just as pivotal. "Honestly, if it wasn't for the amazing support that locals gave — whether they are in our neighbourhood or we are stocked in theirs — we would more than likely have gone under when COVID-19 hit," he admits. "Over the past few years, we have seen a shift towards local; people want to know who makes their beer, food or products," Ward observes, "and the last 12 months have pushed this further into the spotlight". To find these or other Queensland drinks as part of the BWS Local Luvva's initiative, head to your nearest BWS store.
Remember the days before coffee pods, when getting your caffeinated fix didn't involve spending many a minute trying to choose a flavour? Well, that experience has arrived at an Australian pub near you. Yes, beer pods are now a reality. Carlton & United Breweries has rolled out a trial of their new Bond Brothers Fusion brand to selected venues in New South Wales, Victoria and Queensland, adding a whole new dimension to ordering a drink. The base lager remains the same; however once you select your variety of choice — with pink grapefruit, honey, lime, raspberry and apple options available — the appropriate pod will be slipped into the tap, infusing your yeasty beverage with flavour as it is poured. Sounds like a gimmick that's trying to jump on the craft beer bandwagon, right? Yep, it sure does, but we all thought something similar when the concept first reared its head in the coffee world. Speaking to Nine News, CUB marketing director Richard Oppy said that they were looking to "add some excitement" to drinking beer (although we thinking having a bev is pretty exciting enough), as well as extra varieties. While this is the first time you can get this type of drink in Aussie bars, the concept isn't particularly new. Launching in 2014, US company SYNEK is a countertop beer dispenser that uses cartridges to let you pour and drink your favourite brews at home, while wine, spirits and cocktail takes on the trend are also in development. Via Brews News / The Drinks Association.
Are you sick of YouTube constantly delaying your enjoyment of cute animal videos? Do you want to avoid the awkwardness of sitting through an ad with a coworker who just wanted to show you a funny video of a guy ordering pizza? Need something else to add to your credit card statement? If you answered yes to all three of those questions, you might be interested to know that YouTube is launching its premium ad-free streaming service in Australia today. It's called YouTube Red and it's basically a way to make you pay for a premium version of an otherwise free service, much in the way that Spotify Premium works. It was launched in the US in November last year, and Australia is the second region to get the service. For a monthly subscription fee, you'll be freed of all advertising (including display and pre-roll ads) and be able to save videos to watch offline — which is pretty handy if you're jumping on a flight or your data provider is charging you through the roof. You'll also have access to original Red content, which at the moment includes shows from the likes CollegeHumor, Lilly Singh and PewDiePie. It's an obvious attempt to cut in on the success of Netflix's original shows (but show us a series as good as House of Cards and then we'll talk). On top of this, they've also launched their YouTube Music app, which aims to make listening to music on YouTube a much less roundabout and awkward experience. Recognising that there's a whole heap of people that use YouTube to crank tunes, YouTube Music simply arranges the mammoth amount of music content (including music videos, songs, albums, remixes, lyric videos and live performances) into a functional music browsing system. Like Spotify and Apple Music, they'll also have a radio function and will create personalise playlists according to your taste in tunes. Anyone can access YouTube Music, but if you have a Red account, you'll be able to listen ad-free as well as when you don't have the app open on your mobile. Unsure if this is a video streaming service or a music streaming service? We are too. It seems to take elements from both Spotify and Netflix's offerings, however the real drawcard will be in the original content they can produce. Price-wise, it's comparable to other streaming services — you can get a month free trial, and if you sign up before June 6, it'll cost you $9.99 a month (otherwise it's $11.99 a month). However, if you want to watch Beyoncé's Lemonade in full, you'll still need to get Tidal. Sorry.
When you think of goods made out of recycled cardboard, the most common objects that would spring to mind would probably be cereal boxes, toilet paper or drink bottles. A fully-functioning bicycle would most likely not make the top of the list. Yet, now thanks to Israeli bike enthusiast, Izhar Gafni, it will certainly appear somewhere on that list. Gafni has created a bicycle made entirely of recycled cardboard, and all using only $9 of material. The bike functions just like a normal bike, is water resistant and can carry riders of up to a massive 220kg. Despite the material costing between $9-$12 for each bicycle, Gafni is looking to sell his product for $60-$90 a pop, depending on the extra addition of an electrical motor. Nevertheless, this innovative creation is believed to change the world of bicycles by being significantly more eco-friendly and well within consumer's budgets. The inspiration for the recycled bike came after Gafni saw news that an inventor had developed a canoe made from recycled cardboard. Even through the skepticism and doubt he received, Gafni persevered with his idea and three years later achieved what three different engineers had thought to be impossible. Gafni's recycled bicycle has since been made into four different prototypes including one with training wheels for children. He is currently working with investors to establish a company that can produce and distribute his bikes on a global scale.
They've been making ace threads for almost two decades, and now they're making a spot in Sydney their own. Jumping from the shelves of other stores to their bricks-and-mortar outlet, denim label Ksubi has set up shop in Paddington. While they've dabbled in their own retail outlets in the past, the new digs mark the brand's only current stand-alone store in the world. Opening its doors at 130 Oxford Street as part of the designer boutique-filled The Intersection shopping precinct, the new Ksubi store turns 250 square metres into a minimalist, monochromatic space for their full clothing collection, plus YSL frames and Henson jewellery. On the shelves, think distressed denim jeans, jackets, cut-off shorts and skirts aplenty, obviously. Interior design-wise, think industrial-esque touches that evoke Ksubi's unfussy style. Indeed, inside eager shoppers will find white neon lighting, flat black fixtures, raw concrete floors, and an array of very memorable magenta change rooms complete with defaced doors. Plus, Ksubi's new digs also feature a number of permanent installations by commissioned artists. Find Ksubi at 130 Oxford Street, Paddington, or head to their website for further information.
Since 2024, the Australian Academy of Cinema and Television Awards doesn't just give out awards when its annual ceremony celebrating the best of the year's big- and small-screen output rolls around. When the accolades moved its night of nights to the Gold Coast, it turned the whole event into a festival, getting the folks behind — and starring in — Aussie movies and TV shows, plus homegrown talents enjoying success overseas, chatting at sessions open to the public. That's the AACTA Festival setup — and when the nation's screen academy promised that the fest would be bigger this year, it meant it. The lineup for the event from Wednesday, February 5–Sunday, February 9, 2025 has just expanded again, after the initial program details were revealed in November 2024, then more highlights were added in December. One impressive new inclusion is Oscar-winning Memoir of a Snail animator Adam Elliot talking about his work and career, including his latest delight (which, fingers crossed, could be an Academy Award-nominee by then, too). Another is the return of Talk to Me filmmakers Danny and Michael Philippou after they were involved in 2024, this time with ONEFOUR to discuss challenging stereotypes via both horror and drill music. AACTA Festival is also hosting Actor on Actor talks, first teaming up Lee Tiger Halley from Boy Swallows Universe with Alyla Browne from Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga and Sting, then getting Better Man and How to Make Gravy co-stars Kate Mulvany and Damon Herriman talking. [caption id="attachment_986977" align="alignnone" width="1920"] Jono Searle/Getty Images for AFI[/caption] If you're keen to find out more about Binge's upcoming The Last Anniversary, which is based on a novel from Big Little Lies author Liane Moriarty and stars Teresa Palmer (The Fall Guy), the latter will be in attendance with some of the show's team — including director John Polson (Law & Order: Organised Crime) — to dig into the adaptation. Heard about snake-movie remake The Anaconda with Jack Black (Dear Santa) and Paul Rudd (Only Murders in the Building) that's being shot in Queensland?. US film producers Brad Fuller and Andrew Form (A Quiet Place: Day One) are heading along to dive into it, and the topic of bringing making blockbuster films in general. Aussie acting icon Jack Thompson (Runt) is also on the lineup, with 1975 classic Sunday Too Far Away celebrating its 50th anniversary. Thomas Horton, the VFX producer/supervisor on House of the Dragon, will explore bringing Westeros to life as well. And, as part of the screening program — and giving some love to film and TV successes in general — Wicked is receiving a free outdoor showing. The current additions join already-revealed sessions with The Invisible Man and Wolf Man writer/director Leigh Whannell, Better Man and The Greatest Showman filmmaker Michael Gracey, a live How to Make Gravy concert featuring Paul Kelly, Colin and Cameron Cairnes talking Late Night with the Devil and a behind-the-scenes look at Netflix's ripped-from-the-headlines Aussie series Apple Cider Vinegar. In still-huge news, the Working Dog team, aka Santo Cilauro, Tom Gleisner, Jane Kennedy, Michael Hirsh and Rob Sitch, are coming together for an in-conversation session that's bound to touch upon everything from The Castle, Frontline, Thank God You're Here and Utopia to The Dish, The Hollowmen and Have You Been Paying Attention?. The Dish is also the screening program, and the Working Dog team will receive the prestigious AACTA Longford Lyell Award. Australian cinematographer Greig Fraser, who won an Oscar for Dune and is highly tipped for another one for Dune: Part Two, is another significant inclusion, chatting about his Hollywood work. Also in the same category: John Seale, who took home an Academy Award for The English Patient, and was nominated for Witness, Rain Man, Cold Mountain and Mad Max: Fury Road. Everyone can also look forward to authors Trent Dalton and Holly Ringland returning from 2024's lineup, talking about Boy Swallows Universe and The Lost Flowers of Alice on the small screen, respectively; a dive into the Heartbreak High soundtrack; a panel on queer storytelling with RuPaul's Drag Race Down Under season two winner Spankie Jackzon and Deadloch's Nina Oyama; and a session with First Nations filmmakers. And if you're keen to watch movies, Gettin' Square followup Spit will enjoy its Queensland premiere, complete with star David Wenham (Fake) diving into the feature's journey; Looney Tunes: The Day The Earth Blew Up will make its Australian debut, at Movie World, of course; and upcoming action film Homeward with Nathan Phillips (Kid Snow) and Jake Ryan (Territory) will take viewers behind the scenes. [caption id="attachment_926549" align="alignnone" width="1920"] Moshcam[/caption] [caption id="attachment_985262" align="alignnone" width="1920"] Courtesy of Netflix © 2024[/caption] AACTA Festival will run from Wednesday, February 5–Sunday, February 9, 2025 at HOTA, Home of the Arts, 135 Bundall Road, Surfers Paradise, Gold Coast. For further details, head to the fest's website.
A small grey moon passes silently through the dark, desolate vacuum of space. No wait, not a moon, a space station. Suddenly from within that manmade menace, a thunderous blast of brilliant green light tears forth, obliterating the planet of Alderaan. Elsewhere, a frail Obi Wan Kenobi shudders and fretfully remarks: “I felt a great disturbance in the Force, as if millions of voices suddenly cried out in terror, and were suddenly silenced. I fear something terrible has happened”. Fast forward a long, long time to Tuesday April 7, 2015, and once again, one senses a great disturbance has come to pass, only this time, Harrison Ford and the gang are playing for the other team. In a landmark decision by Australia’s Federal Court, iiNet and several other internet service providers (or ISPs) have been ordered to disclose the names and contact details of almost 5000 of their Australian customers accused of illegally sharing the 2013 film Dallas Buyers Club. If you’re currently sitting there with BitTorrent open in the background, chances are you’re one of the millions suddenly crying out in terror. But just how afraid should you be? ISPs, WHERE SIZE DOES MATTER The first question to ask is: which ISP do you use? Telstra, TPG and Optus were all ignored by the rights holders (at least for now), meaning yesterday's ruling only applies to customers of iiNet, Dodo, Internode, Amnet and Adam Internet. If you’re not with them, you’re not in the firing line. TORRENTING: A SEEDY PRACTICE Note the absence of the word ‘downloaded’ above. This case drew a critical distinction between those who downloaded the film and those who seeded the torrent (i.e., those who made it available for others to download). Since it’s impossible to identify downloaders, the names to be provided by iiNet and the other ISPs will only be of those who “made the film available online to other persons; electronically transmitted the film to other persons; and made copies of the whole or a substantial part of the film”. Put another way, if you downloaded Dallas Buyers Club but never shared it, you’re probably in the clear. But if you did seed it (and that does happen automatically through some torrenting software), what happens next? ROUND 1 TO HOLLYWOOD Nothing for the next 28 days at least, which is how long those ISPs have to appeal the decision. The chance of them doing that, however, seems unlikely given the comments by iiNet’s CEO David Buckingham that: "We're very happy with Justice Perram's judgment and his balanced approach to both the studio's and consumers' rights.” In all likelihood, then, four weeks or so from now there are going to be around 5000 letters sent out across Australia courtesy of the film’s rights holder — Dallas Buyers Club LLC. ON A SCALE OF ZERO TO ALDERAAN, HOW SCREWED ARE YOU? Three years ago, a Minnesota woman was famously ordered to pay $1.5 million in damages for illegally downloading just 24 songs from the internet. The plaintiff in that case, the Recording Industry Association of America, never had any real expectation of recovering the money from her because, of course, money wasn’t the point. Sending a message was why they’d pushed so hard, and the same may be said of Dallas Buyers Club here. With this ruling, both they and the court have sought to declare an end to the age of anonymous copyright infringement in Australia. BUT IT WASN'T ME, IT WAS THE ONE-ARMED MAN! Just because you receive a letter from Dallas Buyers Club doesn't mean you're actually guilty of copyright infringement. All it means is your name and contact details are attached to the IP address that was identified in the sharing of the file. Who was doing that sharing is an entirely different matter: your flatmate, a sibling, a child or even an unscrupulous neighbour who cracked your Wi-Fi password (seriously, was it 'password'?). Proving actual guilt will be an additional hurdle that Dallas Buyers Club will still have to jump for each and every case it pursues. OKAY, I AM THE ONE-ARMED MAN So let’s say, for argument’s sake, you’re one of the names about to be provided to Dallas Buyers Club. The ‘balance’ in the decision that David Buckingham was referring above to centres on two key points: 1. Your names won’t be made public; and 2. Every single letter that Dallas Buyers Club intends to send out must first be shown to, and approved by, Justice Nye Perram. That second point is more significant than it may sound, because it seriously limits the ability of Dallas Buyers Club to use those letters as a means of intimidation, otherwise known as ‘speculative invoicing’. Recently in America, Dallas Buyers Club sent similar letters to US-based infringers claiming they were liable for damages of up to US$150,000, but noted they’d be prepared to settle out of court for US$7000. It’s unlikely they’ll be permitted to do the same thing here, though they will almost certainly seek some level of remuneration for the infringement. CLICK HERE TO DOWNLOAD THE FUTURE Does this ruling mean Australians will immediately stop torrenting? Of course not. Australia is Olympic-level bad when it comes to copyright infringement, with BitTorrent accounting for more than 25% of all internet use in the region, and Australians responsible for a full 11.6% of the worldwide illegal downloads of Game of Thrones season four. Crucially, nobody ever disputes that it’s wrong, but everyone finds their own little way of justifying it. For most, that justification sits squarely in what’s termed 'The Australia Tax' — a consistently unreasonable price disparity of up to 400% between here and the rest of the world on everything from automobiles and electronics to music, software, games and films (here’s lookin' at you, Adobe). Coupled with inexplicable delayed releases (something that proved a financial disaster for The LEGO Movie), Australians justifiably feel they shouldn’t have to pay extra for something they want, only to then unjustifiably download the whole thing without paying a single cent. ARISE A KNIGHT The game changer in all of this will be Netflix, which finally launched here last week. In the United States, it's almost singlehandedly credited with reducing torrenting from 31% of all internet traffic to just 5.65% in a mere six years, and there’s no reason to doubt a similar trend in Australia. Cinemas have also wised up, with Village Roadshow CEO Graham Burke declaring last year that in Australia, “movies will [now] be released day and date with the US. Movies will come out at the same time.” Of course, yesterday’s decision may yet be overturned, but it’s a sure sign of the changing times and it would indeed seem the days of torrenting with anonymous impunity are numbered. That's not to say technology hasn't proven remarkably adept at circumventing any measures to control it, just as this author isn't blind to the fact that the Rebels ultimately prevailed over the Empire. Still, this a war neither side is prepared to back away from, so next time you’re thinking about downloading something, perhaps just ask yourself: what if I'm Alderaan? Formerly an intellectual property lawyer with the global firm Allens Linklaters, Tom Glasson is a writer, film critic and TV presenter best known for his work as host of Australia's daily satirical news show The Roast on the ABC.
Well folks, it turns out we've officially arrived at the future — someone has created the world's first holographic smartphone and it's set to hit the market in a matter of months. Dubbed the Hydrogen One, this'll be the first phone offering from camera company Red, and it's being launched by US telecommunications giants AT&T and Verizon. So what kind of magical functions does it have? According to a statement by AT&T spokesman Kevin Petersen, "when the Hydrogen One launches, you'll be able to look around, below and into your screen's image with a four-view holographic display, which is even better than 3D." Apparently, it'll have multi-dimensional surround sound and loads of expansion capabilities, making it a primo tool for anyone using their phone to create content. "This revolutionary smartphone will provide you with significant advancements in the way you create and view content on the leading network for entertainment," he said. The public will be able to get its first glance of the Hydrogen One on June 2 and 3, when it's shown off at AT&T's Shape exhibit at Warner Bros. Studio in Los Angeles. The smartphone will then be available to purchase in the USA by the end of their 2018 summer. Image: RED via PR Newswire.
Uber drivers may want to start thinking about a change of career. The ridesharing giant, whose relationship with its drivers has been turbulent in recent times, may soon reach the point where it no longer has any need for them at all. After all, why spend millions settling lawsuits when you can get the cars to operate themselves? That seems to be the thinking as the company rolled out its first fleet of self-driving cars in the U.S. today. After beginning testing back in May, the fleet of modified Ford Fusion Hybrids, complete with roof-mounted cameras, radar and Uber branding, took its first official outing streets of Pittsburgh on Wednesday — beating other tech companies to the punch. At the moment Uber is still sending a safety driver along in the driver's seat, so they can intervene if anything goes awry. The idea is that eventually those safety drivers won't be needed anymore — but, safety, y'know? "This pilot is a big step forward," said the company via a statement on their website. "Real-world testing is critical to the success of this technology. And creating a viable alternative to individual car ownership is important to the future of cities." They hope that driverless technology will, eventually, help to lower the number of traffic accidents, cut congestion and free up parking space in our cities. At the moment the self-driving cars are only available to "loyal" Pittsburgh Uber riders — if one of the cars is available when they request an uberX, that's what they'll get. That's all well and good, but will these self driving cars be offering their passengers complimentary mints? Where are we on that technology, exactly? By Tom Clift and Lauren Vadnjal.
In cinemas, viewers repeatedly flock to Marvel and Star Wars movies. We've had more than a decade of the former and more than four decades of the latter to prove that fact. But now that both franchises have expanded to the small screen as well, they've been making an impact there, too — and they've now got a swag of 2021 Emmy nominations to prove it. Both The Mandalorian and WandaVision have picked up plenty of nods for this year's awards, with nominations just announced in the early hours of Wednesday, July 14 Australian time. The adventures of Baby Yoda and his titular companion nabbed 24 noms, while Marvel's first Disney+ series landed 23. Among the heavy hitters, The Crown also picked up 24 nominations, while The Handmaid's Tale nabbed 21 nods, Ted Lasso earned 20, Lovecraft Country and The Queen's Gambit scored 18 a piece, and Mare of Easttown collected 16. They're the big contenders that'll be vying for shiny trophies in just over two months time — on Monday, September 21 Down Under — and their nominations are filled with highlights. Pretty much every main actor involved with the heartwarming Jason Sudeikis-led Ted Lasso scored a nod, for example, with seven cast members nominated. Just a week after Lovecraft Country was cancelled by HBO, its noms stand out as well, especially its acting nominations for Jonathan Majors, Jurnee Smollett, Michael K Williams and Aunjanue Ellis. Plenty of the other shows that everyone has been watching over the past year nabbed some attention, too. The immensely dissimilar The Boys and Bridgerton have been nominated for Best Drama — with the latter's Regé-Jean Page also getting a Lead Actor in a Drama nomination. In the comedy field, The Flight Attendant, PEN15 and Emily in Paris are all represented, some more deservingly than others. And, over in the Limited Series categories — which is where WandaVision, The Queen's Gambit and Mare of Easttown all sit — Michaela Coel's phenomenal I May Destroy You rightly got some love after being completely overlooked by the Golden Globes earlier this year. It picked up nine noms, in fact. Also doing big things: Hamilton. That shouldn't come as a surprise anywhere anymore; however, the exceptional filmed version of the smash-hit musical nabbed 12 nods, including for most of its cast members — Lin-Manuel Miranda, Leslie Odom Jr, Daveed Diggs and Jonathan Groff among them. And if you're noticing a big trend towards streaming shows this year, the fact that plenty of the Emmys' usual favourites didn't air over the past 12 months due to the pandemic — shows like Succession and Westworld, for instance — obviously played a part. There were still some noticeable omissions, though, including the lack of love for Girls5eva and for the Ethan Hawke-starring The Good Lord Bird. Also, while Hugh Grant picked up a nod for his work on The Undoing, Nicole Kidman didn't for hers. Being an Australian publication, we have to mention that. The 73rd Emmy Awards will take place on Monday, September 20, Australian time. Here's a rundown of the major nominations — and you can check out the full list of nominees on the Emmys' website: EMMY NOMINEES 2021 OUTSTANDING DRAMA SERIES The Boys Bridgerton The Crown The Mandalorian Lovecraft Country Pose The Handmaid's Tale This Is Us OUTSTANDING COMEDY SERIES Black-ish Cobra Kai PEN15 Emily in Paris Hacks Ted Lasso The Flight Attendant The Kominsky Method OUTSTANDING LIMITED SERIES Mare of Easttown I May Destroy You WandaVision The Queen's Gambit The Underground Railroad OUTSTANDING TELEVISION MOVIE Uncle Frank Sylvie's Love Oslo Robin Roberts Presents: Mahalia Dolly Parton's Christmas on The Square OUTSTANDING LEAD ACTOR IN A DRAMA SERIES Regé-Jean Page, Bridgerton Sterling K. Brown, This Is Us Billy Porter, Pose Jonathan Majors, Lovecraft Country Matthew Rhys, Perry Mason Josh O'Connor, The Crown OUTSTANDING LEAD ACTRESS IN A DRAMA SERIES Emma Corrin, The Crown Olivia Colman, The Crown Uzo Aduba, In Treatment Elisabeth Moss, The Handmaid's Tale Jurnee Smollett, Lovecraft Country Mj Rodriguez, Pose OUTSTANDING LEAD ACTOR IN A COMEDY SERIES Jason Sudeikis, Ted Lasso Anthony Anderson, Black-ish Michael Douglas, The Kominsky Method William H Macy, Shameless Kenan Thompson, Kenan OUTSTANDING LEAD ACTRESS IN A COMEDY SERIES Aidy Bryant, Shrill Jean Smart, Hacks Allison Janney, Mom Kaley Cuoco, The Flight Attendant Tracee Ellis Ross, Black-ish OUTSTANDING LEAD ACTOR IN A LIMITED SERIES OR TELEVISION MOVIE Paul Bettany, WandaVision Hugh Grant, The Undoing Ewan McGregor, Halston Lin-Manuel Miranda, Hamilton Leslie Odom Jr, Hamilton OUTSTANDING LEAD ACTRESS IN A LIMITED SERIES OR TELEVISION MOVIE Kate Winslet, Mare of Easttown Michaela Coel, I May Destroy You Anya Taylor-Joy, The Queen's Gambit Elizabeth Olsen, WandaVision Cynthia Erivo, Genius: Aretha OUTSTANDING SUPPORTING ACTOR IN A DRAMA SERIES Michael K. Williams, Lovecraft Country Bradley Whitford, The Handmaid's Tale Max Minghella, The Handmaid's Tale O-T Fagbenle, The Handmaid's Tale John Lithgow, Perry Mason Tobias Menzies, The Crown Giancarlo Esposito, The Mandalorian Chris Sullivan, This Is Us OUTSTANDING SUPPORTING ACTRESS IN A DRAMA SERIES Gillian Anderson, The Crown Helena Bonham Carter, The Crown Emerald Fennell, The Crown Ann Dowd, The Handmaid's Tale Yvonne Strahovski, The Handmaid's Tale Samira Wiley, The Handmaid's Tale Madeline Brewer, The Handmaid's Tale Aunjanue Ellis, Lovecraft Country OUTSTANDING SUPPORTING ACTOR IN A COMEDY SERIES Bowen Yang, Saturday Night Live Kenan Thompson, Saturday Night Live Brett Goldstein, Ted Lasso Brendan Hunt, Ted Lasso Nick Mohammed, Ted Lasso Jeremy Swift, Ted Lasso Paul Reiser, The Kominsky Method Carl Clemons-Hopkins, Hacks OUTSTANDING SUPPORTING ACTRESS IN A COMEDY SERIES Kate McKinnon, Saturday Night Live Cecily Strong, Saturday Night Live Aidy Bryant, Saturday Night Live Rosie Perez, The Flight Attendant Hannah Einbinder, Hacks Hannah Waddingham, Ted Lasso Juno Temple, Ted Lasso OUTSTANDING SUPPORTING ACTOR IN A LIMITED SERIES OR TELEVISION MOVIE Daveed Diggs, Hamilton Jonathan Groff, Hamilton Anthony Ramos, Hamilton Thomas Brodie-Sangster, The Queen's Gambit Evan Peters, Mare of Easttown Paapa Essiedu, I May Destroy You OUTSTANDING SUPPORTING ACTRESS IN A LIMITED SERIES OR TELEVISION MOVIE Jean Smart, Mare of Easttown Julianne Nicholson, Mare of Easttown Kathryn Hahn, WandaVision Phillipa Soo, Hamilton Renee Elise Goldsberry, Hamilton Moses Ingram, The Queen's Gambit
Brisbane Festival's theatre lineup has been shining especially bright in recent years, after the world-premiere adaptation of Boy Swallow Universe played at the River City arts and culture festival in 2021, then fellow page-to-stage hit Fourteen did the same in 2022. Following them in 2023 are two new impressive homegrown shows — one a musical comedy from the songwriting team behind Muriel's Wedding The Musical, the other inspired by a true story. The first: Bananaland, which has been created by Kate Miller-Heidke and Keir Nuttall after their success treading the boards with everyone's favourite Porpoise Spit resident. This time, they're focusing on 21-year-old Ruby, who has her own protest band called Kitty Litter, which accidentally becomes a hit with preschoolers. Penned by Nuttall and featuring a score composed by Miller-Heidke, with the pair joining forces on the show's musical numbers, Bananaland promises a warmhearted but incisive exploration of chasing dreams — and an ode to performing live. It'll make its debut in QPAC's Playhouse from Saturday, September 16–Sunday October 1, charting Kitty Litter's path to following in The Wiggles' footsteps. "It has been exhilarating creating a completely new Australian musical from the ground up. With renowned director Simon Phillips at the helm, we have assembled a dream team of the most talented actors, musicians and designers. To able to achieve this in our hometown of Brisbane has been particularly thrilling," said Miller-Heidke. [caption id="attachment_884251" align="alignnone" width="1920"] Jo Duck[/caption] Brisbane Festival's second big 2023 stage premiere comes courtesy of Tae Tae in the Land of Yaaas!, which draws upon Estee Lee's true tale and will kick off before the fest itself, taking over QPAC's Cremorne Theatre from Friday, August 25–Sunday, September 17. Her sister Nelle Lee co-directs and also wrote the story, which focuses on the eponymous character who was paralysed in a car accident when she was six, struggles afterwards and later receives a much-needed boost from a fairy godmother (who'll be played by Maxi Shield from RuPaul's Drag Race Down Under). "This project has been one of my most demanding undertakings to date, as it hits so close to home. My sister, Tae, has always been fabulous, and her uncanny ability to discover happiness in the unlikeliest of places has always left me in awe," said Nelle Lee. "We are thrilled to share this story with the world, and to have it brought to life by an incredible cast. It's going to be honest and heartbreaking, but also camp, positive and uplifting." Brisbane Festival won't unveil its complete lineup until July, but it's been busy drip-feeding early details recently. Back in March, the event announced that it would kick off with Riverfire for the second year in a row. And, also in May, it revealed plans to break the world record for a kazoo orchestra with mass-participation piece 10,000 Kazoos, then named Paul Kelly, Gretta Ray, Groove Terminator with the Soweto Gospel Choir and a tribute to rock's Laurel Canyon era on its music lineup. Brisbane Festival 2023 runs from Friday, September 1–Saturday, September 23 at venues all around Brisbane, with Bananaland playing the QPAC Playhouse from Saturday, September 16–Sunday October 1, and Tae Tae in the Land of Yaaas! playing QPAC's Cremorne Theatre from Friday, August 25–Sunday, September 17. Tickets for both shows go on sale at 9am on Friday, June 2. Brisbane Festival's full program will be released in early July — for more information in the interim, head to the fest's website. Top image: Jo Duck.
Always dreamed of visiting the Mediterranean island of Sicily? Then you might want to bump it to the top of your post-COVID-19 travel plans. If you do, you could score some handy financial help — with the Sicilian government offering to cover some travel expenses once Italy is out of lockdown. As first reported by The Times, the regional government is offering to pay a portion of flight costs and accommodation expenses — covering half the price of airfares to and from the island, and paying for one in every three hotel nights. It'll also stump up the entire cost for tickets to museums and archaeological sites, so that visitors can do plenty of sightseeing. At present, few other details have been revealed, such as when it'll come into effect, when eager tourists will be able to start booking, who the scheme will apply to and where in the world you'll be able to fly in from. That said, when the plan is implemented, it'll be done via vouchers available from the Visit Sicily website — so you might want to bookmark it for future reference. The Sicilian government will spend €50 million (AU$86.4 million) on the scheme to revive its tourism industry — which, with not only the country but most of the world enforcing restrictions to help contain the spread of COVID-19, has understandably taken a battering in recent months. Italy has been in lockdown nationwide since Sunday, March 10, but announced on Sunday, April 26 that it would enter 'phase two' from Monday, May 4. That'll involve the slow easing of current restrictions, including allowing Italians to travel within their regions to visit relatives. Factories, parks and public gardens will also reopen, with museums, galleries, libraries and shops able to open their doors from Monday, May 18, then bars, restaurants and hairdressers from Monday, June 1. For further details about the Sicilian government's tourism scheme, keep an eye on the Visit Sicily website. Via The Times.
Almost synonymous with the proud Aussie spirit, R.M.Williams boots are representative of far more than sturdy footwear. Made on demand in the Adelaide workshop, a pair of RMs delivers quality craftsmanship, trend-surpassing style and excellence in both form and function — all from an Australian owned and operated business. In celebration of R.M.Williams' 90th birthday — a milestone indicative of its long-held icon status — the brand released a limited-edition capsule collection. The release features an exclusive range of boots in the iconic Craftsman and Lady Yearling styles — both renowned for being made from a singular piece of leather and passing through over 80 pairs of hands in their making — which come adorned with commemorative 90th anniversary tugs. Also in the collection is the Jerrawa belt complete with a celebratory plaque (a detail that graces the boots, too). Although the boots and belts are the hero pieces of the range, the exclusive apparel and lifestyle offering from the outback originals are just as worth coveting. Joining the leatherwear is an assortment of tees, made in collaboration with the world's first climate-positive cotton company Good Earth Cotton, and sweatshirts — all of which are emblazoned with the 90th anniversary branding. Plus, if you're keen to try your hand at leatherwork, you can buy the all-new Makers Kit, which is stocked with supplies to handcraft a durable leather cover for The Bushman's Handcrafts, the book authored by RM himself. If you're a legacy fan of the company or you're simply looking to get your first piece, the brand reaching nonagenarian status offers a momentous occasion for your purchase. As the legendary bootmaker Reginald Murray Williams explained, "If you make something good, people will make a track to your door. We made simple things that people wanted and kept them simple." And come the people did. To secure your slice of Australian history, shop online or in store.
We're toes deep in cotton socks and this can only mean one thing — Brisbane has been plunged into the depths of July. Yes, winter is here. At night there is a frost to the air, and humidity is becoming but a distant cousin. You've been spending a concerning amount of time in bed, your social life is in peril and your doona has become your closest relationship. The time is now to leave your other half behind, crawl out from under the covers, grab that one jacket you own and get out. The mission to find the best warm cocktails started out as a mere novelty bar crawl, but at the other end we've learnt three lessons: One, there is more to cocktails than crushed ice; two, many come with a free fire show; and most importantly, three, there is a true craft to getting warm drinks right (it's not all steam, gas and flames). Canvas: Soul Lover No.1 What gets you up when you’re down? The Soul Lover No.1 from Canvas. With a blend of horny goat weed, damiana and passion flower included, it will be more than the alcohol affecting your decisions tonight. Tsingleton scotch, Illegal Mezcal, dark cocoa, black walnut and yellow chartreuse also go in the mix to make what tastes like an alcoholic hot chocolate. It’s served in a teacup topped with smoked whipped cream and mini marshmallows. If it doesn’t sound like your cup of tea (heh) Canvas does three other warm ones – try Professor Geraldo. 16 Logan Road, Woolloongabba Emporium: Provencal Hot Toddy The folks behind Emporium Bar always produce a stellar cocktail menu, and Winter 2014 is no exception. We could go on about the caramel popcorn martini or Morning Tea gin one, but we’re here about warmth today. Emporium offers the Provencal Hot Toddy. In what essentially is warm apple juice that makes you a bit giggly, Martell VS cognac, Le Birlou apple and chestnut liqueur, lemon, apple juice and oregeat combine in a teacup topped with flaked almonds and fresh nutmeg. 1000 Ann Street, Fortitude Valley Hoo Ha Bar: The Lenny We once said “What Hoo Ha do, Hoo Ha do well” and the story is still the same when we’re not talking about milkshakes. Hoo Ha Bar has added ‘The Lenny’ to its winter offering, describing it as ‘a warm milk punch that hugs you in all the right places’. A mix of vodka, salted caramel (our favourite), honey and milk is steamed and sprinkled with chinese five spice and homemade orgeat chocolate. Winter isn’t so bad. 41 Tribune Street, South Brisbane The End: Mulled Wine Pocket-sized The End packs a punch. The small bar is always busy with locals, and they’ve found a surefire way to get you out on the frostiest of nights. The End’s new winter cocktail menu has a whole page dedicated to ‘winter warmers’ – that’s right, four cocktails plus mulled wine make the list. Served in a vintage teacup with a slice of orange, the mulled wine is made in house with Three Brothers shiraz, triple sec, brandy, its own spiced syrup and fresh fruit – better than a cup of earl grey any day. 73 Vulture Street, West End Twig & Berry: Aceso’s Ichor Newbie on the Newstead block, Twig & Berry has thrown up a great first cocktail menu. We went in for ‘Aceso’s Ichor’ (don’t ask us how to say it) – a mix of Martell VS, Luxardo Maraschino, water, lemongrass, cloves, star anise, black pepper, ginger and allspsice brewed with a lemongrass and ginger tea. Served in an espresso teacup, this hot cocktail sure packs a mighty kick and, as the ingredients may have given it away, tastes a lot like chai tea. Delicious alcoholic chai tea. Free fire show included in the making. 9/92 Commercial Road, Newstead Escobar: Hot Toddy New kid on the block, Escobar is doing it’s neighbourhood duty with a sweet winter offering that’ll make you want to claim it as your local. The venue is serving up a hot toddy – bourbon, apple, lemon, sugar and bitters – for a sweet $10 that’ll have you warm from the inside out. Sit down, sip it up and indulge in some old-school boardgames. 4/154 Merthyr Road, New Farm Papa Jack’s: Hot Pumpkin'd Rum Dessert and cocktails – two great loves. What if we told you Papa Jack’s had combined them with its Hot Pumpkin’d Rum? Pumpkin pie fans out there will appreciate the smooth, warm liquid of spiced rum, pumpkin puree, cream, whiskey barrel bitters, cayenne pepper and nutmeg dust. It is served in a small silver goblet – but be warned, this creamy drink packs a peppery kick at the end. Corner Connor & McLachlan Streets, Fortitude Valley Fourth Wall: The Aduous Road We originally said Fourth Wall was ‘our little secret’, but times have changed since we’ve been harping on about it ever since. Fourth Wall is known for its what-do-you-feel-like-tonight cocktail menu, but dive in, ask for The Arduous Road and be rewarded with a hot gin punch. Manager Alex Boon has made it into the top 11 Australian finalists with his Hendrick’s hot gin cocktail and will be jetting off to Vanuatu for the comp in August. We suggest you jet into Fourth Wall now and try this delicious gin, sherry, lemon, peach bitters, and lavender and cucumber shrub concoction. 743 Ann Street, Fortitude Valley The Gresham: Spiced Stoneface Step into The Gresham and back in time. This charming whiskey saloon plays on the days of yesteryear with its cedar tables, dark wooden bar and 20-bulb chandelier hanging three storeys above. The Gresham’s hot offering is the Spiced Stoneface – house-made spiced bourbon, cider, apple, ginger, spices and bitters. There’s a chesterfield couch here with your name on it, waiting to be sunk into with the aforementioned cocktail in hand and imaginary cigar in the other. 308-322 Queen Street, Brisbane Jungle: Kope Lani Sometimes you have to branch away from the espresso martini and Jungle Bar has the perfect answer. Havana Club, Kahlua, cold-press coffee and sugar is heated, layered with coconut cream and dusted with nutmeg. Chuck on the lei, but leave the grass skirt at home – tiki has never been so soul-warming, 76 Vulture Street, West End
Real life has enough drama, as we all well and truly know at the moment. When it comes to getting cosy on your couch, you can be forgiven for wanting to forget the world's troubles — and your own, and this year's — and get caught up in a side-splitting comedy instead. Our tip: pick a top-notch TV series of the rib-tickling kind and stream (or re-stream) your way through it. Some you can knock out fairly quickly, filling your weekend with laughter. Others will take weeks and months, and will constantly brighten up your days in the process. From acerbic delights and absurd wonders to heartwarming gems and instant classics, streaming platform Binge isn't lacking in the comedy department. Because being able to lose yourself in a hilarious TV series is one of life's simple but much-needed pleasures, we've teamed up with the Australian service to highlight five shows that are guaranteed to have you giggling and guffawing — including via a 14-day free trial for new customers.
When staring at a new page, a blank screen or an empty plate, what inspires us to take that first step into the unknown? Is it the wish to emulate the greats or is it a wish to add to the canon or is it simply a matter of sustenance? The Greeks gave a name to the thing that pushes you into the dark. It was the muse, an elusive source of creation that was part divination, part nature but was the driving power behind mankind's greatest creations. Modern day muses take many forms and the Sydney Film Festival is looking to explore six of them. Creative Drive is a collection of six movies designed to engage and produced to inspire - with some of the movie industry's biggest names going back to their roots to discover what inspired those who have inspired them. In A Letter to Elia, Martin Scorsese looks at the director behind On The Waterfront and A Streetcar Named Desire, controversial Hollywood filmmaker Elia Kazan. The documentary, El Bulli: Cooking In Progress goes behind the scenes of El Bulli, the Spanish restaurant which is the most exclusive and the best in the world. The Mill and the Cross exmaines Pieter Bruegel's 1564 masterpiece, The Procession to Calvary, and some of the stories behind it - the SFF points out that it may be the closest a feature film has ever come to being a painting. How to enter If you wish to uncover genius approaches, dissect the masters' processes or simply enjoy an engaging film, Concrete Playground has a double pass to each of the 6 films. To go in the running, simply subscribe to our newsletter and tell us which one of the six films you'd like to see by email at hello@concreteplayground.com.au. Entries close on Wednesday, June 25 at 5pm. https://youtube.com/watch?v=qzbbYinuTWc
Overworked? Jet lagged? Hung over? Desperate for a nap, with nowhere to run? Kickstarter is your new best friend. Without crowd funding, the 'Ostrich Pillow' might well have been just another designer's castle in the air. But with 1,846 backers having provided support to the tune of $195,094, it's become every dreamer's reality - in airports, offices and parks all over the world. Architecture and design studio Kawamura-Ganjavian (also known as Studio KG) ran their Ostrich Pillow campaign last year. Not only did they met their initial $70,000 target, they nearly tripled it. 'Ostrich Pillow is a revolutionary new product to enable easy power naps anytime, anywhere,' they explained. '[Its] unique design offers a micro environment in which to take a cosy and comfortable power nap at ease . . . Its soothing soft interior shelters and isolates your head and hands (mind and body) for a short break, without needing to leave your desk, chair, bench or wherever you may be.' It's not difficult to understand why weary travellers and office workers might have rushed to pledge support. Made of 'Flexible Fabric' and filled with 'micro balls', the pillow measures 45cm x 28cm x 15cm, with a 70cm round opening, which means that pretty much any human head should be able to find its way in. Studio Banana Things is selling it online for $US99. [via Kickstarter]
If you spend your free time binging on true crime, then you're probably familiar with the Golden State Killer. Between 1974–1986, the serial killer, rapist and burglar terrorised California, committing at least 12 murders, over 50 home-invasion rapes and more than 100 burglaries. Until 2018, however, the culprit hadn't been caught. Accordingly, it's the type of case that has kept more than a few folks wondering over the years and decades — including writer Michelle McNamara. HBO's new true-crime docuseries I'll Be Gone in the Dark chronicles McNamara's obsession with the case, as well as her hunt to find the perpetrator. Her tale is filled with intrigue, too, with her nights spent sleuthing through unsolved crimes and penning the blog True Crime Diaries while her family slept. Fixating on the Golden State Killer led McNamara to writing an article for Los Angeles Magazine, plus a book deal. But before she could finish her manuscript, McNamara — who was also married to comedian Patton Oswalt — died of an accidental prescription drug overdose in her sleep. Based on McNamara's book I'll Be Gone in the Dark: One Woman's Obsessive Search for the Golden State Killer, which was published two years after her death (and before an arrest was made in the case), the six-part series steps through this whole scenario. Across both its first and second trailers, it promises quite the detective story — and, after airing in the US from the end of June, it's finally making its way to Australian screens from Sunday, August 9. Available to binge in full via aptly named new streaming service Binge, and also airing on Foxtel as well, the series combines archival footage and details from police files; interviews with detectives, survivors and family members of the killer; and McNamara's own words, via original recordings as well as excerpts from her book read by actor Amy Ryan (Late Night, Beautiful Boy, The Office). It also doubles as an exploration of the handling of sexual crimes in the 70s and 80s by law enforcement, as well as an examination of true-crime obsession and pursuit of justice. Check out the trailer below: I'll Be Gone in the Dark will be available to stream via Binge on Sunday, August 9 — and will also air on Foxtel as well. Top images: Robyn Van Swank/HBO.
Coca-Cola has been turning green lately with sustainable bottles and recycled store shelving already upping their eco-cred, but their latest venture in the Philippines might be the best yet. Partnering with WWF, their new 60 foot by 60 foot billboard features 3,600 Fukien tea plants held in pots made from recycled Coca-Cola products, the plants defining a simple silhouette of a Coke bottle. As well as catching the eye the billboard should soak up carbon from the immediate atmosphere, as each plant is capable of absorbing 13 pounds of carbon dioxide in a year. Critics have cited it as mere greenwashing, and only a drop in the ocean compared to Coke's giant production and transport carbon outputs. Nevertheless, at least it's a step in the right direction, and as well as advertising their product the billboard also highlights the issue of climate change. But, will it ever make up for the decades of flashing lights on the Kings Cross Coke sign? Will Sydney ever see the lights dimmed and replaced with some greenery? [via PSFK]
A massive Gandhi exhibition is on its way to Melbourne's Immigration Museum. Curated from more than 1000 photos, over two hours of footage, an hour's worth of film clips and 20 audio recordings, the show focuses on Gandhi's role in leading India to independence, as well as his travels in England and South Africa. At the same time, it's a celebration of Indian diaspora all over the world. One of the reasons the exhibition is heading for Victoria is that the state is home to more people of Indian descent than any other place in Australia. "Mahatma Gandhi was an inspirational leader and I'm thrilled that Victorians will be able to enjoy this incredible exhibition," said Victorian Premier Daniel Andrews, who's in India this week checking out the show. It's been at Pravasi Bharatiya Kendra in Delhi since October 2016. "Victoria is home to Australia's largest Indian population and this exhibition is an important way to acknowledge their cultural heritage and build the cultural understanding of India among the wider Victorian community." You'll have until July to head along. The show is just one of many upcoming events celebrating Victoria's Indian connections, following the release of Victoria's India Strategy: Our Shared Future. The Mahatma Gandhi Exhibition will be at Melbourne's Immigration Museum from April to July, 2018.
Urban beekeepers in Australia are on the increase, with more and more people besotted by an unusual new love affair with backyard native beekeeping. According to Sydney's Lord Mayor, Clover Moore, the new trend has brought an element of nature back to the city, where residents and native bees alike are reaping its benefits. The Asylum Seekers Centre community garden in Surry Hills is currently home to several hundred sugarbag bees. Volunteer Jess Perini says that asylum seekers are “hooked” on the beauty of the tiny bees, which produce roughly one kilo of sugarbag honey – an expensive, nutritious variety – a year. Not only do the creatures add to the splendour and biodiversity of the garden, they have also helped to break down language barriers for asylum seekers. Sydneysiders can expect the backyard beekeeping craze to stay with the instalment of native beehives in several community gardens later this year. In Brisbane, a code of practice for urban beekeeping has already been established. And in Melbourne, an organisation called Rooftop Honey offers people the chance to sponsor their own hives. Australia is home to ten different species of stingless bees which grow to only a few millimetres. Tiny and harmless, they quite literally take the sting out of a mutually beneficial relationship. Backyard beekeepers are able to harvest their own sources of honey, while the bees find sanctuary from the destruction of their habitats from land clearing. Native bees also play an important role in balancing the natural ecosystem by pollinating native plant species and crops. With so many environmental and community benefits, it’s not hard to see why urban beekeeping has generated such a buzz. And it’s not limited to Australia – since a ban on beekeeping in New York was overturned in 2010, the popular pastime has hit the roof on NYC's rooftops.
When it comes to Australia's annual collection of Jewish cinema, variety isn't simply the spice of life — it's the festival's guiding principle. Showcasing the breadth and depth of Jewish culture and storytelling is this event's aim, and it has the range to match. In fact, 2017's Jewish International Film Festival lineup boasts 65 films from 26 countries, including Danish dramas, Aussie docos, Israeli love stories, restored Polish classics, Russian projects and everything in between. A heartbreaking array of factual efforts? Tick. The sounds of Yiddish? Tick again. Explorations of famous Jewish filmmakers? A Sundance-like range of US indies? Multiple perspectives on Israeli life? Just keep ticking. With the fest making its way around the country between October 25 and November 22, we've chosen our five must-see movies from this year's program. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=83UoZcdX__Y MENASHE If you only see one Yiddish-language movie this year, make it Menashe, which has been earning ample praise since it premiered at Sundance back in January. Loosely based on the real life of its Hasidic first-time actor and star Menashe Lustig, writer-director-producer-cinematographer Joshua Weinstein's debut full-length film unravels the story of a grocery store worker desperate to keep custody of his son after his wife's death — but beholden to strict religious tradition that dictates otherwise unless he remarries. For extra authenticity, the film was reportedly shot in secret within New York's ultra-orthodox community. Screening in Sydney, Melbourne and Brisbane. https://vimeo.com/224428115 IN BETWEEN Three female friends cope with life, love and navigating society's standards in In Between, a film that sounds oh-so-familiar — until it comes to its setting and cultural perspective. Screens big and small are filled with similar stories, but this isn't just Girls set in Tel Aviv. Rather, first-time feature filmmaker Maysaloun Hamoud delves into the difficulties confronting her trio of Palestinian protagonists as they try to wade through several layers of oppression, refuse to conform to expectation, and — crucially — fight to be themselves in a world of rules, tradition and control. Screening in Sydney and Melbourne. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hjt3J9mM7aE REBEL IN THE RYE For a famous recluse who shunned the spotlight for the bulk of his adult life, the late JD Salinger is rarely far from public attention. Writing one of the most iconic novels of the twentieth century will do that. While Salinger refused to let anyone turn The Catcher in the Rye into a film (not that it stopped the likes of Marlon Brando, Jack Nicholson and Leonardo DiCaprio trying), the author's own tale keeps popping up on screen. Documentary Salinger stepped through his story back in 2013, and now Rebel in the Rye dramatises his early years — with Nicholas Hoult as the scribe and Mad Men actor turned writer-director Danny Strong behind the camera. Screening in Sydney, Melbourne and Brisbane. https://vimeo.com/209150832 SCARRED HEARTS After helming the nineteenth century-set Romanian art-western Aferim!, filmmaker Radu Jude once again opts for something far from ordinary with Scarred Hearts. Based on autobiographical writings by Jewish Romanian author Max Blecher, the film tells the story of a twenty-something man's bedridden state as he recovers from bone tuberculosis, falls in love with a recovering former patient, and endeavours to reach beyond his confined state. A tale of living, resting, trying to find small joys, and coping with both illness and Facism, suffice it to say that this isn't the type of film you see every day. Screening in Sydney and Melbourne. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BKXAkITImGU BOMBSHELL: THE HEDY LAMARR STORY She amassed 35 acting credits to her name in both Europe and the US, and starred alongside everyone from Judy Garland to Spencer Tracy to the Marx brothers in her '40s and '50s heyday. That's only part of Hedy Lamarr's considerable true tale, however. Bombshell: The Hedy Lamarr Story steps through the smarts behind the screen persona, with the Austrian-born talent not only an actress but an accomplished inventor. Self-taught, she devised a frequency-hopping signal that was used by the Allies during the Second World War, as this Diane Kruger-narrated documentary explores. Screening in Sydney and Melbourne. The 2017 Jewish Film Festival screens at Sydney's Event Cinemas Bondi Junction and Hayden Orpheum from October 26 to November 22, Melbourne's Classic Cinemas and Lido Cinemas from October 25 to November 22, and Brisbane's New Farm Cinemas from October 26 to November 1. For more information and to buy tickets, visit the festival website.
With its "funny Broadchurch" premise, Deadloch gave murder-mysteries The Kates treatment. In its first season, the Australian hit served up both crime drama and comedy, as well as a whip-smart subversion of the usual tales about detectives investigating a spate of killings, in one of the best new TV shows of 2023. No one familiar with Kate McCartney and Kate McLennan's past work could've expected anything different — and the pair delivered, so much so that a second season is on its way. Those prior shows? Before the pair got satirical with whodunnits — while also making a stellar whoddunit — McCartney and McLennan gave television cooking programs a spin, then morning TV. The Katering Show and Get Krack!n were the end results, and both remain as hilarious now as they each did when they debuted, as you can now see on The Kates' YouTube channel. Viewers have been able to enjoy The Katering Show online for years, but season one of Get Krack!n has just joined it. If you're still trying to fill the Deadloch-shaped hole in your viewing until more episodes arrive, this is the solution — whether or not you've already seen the hit series, which spoofs breakfast television in sharp and side-splitting fashion. While they didn't appear on-screen in Deadloch, McCartney and McLennan are front and centre in Get Krack!n as the titular show's hosts. For company, everyone from Sam Neill (Apples Never Fall), Hannah Gadsby (Sex Education), Miranda Tapsell (The Artful Dodger), Deborah Mailman (Last Days of the Space Age) and Aunty Donna (Aunty Donna's Coffee Cafe) to Adam Briggs (Boy Swallows Universe), Celia Pacquola (Utopia), Nakkiah Lui (Preppers), Charlotte Nicdao (Mythic Quest) and Michelle Lim-Davidson (The Newsreader) pop up. "We can't wait to bring our topical, satirical satire Get Krack!n to the world. We think it will be just as relevant to audiences now as it was the day it was filmed ... seven years ago," said The Kates. The Northern Territory-set second season of Deadloch is shooting now, with Kate Box (Boy Swallows Universe), Madeleine Sami (Our Flag Means Death), Nina Oyama (Utopia) and Alicia Gardiner (The Clearing) all returning from season one. New to the series this time around: Luke Hemsworth (Next Goal Wins), Steve Bisley (Human Error), Shari Sebbens (The Moogai) and plenty more. Check out the first season-one episode of Get Krack!n below — and the entire season via The Kates' YouTube channel: Get Krack!n is available to stream via The Kates' YouTube channel.
When Nathan Sasi isn't cooking up a storm as the head chef at inner-city fine-dining restaurant Mercado, he's overseeing Good Times Artisan Ice Cream. When he's not doing that, he's collaborating with Lynx and designer Felix Chan to design accessories for Lynx's Find Your Magic collection. That's quite a number of hats to wear. And that's what makes him Sydney's renaissance man – he's clever, detail-focused, enthusiastic and can take on as many projects as he likes. He gets things done, and he gets them done well. Whether he's working in the kitchen, whipping up imaginative flavours in his ice cream shop or dabbling in the sartorial world, Sasi's entire existence focuses on showcasing his own personal style. We wondered, how does he balance so many projects? And how does he ensures that he expresses his individuality in everything he does? "You have to be passionate," he says. "Having a sense of confidence – not arrogance – with your style helps you pull of your look." Whether it's fashion, food, or life in general, Sasi says your style has to suit your personality. He says being passionate about what you do helps you to be persistent and reach your goals, and it also helps with the ability to juggle several different projects somewhat easier, or at least worthwhile. "Just go for it," is the advice he followed when it came to realising his childhood dream of selling everyone's favourite frozen sweet treat at Good Times. "Growing up I actually wanted to be a dentist or a lawyer," Sasi notes. But, "I always dreamt of having my own ice cream parlour, really so I could have an endless supply of ice cream." Sasi didn't just dream big though. He was also practical and thorough, and knew what worked best for him. His two food-focused roles are all about perfecting every element of the eating experience in a creative and unique way, from the Spanish-style dishes available at the former to hand-made ice cream served at the latter. "Becoming a chef was something I knew I was going to work towards actually becoming," he advises. "Once I developed my style of cooking with learning the art of making everything from scratch — charcuterie, cheese, vinegars, you name it — I knew that I wanted to extend that outside of the kitchen and typical restaurant setting. That's where the dream of really owning an ice cream parlour came about." [caption id="attachment_586645" align="alignnone" width="1280"] Sasi's collaboration with Lynx.[/caption] It was while he was waiting for Mercado to come to fruition that Good Times became a reality, with Sasi forging ahead — or just going for it — when the opportunity arose. "I was waiting for the build of Mercado Restaurant to be completed, and with time up my sleeve and a vacant space in a prime location in Potts Point, I decided I would give it a crack," he says. Give it a crack, he did. Good Times made a splash as soon as it opened its doors back in February. Sasi makes all the bases from scratch with pure cream and milk rather than pre-made powered mixes, along with using top quality ingredients for the garnishes. He found his inner magic and infused it into Good Times — and it's that outlook that inspired Lynx to come calling for a collaboration. He often alters his own clothes to create a little uniqueness, saying "people own the right to express themselves through their fashion choices, through their accessories and personal style." His own look is a blend of "old school gentlemen with a touch of rock and roll," which shines through in his collaboration with Chan. The line of silk pocket squares, checked socks and patterned ties they've designed together doesn't just try to convey Sasi's particular style, but aims to share his way of looking at the world. "I think to some degree, cooking and fashion go hand in hand. Chefs are putting what they create with heart and soul onto a plate for restaurant reviewers and diners to critique, so they tend to just do what they love, what feels right — and don't fuss too much about what others think, providing they are doing what is true to them." "You learn early on that you aren't always going to please everyone, and I think the same goes with fashion," he says. "If we didn't take risks and love being creative in the kitchen then we probably wouldn't be chefs." Or in Sasi's case, chefs, ice cream parlour owners and accessory designers. The Find Your Magic collection is available to purchase at Men In This Town, all proceeds will go to I-Manifest.
A scroll through your social media feeds can often leave you feeling like you're the only one not on holidays. While you're doing the same old nine-to-five slog, there are your peers inconsiderately boasting about all of the worldly arts and culture (and food) they're consuming. But, as it happens, you don't need to fork out the big bucks for a plane ticket to see some of the world's most important artworks. Come October, the Art Gallery of NSW will launch its next major exhibition Masters of Modern Art from the Hermitage. It'll see 65 artworks from some of the early 20th century's most revered artists — think Cézanne, Matisse, Picasso and Gauguin, plus their celebrated Russian contemporaries Malevich and Kandinsky — drawn extensively from St Petersburg's State Hermitage Museum. This landmark exhibition focuses on a revolutionary era in art history when these now legendary artists "freed themselves from tradition" and began to imagine art in previously untold vibrant, innovative and abstract ways. The collection acts a self-contained timeline tracking this defining period, with highlights including Monet's Poppy Field (1890), Picasso's Table in a Café (1912) and Kandinsky's Landscape near Dünaberg (1913). The exhibition also delves into the lives of visionary Russian art collectors Sergei Shchukin and Ivan Morozov — more than two-thirds of the exhibition has been drawn from their art collections. Realising the potential of the French modern masters, from the beginning of the 20th century, both Shchukin and Morozov acquired many of today's most acclaimed artworks. The Masters of Modern Art from the Hermitage is half of the 2018/19 Sydney International Art Series, with the Museum of Contemporary Art's David Goldblatt making up the other half. Master of Modern Art from the Hermitage will run from Saturday, October 13, 2018 to Sunday, March 3, 2019. You can purchase tickets now from the Art Gallery of NSW website. We also have double passes to the exhibition to give away. To enter, see below. [competition]687134[/competition] Images: Paul Cézanne 'Fruit' 1879-1880. Courtesy of The State Hermitage Museum, St Petersburg. Claude Monet France 1840–1926 'Poppy field' 1890/91. Courtesy of The State Hermitage Museum, St Petersburg, Pavel Demidov and Konstantin Sinyavsky; Henri Matisse 'Game of bowls' 1908. Courtesy of The State Hermitage Museum, St Petersburg, Vladimir Terebenin and H Matisse/Copyright Agency; Wassily Kandinsky 'Landscape: Dünaberg near Murnau' 1913. Courtesy The State Hermitage Museum, St Petersburg and Vladimir Terebenin.
Already home to the annual Midsumma Festival and Pride March, and soon to welcome Australia's First Pride Centre, Melbourne could also host a huge one-off pride celebration in 2021. If Victoria's Labor government is re-elected next weekend, it has pledged to host an event on par with pride celebrations in London, New York and Berlin. Dubbed Melbourne Pride 2021, the festival would take place on and around Fitzroy's Smith Street and Gertrude Street — with the area's pubs, bars and restaurants all involved in a street party held both indoors and outdoors. To be organised by tourism body Visit Victoria in consultation with LGBTQIA+ community leaders, just what else the festival will entail is yet to be revealed — although the timing is designed to mark 40 years since Victoria's state parliament decriminalised homosexuality. "By backing Melbourne's very own pride event, we're sending a clear message: here in Victoria, equality is not negotiable," said Victorian Premiere Daniel Andrews. Regional Victoria could also be set to host more LGBTQIA+ festivities, with $200,000 in funding also promised for rural pride events. Image: Midsumma Carnival, Jackson Grant.
If you watched Jemaine Clement and Taika Waititi's vampire sharehouse mockumentary What We Do in the Shadows back in 2014, then instantly found yourself yearning for more, that's understandable. Smart, silly and hilarious, the undead flick is one of the decade's best comedies. Thanks to two TV spinoffs, that dream has come true, letting viewers keep spending time in the movie's supernatural world — and that's not going to end any time soon. Last year, the New Zealand-made Wellington Paranormal made it to screens, following the movie's cops (Mike Minogue and Karen O'Leary) as they keep investigating the supernatural. It proved a hit, unsurprisingly, and has a second season in the works. This year, an American television version of What We Do in the Shadows also started airing, following a group of vampire flatmates living in Staten Island. Featuring Toast of London's Matt Berry, Four Lions' Kayvan Novak, British stand-up comedian Natasia Demetriou, The Magicians' Harvey Guillen, The Office's Mark Proksch and Lady Bird's Beanie Feldstein, it follows the same basic concept as the original movie, just with memorable new characters. And now it has been renewed for a second season as well. Created and co-written by Clement, and executive produced by the Flight of the Conchords star with Thor: Ragnarok's Waititi, the US take on What We Do in the Shadows was first hinted at back in 2017, and then confirmed in May 2018. While the duo don't star in the new-look series, Berry, Novak and company have been doing them proud as the next batch of ravenous — and comic — vamps. Novak plays the gang's self-appointed leader, 'Nandor The Relentless', who dates back to the Ottoman Empire days and is somewhat stuck in his ways. As for Berry's mischievous British dandy Laszlo and Demetriou's seductive Nadja, they're like a blood-sucking Bonnie and Clyde (but much funnier). Guillén plays Nandor's familiar, who'd do anything to join the undead, while Proksch's Colin is an 'energy vampire'. And Feldstein's Jenna is a college student with a new craving. If you haven't caught the series yet, here's one of the first season's trailers: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VWUiU3t5udM Can't wait to sink your fangs into more? The first season is still on the air at present, and the second season will continue the story — charting Nandor, Laszlo, Nadja and the group's undead antics in the New York borough. It wasn't easy being a centuries-old bloodsucker in Wellington in the movie, and it's just as tough (and amusing) on the other side of the world. What We Do in the Shadows' first season is currently airing on Foxtel's Showcase channel weekly at 8.30pm on Tuesdays. Expect the second season in 2020. Via Variety.
Just when you thought IKEA had ruined enough relationships with its 'easy-to-follow' 'three-step' 'anyone-can-do-it' DIY furniture, they're now giving punters the opportunity to do it all again over dinner. The Swedish company will next week launch The Dining Club, a pop-up 'DIY' restaurant on London's Shoreditch High Street. If you're thinking a 'DIY restaurant' sounds a little suss — it is. It's like a restaurant in that there will be tables, chairs and food, but less like one in that you have to cook the meal yourself. There will be a sous chef and maître de on-hand to help out though. The whole thing is meant to allow punters to have "an intimate foodie experience in a homely kitchen environment", according to a statement on IKEA's website. Sittings will run for brunch, lunch and dinner, and will feature "a range of modern sharing dishes, including some Scandinavian classics" — which we'll take to mean meatballs will totally be on the menu. The whole experience — including the food, drinks and service — is free of charge but there's only 38 up for grabs in a ballot-like system. Hopeful hosts can register their interest (which includes dreaming up a creative answer to 'who would you invite?') and, if selected by the IKEA gods, can bring along 7-19 friends. Earlier this year IKEA announced it will finally launch an online store for Australian customers — so who knows, maybe a pop-up kitchen will be coming our way too? The Dining Club will run from September 10-25 at 3-10 Shoreditch High Street, London. If you're in London, you can register your interest for a booking at ikeathediningclub.com. Image: Jay Wennington.
Already known for Japanese fine-dining thanks to longterm tenant Sono, Portside Wharf has now added high-end Korean BBQ to its suite of riverside restaurants. At an eatery that's all about levelling up the usual grill experience, patrons still sear their meat themselves, but on a smokeless setup installed in the table. Premium wagyu cuts, wine flights, oysters to start, slow-cooked short ribs if you'd prefer a main to a set menu, a cocktail bar pouring tipples: that's the Marble Korean Steakhouse offering. Add Marble Korean Steakhouse to Portside's recent newcomers as part of its multimillion-dollar revamp, following the likes of Rise Bakery, Mademoiselle, Fosh, Rosé Gelateria, Birds Nest Yakitori, Portside Social, Dumbo and The Ballpark Portside — and more — over the last few years. Husband-and-wife duo Simon Kang and Vanessa Devine — a Korean-trained chef and a hospitality professional, respectively — have launched a venue that pays tribute to its chosen cooking style, but also aims to give it a more-contemporary spin. As Devine puts it: "we've reimagined the Korean BBQ experience for a modern audience". The look of the place: sleek and moody, all in an industrial-inspired space. The vibe: a lively night out. For those fresh to the Korean BBQ experience, or just keen on some expert guidance, Marble Korean Steakhouse's staff are on hand to assist as you get grilling. And to ensure that your vino pairs perfectly with your meat, that's where the wine flights come in. "Rather than the usual thin cuts and DIY cooking, we guide diners through premium selections of high-grade meats, paired with vibrant side dishes and house-made sauces. It's about indulgence, discovery, and confidence at the grill," explains Mr Kang. "You don't need to be a wine expert — we've done the hard work for you. Everything is curated to enhance the flavours and elevate the experience," adds Devine. Two key options await diners: the $89 butcher's fire menu and the $129 marble signature. With the first, you'll work through a range of Tajima wagyu and Australian wagyu cuts, while the second adds full-blood wagyu as well. Both packages also include a choice of two braised stews, savoury egg soufflé, pickled seasonal vegetables, ssam and the chef's pick of desserts. If the grill isn't calling your name, you can go for the $79 hansang set for non-BBQ tables, where Korean fried chicken is a prime part of the nine-dish range. Find Marble Korean Steakhouse at 39 Hercules Street, Hamilton — and head to the venue's website for more details.
Take one secret Sydney location and one celebrated Perrier mixologist, and what do you have? Concrete Playground’s first covert cocktail, that’s what, brought to you from one of Sydney’s best kept hideaways: Wendy’s Secret Garden. Tomas Vikario is a beverage innovation manager and top mixologist from Croatia. He divides his time between New Zealand and Australia, working on new cocktail ideas for brands like Perrier. “The source was discovered a long time ago by the Romans,” Tomas tells us, “and today, it’s an iconic brand found in many of the world’s best bars and restaurants. Perrier, is great for mixology, because of the long-lasting bubbles. It’s 100% natural, from volcanic soil.” The mixologist, who is a little like the Adriano Zumbo of cocktail making, has been creating innovative drinks for 18 years in Europe and Australasia. He loves to travel, and says that he likes to take inspiration from the places he visits and convert the aromas and flavours from a place into a drink. For the first in a series of new cocktail recipes for Concrete Playground, Tomas is making a ‘Perrier Tea Break’ in the luscious surround of Wendy’s Secret Garden, Lavender Bay (here's a map). A formerly derelict space, owned by NSW Rail Corp, the public space was restored by Australian artist Wendy Whiteley, widow and former muse of the Archibald Prize-winning painter Brett Whiteley. Wendy removed old train carriages and dumped waste, creating a truly hidden spot that anyone can visit, at any time. After heading down the secluded path into the gardens, Tomas found a spot in the sun, overlooking Sydney Harbour, to show us how to make a ‘Perrier Tea Break’. “It’s like a garden,” he says, “oranges, apples and lemon... It’s easy to make and it’s romantic. I can imagine two people escaping to this garden, hiding away, and enjoying something like this. It’s very refreshing; perfect for a hot day.” In his picnic basket: 1 orange1 lemonOrange blossom water, or essential orange oil330ml bottle of Perrier water (chilled)Apple flavoured vodka (optional) Step 1 First, peel approximately 4cm of the zest of an orange. Using a knife, score the zest length-ways, then twist and squeeze over a glass or cup to release the fruit’s oils and aroma. (To look like a true pro, swirl the zest along the rim of the glass before popping it in the bottom of the cup). Step 2 Peel and score the zest of a lemon. Twist and squeeze the lemon zest, as with the orange in step one, to release the fruit’s oils and aroma. Place the lemon zest in a teapot or glass container. Step 3 Add two drops of orange blossom water, or essential orange oil, in to the teapot. If you don't have a nifty measuring pipette like Tomas, one or two teaspoons will work just as well. Step 4 Add one 330ml bottle of Perrier water and stir. For the best results, ensure the Perrier is chilled. (Perfect! No need to pack the ice). Step 5 (optional) To take this refreshing mocktail to a cocktail, simply add 60ml of flavoured vodka. Tomas uses Smirnoff’s apple vodka to create a his Perrier Tea Break, but he also recommends Belvedere orange or lemon flavoured vodkas. Enjoy! Finally, kick back and enjoy this refreshing, clean and fruity drink with sweet treats and sunshine. A glorious garden picnic!
Last year saw a slew of announcements around new streaming platforms, including two dedicated to horror and another to the world of Disney. Now, Australia's ever-growing streaming landscape is being joined by a service spotlighting great storytelling. Landing at the beginning of March, the documentary-focused iWonder launched with more than 500 hours of on-demand content, and hopes to host over 1000 blockbuster and under-the-radar titles by the end of the month. Documentaries already available on the platform cover a huge range of topics, from fast food social experiment Super Size Me, to fly-on-the-wall spectacle Jesus Camp which follows an Evangelist summer camp, and Morgan Neville's Oscar-winning music doco 20 Feet from Stardom. Music doco series Rolling Stones: Stories From the Edge, which covers the last 50 years of music in the US, and timely political flick Alt-Right: Age of Rage are also available on the service. iWonder co-founder James Bridges says a key feature of the service is the curation of the home page, which will reflect current events through articles and relevant documentary recommendations. Subscriptions have been set at $6.99 per month or $69.90 for an annual subscription. New Aussie users will receive the first month free — you can sign up here. The service is available on iOS and Android and can be cast to the small screen via Apple TV and Chromecast. The platform previously launched with 15 million users via the iflix platform in Southeast Asia, Africa and the Middle East. iWonder debuted in Singapore and New Zealand at the same time as Australia. You can sign up for iWonder via the website. Top image: Alt-Right: Age of Rage.
Marvel fans, it's time to get witchy. Agatha Harkness is back and she has a quest in her sights, plus a new posse of pals helping the MCU's latest small-screen series get spooky. A spinoff from WandaVision, Agatha All Along was announced back in 2021, then locked in its exact September 2024 release date earlier this year — and now Disney+ has conjured up the first teaser trailer for the eagerly awaited show. Kathryn Hahn (Tiny Beautiful Things) is also back as the series' namesake, starting the just-dropped sneak peek without her powers; however, that situation doesn't last long. First, Aubrey Plaza (Scott Pilgrim Takes Off) is on hand for a Parks and Recreation reunion, and to point out the bind that Agatha is in. Then, there's a goth teen, a magical gauntlet of trials and the promise of rewards — with the assistance from a coven of chaos. Joining Hahn and Plaza in the series: Joe Locke (Heartstopper), Patti LuPone (Beau Is Afraid), Sasheer Zamata (Unfrosted), Emma Caulfield Ford (a Buffy the Vampire Slayer alum) and Debra Jo Rupp (That '90s Show). Behind the scenes, Jac Schaeffer (Black Widow) returns from bringing WandaVision to the screen to run the show and direct the pilot instalment. For fans, this series really has been Agatha All Along thanks to the Emmy-winning tune that everyone who saw the character's first on-screen appearance has had stuck in their heads ever since — and again now — but the program has gone through a few monikers. House of Harkness, Coven of Chaos and Darkhold Diaries, this won't be, though, when it hits streaming queues from Thursday, September 19, 2024. If nothing else joins the Marvel television slate between now and then, that'll make Agatha All Along just the second Marvel Cinematic Universe TV series of the year, after Echo (by design, with the Mouse House noting several times that it wants to better space out its releases). When the MCU made the leap to Disney+ back in 2021, WandaVision was the first program to arrive. It also finally made everyone take notice of the always-great Hahn, who stole every scene she was in each and every time that she popped up — hence Agatha All Along getting the green light. Obviously, WandaVision was about Wanda and Vision, with Avengers: Endgame's Elizabeth Olsen (Love & Death) and Paul Bettany (A Very British Scandal) reprising their roles. But Hahn played a significant part as neighbour-slash-witch Agatha, even nabbing an Emmy nomination for her efforts. So, because she was such a fan favourite, Disney magicked her up her own show. Check out the first trailer for Agatha All Along below: Agatha All Along will stream via Disney+ from Thursday, September 19, 2024. Read our review of WandaVision. Images: courtesy of Marvel Television. © 2024 MARVEL.
Have you ever noticed the effervescent trail of light that follows your mobile phone screen when you move it in a dark room? Or how you can create shapes by whirling a glow stick around at night? Both are rudimentary examples of a recent trend: light painting. Light painting essentially consists of capturing light moving by using high exposure photography; the result is an image of the moving lights' path through the air. According to geek.com, the trend began "with a group of artists that wanted to map urban WiFi signals. This project created a visual landscape of technology we couldn’t see before, giving perspective on something we use everyday." Since then, artists and technology nerds alike have been creating floating works of light. In order to 'paint' properly, the painter must have an understanding of both the creative and scientific elements involved. The photography must be spot-on, and the hardware and software well-managed. Introducing the LightScythe: one of the first light-painting devices designed specifically with artistic endeavors in mind. The hardware is simply a long staff covered in LED lights, controlled by arduino boards and software the Mechatronics Guy designed. Watching the process, it may seem as though someone is just walking slowly with a large stick in hand, but the photographs reveal much more. The Mechatronics Guy uses the LightScythe to create floating images and text, and he wants you to, too. Check out the directions online and get to painting for yourself.
Something delightful has been happening in cinemas in some parts of the country. After numerous periods spent empty during the pandemic, with projectors silent, theatres bare and the smell of popcorn fading, picture palaces in many Australian regions are back in business — including both big chains and smaller independent sites in Sydney, Melbourne and Brisbane. During COVID-19 lockdowns, no one was short on things to watch, of course. In fact, you probably feel like you've streamed every movie ever made, including new releases, Studio Ghibli's animated fare and Nicolas Cage-starring flicks. But, even if you've spent all your time of late glued to your small screen, we're betting you just can't wait to sit in a darkened room and soak up the splendour of the bigger version. Thankfully, plenty of new films are hitting cinemas so that you can do just that — and we've rounded up, watched and reviewed everything on offer this week. SPENCER With two-plus decades as an actor to her name, Kristen Stewart hasn't spent her career as a candle in the wind. Her flame has both blazed and flickered since her first uncredited big-screen role in The Flintstones in Viva Rock Vegas but, by Elton John's definition, she's always known where to cling to. After jumping from child star to Twilight heroine and then one of the savviest talents of her generation, she's gleaned where to let her haunting gaze stare so piercingly that it lights up celluloid again and again, too. Spencer joins Stewart's resume after weighty parts in Clouds of Sils Maria, Personal Shopper, Certain Women and Seberg, and has her do something she's long done magnificently: let a world of pain and uncertainty seep quietly from her entire being. The new regal drama should do just that, of course, given its subject — but saying that director Pablo Larraín has cast his Diana well, pitch-perfect head tilt and all, is a royal understatement. Larraín also trusts himself well, making the kind of movie he's made three times now — not that Jackie, Ema and Spencer are carbon copies — and knowing that he does it phenomenally. Both essaying real-life figures and imagining fictional characters, the Chilean filmmaker keeps being drawn to tales about formidable women. His eponymous ladies could all be called strong female leads, but Larraín's features unpack what strength really means in various lights. Like her predecessors in the director's filmography, Diana faces searing traumas, plus ordinary and extraordinary struggles. She scorches away tradition, and values letting her own bulb shine bright over being stuck in others' shadows. Viewers know how this story will end, though, not that Spencer covers it, and Larraín is just as exceptional at showing how Diana's candle started to burn out. The year is 1991, the time is Christmas and the place is the Queen's (Stella Gonet, Breeders) Sandringham Estate, where the Windsors converge for the holidays (yes, Spencer is now prime seasonal viewing). As scripted by Peaky Blinders and Locked Down's Steven Knight, the choice of period puts Diana in one of the most precarious situations of her then decade-long married life, with her nuptials to Prince Charles (Jack Farthing, The Lost Daughter) turning into an "amicable separation" within 12 months. Spencer's focus is on three days, not all that defined the People's Princess' existence before or after, but she can't stop contemplating her past and future. The Sandringham grounds include the house where Diana was born, and those happier recollections — and time spent now with her children (debutants Jack Nielen and Freddie Spry) — give her a glow. Alas, all the monarchical scrutiny simmers her joy to ashes, unsurprisingly. Larraín is one of today's great detail-oriented filmmakers, a fact that glimmers in his approach to Spencer — and did in Jackie, too. Both character studies let snapshots speak volumes about broader lives and the bigger narratives around them, including when poised as "a fable from a true tragedy" as the title card notes here. 'Poised' is one word for this fictionalised imagining of real events, which builds its dramas in an immaculate chamber, lets heated emotions bounce around as it tears into privilege and power, and allows audiences to extrapolate from the meticulous minutiae. Specific tidbits are oh-so-telling, such as the demand that Sandringham's guests hit the scales upon arrival and leaving, their weight gains deemed a sign of how much they enjoyed themselves. Bolder flourishes are just as exacting, like the way the place is lensed to make the Princess of Wales resemble a doll being toyed with in a playhouse, as well as a Jack Torrance substitute trapped in her own Overlook Hotel The Shining-style. Read our full review. NIGHTMARE ALLEY Don't mistake the blaze that starts Nightmare Alley for warmth; in his 11th film, Guillermo del Toro gets chillier than he ever has. A lover of gothic tales told with empathy and curiosity, the Mexican filmmaker has always understood that escapism and agony go hand in hand — in life, and in his fantastical movies — and here, in a carnival noir that springs from William Lindsay Gresham's 1946 novel and previously reached cinemas in 1947, he runs headfirst into cold, unrelenting darkness. As The Shape of Water movingly demonstrated to Best Picture and Best Director Oscar wins, no one seeks emotional and mental refuge purely for the sake it. They flee from something, and del Toro's life's work has spotted that distress clearly from his first dalliance with the undead in his 1993 debut Cronos. The Divinyls were right: there is indeed a fine line between pleasure and pain, which del Toro keeps surveying; however, Nightmare Alley tells of trying to snatch glimpses of empty happiness amid rampant desolation. That burning house, once home to the skulking Stanton Carlisle (Bradley Cooper, Licorice Pizza), is surrounded by America's stark midwestern landscape circa 1939. Still, the terrain of its now-former occupant's insides is even grimmer, as Nightmare Alley's opening image of Stan dropping a body into a hole in the abode's floor, then striking a match, shows. From there, he descends into the carny world after hopping on a bus with only a bag and a radio, alighting at the end of the line and finding a travelling fair at this feet. Given a job by barker Clem Hoatley (Willem Dafoe, Spider-Man: No Way Home), he gets by doing whatever's asked, including helping clean up after the geek act — although, even with his ambiguities evident from the outset, stomaching a cage-dwelling man biting the heads off live chickens to entertain braying crowds isn't initially easy. While set in an already-despondent US where the Depression is only just waning, the shadows of the First World War linger and more are soon to fall via World War II, Nightmare Alley still gives Stan flickers of hope. Adapted from the novel by del Toro with feature debutant Kim Morgan, the movie doesn't ever promise light or virtue, but kindness repeatedly comes its protagonist's way in its first half. In fortune-teller Zeena the Seer (Toni Collette, Dream Horse) and her oft-sauced husband and assistant Pete (David Strathairn, Nomadland), Stan gains friends and mentors. He takes to mentalism like he was born to it, and his gift for manipulating audiences — and his eagerness to keep pushing the spiritualism further — is firmly a sign. Soon, it's 1941 and he's rebadged himself as 'The Great Stanton' in city clubs, claiming to speak to the dead in the pursuit of bigger paydays, with fellow ex-carny Molly Cahill (Rooney Mara, Mary Magdalene) as his romantic and professional partner beyond the dustbowl. The tone may be blacker than del Toro's usual mode — positively pitch-black in the feature's unforgettable ending, in fact — but Stan is just doing what the director's main characters tend to: trying to find his own place as he runs from all that haunts him. "My whole life, I been lookin', lookin' for somethin' I'm good at — an' I think I found it," he says, his elation palpable. Although his first altercation with Dr Lilith Ritter (Cate Blanchett, Don't Look Up) starts with a public scene at one of his swanky gigs, he's equally as thrilled that his crowd-pleasing act attracts her attention, and by the psychologist's suggestion that they team up on wealthy mark Ezra Grindle (Richard Jenkins, Kajillionaire). But here's the thing about being a grifter, even one who was so recently a drifter: if you're fleecing someone, you're likely being fleeced back in turn. Read our full review. BELLE When Beauty and the Beast typically graces the screen, it doesn't involve a rose-haired singer decked out in a matching flowing dress while singing heart-melting tunes atop a floating skywhale mounted with speakers. It doesn't dance into the metaverse, either. Anime-meets-Patricia Piccinini-meets-cyberspace in Belle, and previous filmed versions of the famed French fairytale must now wish that they could've been so inventive. Disney's animated and live-action duo, aka the 1991 musical hit that's been a guest of childhood viewing ever since and its 2017 Emma Watson-starring remake, didn't even fantasise about dreaming about being so imaginative — but Japanese writer/director Mamoru Hosoda also eagerly takes their lead. His movie about a long-locked social-media princess with a heart of gold and a hulking creature decried by the masses based on appearances is firmly a film for now, but it's also a tale as old as time and one unafraid to build upon the Mouse House's iterations. At first, there is no Belle. Instead, Hosoda's feature has rural high-schooler Suzu (debutant Kaho Nakamura) call her avatar Bell because that's what her name means in Japanese. That online character lives in a virtual-reality world that uses body-sharing technology to base its figures on the real-life people behind them, but Suzu is shy and accustomed to being ignored by her classmates — other than her only pal Hiroka (Lilas Ikuta of music duo Yoasobi) — so she also uploads a photo of the far-more-popular Ruka (Tina Tamashiro, Hell Girl). The social-media platform's biometrics still seize upon Suzu's own melodic singing voice, however. And so, in a space that opines in its slogan that "you can't start over in reality, but you can start over in U", she croons. Quickly, she amasses an audience among the service's five-billion users, but then one of her performances is interrupted by the brooding Dragon (Takeru Satoh, the Rurouni Kenshin films), and her fans then point digital pitchforks in his direction. Those legions of interested online parties don't simplistically offer unwavering support, though. Among Belle's many observations on digital life, the fact that living lives on the internet is a double-edged sword — wielding both opportunities to connect and excuses to unleash vitriol, the latter in particular when compared to the physical experience — more than earns its attention. That said, all those devotees of Suzu's singing do rechristen her avatar as Belle, and she starts living up to that fairytale moniker by becoming fascinated with the movie's Beast equivalent. He's mysterious to the point that no one in U or IRL has been able to discern who he really is, but the platform's self-appointed pseudo-police force is desperately trying. Suzu is also mortified about the possibility of anyone discovering that she's Belle, although she's drawn to Dragon because she can sense his pain. Hosoda has repeatedly proven an inspired filmmaker visually — one just as creative with his stories and storytelling alike, too — and Belle is no exception on his resume. After the likes of The Girl Who Leapt Through Time, Summer Wars, Wolf Children and Mirai, he's in especially dazzling form in a movie that wields its images in two distinctive modes. In U, Belle is an epic onslaught for the eyes, its animation lively, busy and hyper-real in a way that cannily mirrors the feeling of wading through always-on online realms. This is where that whale swims through the air, concerts are held in what appears to be a hollow planet and Disney-style castles turn gothic. When it's in Suzu's reality, the film opts for naturalistic tones in a look that notices the everyday beauty in the flesh-and-blood world, even amid daily routines in fading small towns filled with average teens and their families. Hosoda revels in the contrast between the two, in fact, because that clash constantly sits at the film's core. Read our full review. ONE SECOND Any new film by Zhang Yimou deserves eyeballs the world over, but One Second, the Raise the Red Lantern, Hero and House of Flying Daggers director's latest, hasn't charted the smoothest route to screens. Pre-dating the filmmaker's Cliff Walkers, which reached Australian cinemas in 2021, it was originally scheduled to show at the 2019 Berlinale. But after the festival began, it was removed from the lineup — and while a "technical problem" was cited as the official reason, Chinese censorship was floated as the real cause. One Second eventually surfaced on home soil late in 2020, and elsewhere around the globe in the last few months of 2021. It's now an immensely timely movie, although purely by coincidence. Every great feature by a great director inherently pays tribute to the medium of film, so that's hardly new for Zhang — but celebrating the silver screen, and the pandemic-relevant yearning to bask in its glory when life conspires to get in the way, isn't just a side effect here. It's 1975 when One Second begins, and crowds are flocking to makeshift small-town picture palaces to see propaganda films. The specific movie drawing in the masses: 1964's Heroic Sons and Daughters, which prison-camp escapee Zhang Jiusheng (Zhang Yi, Cliff Walkers) is desperate to catch. Alas, after finding his way into one village through mountains of sand that wouldn't look out of place in Dune, the fugitive discovers that he's already missed the showing that the night. Worse still, the film's canisters are being packed onto a motorbike to be driven to their next destination. And, he isn't the only one keen to make the movie's acquaintance, with the orphaned Liu (Liu Haocun, another Cliff Walkers alum) swiftly stealing its sixth reel before it departs town. An unlikely pair seeking the same thing for different reasons — he's heard that his estranged daughter appears in newsreel footage in the feature, while she wants the celluloid to make a lamp for her younger brother — Zhang and Liu are soon following the rest of the film through the desert to its next stop. That's where Mr Movie (Fan Wei, Railway Heroes) awaits, courting profit and glory compared to Zhang's desperation to glimpse his family and Liu's resourcefulness (that said, sporting a mug calling himself the 'World's Greatest Projectionist', the man behind the travelling cinema that's screening Mao-approved fare to entertainment-starved locales does still love his a clear fondness for his job). But the reels don't return intact, sparking a homemade restoration campaign that needs the entire town's help. Yes, loving film is also a tactile experience here. Zhang has always been able to make any kind of movie he's put his mind to, and has the four-decade-long resume to prove it. With 2009's A Woman, a Gun and a Noodle Shop, he even remade the Coen brothers' Blood Simple. One Second sees him masterfully blend film-adoring melodrama with a Cultural Revolution-era portrait that's laced with just the amount of commentary that managed to escape the censors. He revels in sight gags and chases that could've been lifted out of silent comedy greats from a century back as well, giving cinema yet another ode. The end result mightn't be Zhang's absolute best — his resume isn't short on highlights — but it easily ranks among his most endearing. One Second makes exceptional use of its dust-swept setting, too, and its trio of chalk-and-cheese main players; plus, in celebrating an artform that's both tangible and an illusion, Zhang still makes a clear statement. One Second is currently screening in Sydney and Brisbane, after opening in Melbourne in December 2021. If you're wondering what else is currently screening in Australian cinemas — or has been lately — check out our rundown of new films released in Australia on September 2, September 9, September 16, September 23 and September 30; October 7, October 14, October 21 and October 28; November 4, November 11, November 18 and November 25; December 2, December 9, December 16 and December 26; and January 1, January 6 and January 13. You can also read our full reviews of a heap of recent movies, such as Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings, Summer of Soul (...Or, When the Revolution Could Not Be Televised), Streamline, Coming Home in the Dark, Pig, Big Deal, The Killing of Two Lovers, Nitram, Riders of Justice, The Alpinist, A Fire Inside, Lamb, The Last Duel, Malignant, The Harder They Fall, Roadrunner: A Film About Anthony Bourdain, Halloween Kills, Passing, Eternals, The Many Saints of Newark, Julia, No Time to Die, The Power of the Dog, Tick, Tick... Boom!, Zola, Last Night in Soho, Blue Bayou, The Rescue, Titane, Venom: Let There Be Carnage, Bad Luck Banging or Loony Porn, Dune, Encanto, The Card Counter, The Lost Leonardo, The French Dispatch, Don't Look Up, Dear Evan Hansen, Spider-Man: No Way Home, The Lost Daughter, The Scary of Sixty-First, West Side Story, Licorice Pizza, The Matrix Resurrections, The Tragedy of Macbeth, The Worst Person in the World, Ghostbusters: Afterlife, House of Gucci, The King's Man, Red Rocket, Scream, The 355, Gold, King Richard and Limbo.
To the joy of folks who love ice cream but don't consume animal products, tucking into a creamy frozen dessert that's 100-percent vegan is much easier than it used to be. You'll find vegan Magnums, Cornettos and Weiss Bars in your supermarket freezer, vegan choc tops at Event Cinemas in Sydney and Brisbane, vegan ice cream sandwiches at Lord of the Fries around the country, and a selection of vegan sorbets at Gelato Messina — and now you'll find a new vegan lineup at gelato chain Gelatissimo as well. Gelatissimo already has its own vegan sorbet range, spanning flavours such as green apple, lemon, mango, passionfruit, raspberry, strawberry and coconut. Now, it's also scooping up dairy-free gelato. As part of the new selection, two varieties are on offer at present, with a third still to come — and they're the first in the chain's ongoing commitment to providing flavours for all dietary preferences. If you like your frosty desserts with a dash of decadence, you're in luck, with caramel mudcake and triple chocolate flavours on the menu. When you're licking your way through a cup or cone of caramel mudcake vegan gelato, you'll be enjoying vegan caramel gelato combined with caramelised sugar, as well as chunks of vegan caramel mudcake. As for the vegan triple chocolate gelato, it blends West African cocoa, vegan dark chocolate morsels and vegan chocolate sauce, then dusts the whole thing with cocoa powder. Available until Thursday, April 2 — or until stocks last — in all Australian stores, both dairy-free flavours use coconut and soy milk. Just what the third vegan gelato flavour will be, or when it'll be available, hasn't been revealed as yet. Gelatissimo's new vegan range is available from all stores nationwide until Thursday, April 2 — or until stocks last. If you're choosing to go out and support local businesses, have a look at the latest COVID-19 advice and social-distancing guidelines from the Department of Health.
If you avoid glass observation decks atop high structures like the plague, then you might want to look away. Those cash-grabbing, genius high rise developers have taken our apparent insatiable desire to stand on a floor of reinforced glass at great heights to the next level and turned the standing attraction into a sliding one. Yep, a see-through glass slide has just opened on top of Los Angeles' highest skyscraper. Terrifying. The slide — aptly named Skyslide — is part of the iconic U.S. Bank Tower's new Skyspace development, which opened on Saturday, June 25. Skyspace has turned the tower's 70th floor into an impressive open-air observation deck (the highest of its kind in California), and the slide is just an extra addition for people who feel that merely looking at a view of Downtown LA from 1000 feet is not enough. That said, the slide is relatively short at about 14 metres — it only travels the length of one floor, from the 70th to the 69th. So it's a bit of a short-lived ride. But if you're scared of heights, you can at least take comfort in the fact that it'll be over before you know it. Well, we assume there's nothing quite like moving at high speed in a glass tube on the side of a building to truly appreciate the view. Even if it is only for 3.5 seconds.
