It's with a wink and a nod that Ladj Ly names his Cannes prize-winning, Oscar-nominated crime-thriller after one of the most famous French works there is: Les Misérables. And it's with the same irreverent spirit that the first-time feature director lets audiences literally hear the people sing in the movie's opening moments, even though this definitely isn't a musical. Set in 2018, the film's early crowds are belting out 'La Marseillaise'. France has just won the FIFA World Cup, Avenue des Champs-Élysées is alive with soccer fans waving flags and celebrating, and everyone is chanting the national anthem with beaming pride. Shot documentary-style, the city's residents couldn't be more joyous, including when the movie's moniker — literal translation: the miserables — is humorously splashed across the screen. But, despite the ecstatic scenes that kickstart Ly's feature, this is still a rousing cinematic song of angry Parisians. Nearing 160 years since Victor Hugo immortalised the Montfermeil commune, using the Paris district as a key setting in his well-known work, this Les Misérables heads there to tell a different story. Or, to be exact, to explore comparable themes in contemporary France — and to interrogate the reality of life in Les Bosquets housing estates in one of the capital's banlieues. The latter and their communities have featured in the likes of 1995's La Haine and 2014's Girlhood before, two hands-down French movie masterpieces, but the approach here is especially inspired. Drawing parallels with a globally known, much-adapted, long-popular classic to shine a spotlight on modern-day class and cultural clashes is smart and savvy and, in the hands of a filmmaker from the area who is already known for making documentaries about the area, results in a particularly compelling and confronting piece of cinema. Every neighbourhood bubbles with stories. So, focusing on Les Bosquets, Ly relays as many tales as he can. With propulsive and fittingly restless energy, his film flits between the locale's cops, kids and gangs — with struggles between all three groups reaching boiling point over the course of two summery and eventful days. The catalysts: familiar prejudices, long-held beefs, a stolen lion, a wrongful shooting and some controversial drone footage. Anti-crime brigade officers Chris (The Eddy's Alexis Manenti), Gwada (C'est tout pour moi's Djebril Zonga) and the newly transferred Stéphane (Dunkirk's Damien Bonnard) are never far from the trouble, sometimes causing it, sometimes trying to stop it. But two local adolescents also play pivotal parts, with young Issa (debutant Issa Perica) responsible for the jungle cat missing from a visiting circus troupe and shy teen Buzz (fellow newcomer Al-Hassan Ly) the owner of the highly sought-after drone. While Les Misérables takes place just two years ago, Ly, actor and scribe Manenti, and their co-screenwriter Giordano Gederlini (Mother's Instinct) use events from a decade earlier as their basis, with Montfermeil one of the sites of the 2005 French riots. Ly's documentary short 365 Days in Montfermeil chronicled the chaos and the police brutality from the inside, as shot at the time — but here, he dramatises it. It's no wonder, then, that Les Misérables proves unrelentingly terse and always on edge, as well vehemently unafraid to filter real-world unrest through every frame. It's just as unsurprising that it isn't always subtle, but given the complicated terrain that it traverses, it needn't be. As a portrait of social tensions drawn from real-life situations, this is a film of explosive emotional and visceral power even when it's clearly lacking in nuance. Les Misérables makes a range of statements, including pondering the powder-keg banlieue environment, as well as the similarities between the film's cops, children and thugs — all of whom, in their own ways, are trying to get by. Ly contemplates how one event can escalate, detonate and spark a chain of chaos, and, Hugo-style, how insurrectionary acts come about. There's a message in the simple act of calling upon the riots the filmmaker lived through for a movie set years later, too, and it's one of Les Misérables' most potent. The idea that Ly's fictionalised story doesn't just lift details from reality, but that its ins and outs have never stopped being relevant to or reflective of life in Les Bosquets, purposefully hits hard. Also having an impact, and by design: the jittery on-the-ground camerawork that conveys tension, terror and heartbreak in equal measures; and the sky-high, bird's-eye drone footage that reminds viewers visually about perspective and the bigger picture. Indeed, Ly and his cinematographer Julien Poupard (Divines) ensure audiences feel like they're traversing Montfermeil's streets, and that they've seen every corner of the area from every angle as well. The urgent electronic score by Pink Noise does a cracking job of setting the mood, as does the brisk pace set by editor Flora Volpeliere (The Hookup Plan). And, cast-wise, Les Misérables' experienced actors and fresh faces alike all impart a sense of authenticity. By the time all of the above has worked its magic, no one is singing 'La Marseillaise' exuberantly, of course, but viewers have witnessed a stunning film with revolution at its heart. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TIsEZ2tTavU&t=6s
Giving new meaning to the idea of speaking with one’s hands, The Colour of Saying by Paris- and Sydney-based artist Angelica Mesiti is an exploration of non-verbal expression. This multichannel video work is woven from music, movement and silence. It is the result of a workshop led by Mesiti in Sweden. Set within a white landscape, the work incorporates a diverse group of performers — dancers, musicians and a sign language choir. Praised for the cinematic quality of her practice, Mesiti has been tapping into different cultures and methods of communication for some time now. On display at Anna Schwartz Gallery, this alluring take on the spectrum of human interaction is likely to uphold her reputation.
A few years ago, Sydney was whistling a hesitant tune when it came to the beauty of craft beer, with Sydney Craft Beer Week consisting of only a handful of events. Now in its fourth year, SCBW has grown to be a massive affair, involving over 100 crafty, boozy events from October 18-26. Sydneysiders have begun jumping on the bandwagon of the microbrew. Just as the first sweltering days of the season descend on Sydney, brewers far and wide are becoming our heroes with their individual take on the much-loved frosty beverage. This year we recommend you have some beer in your pastries, try some brews spiked with Australian native flavours, get messy with whole crabs and Batch Brewing, and get stuffed with three pigs on spits and a whole lot of Stone & Wood. They're all in our top ten picks of the festival over here.
They said Dead Europe would be unfilmable. As a novel, Dead Europe, written by Christos Tsiolkas in 2005, is dense, sprawling, and frequently horrifying. Yet a film version has been made, however challenging that may have been. Dead Europe is the second feature film from Tony Krawitz, whose previous work includes Jewboy and the 2011 documentary The Tall Man, with a team of producers behind it whose resumes boast films such as Shame and Animal Kingdom. What is remarkable about it is that very few films deliver the same kind of visceral impact as Dead Europe, and even fewer deal with the generally abstract themes of memory, history, and commodity capitalism in a way that leaves you shaking when you leave the theatre. There have been few Australian films made like this one. The film addresses the sins of the past, and the way in which we continue to be haunted by apocryphal stories we frequently refuse to acknowledge. The story sees Isaac (Ewen Leslie), the son of Greek migrant parents, return to Greece to scatter his father's ashes. He gets wasted, he has sex, and he observes the underbelly of Europe, a place haunted by the atrocities of the 20th century to such an extent that Isaac's own family's past slowly begins to torment him in the spectral form of Josef, a young boy played by The Road's Kodi Smit-McPhee. The film is in part a psychological thriller — something akin to the heathen child of Rosemary's Baby and Lilya 4-Ever — with the audience never sure whether the presence haunting Isaac is real or simply a figment of his imagination. Yet it is also an unflinching view of Europe, and the ways in which people simply are not good to each other. The problems with the film emerge if you've read the book. An adaptation of a novel is a tricky thing, because there is always some expectation that the filmmakers will attempt to maintain the integrity of the book. Yet the cinematic adaptation of Dead Europe is so far removed from the novel — in the changes to the plot, the setting, and the ending of the film — that it seems almost misleading to give it the same title. It says something very different to Tsiolkas's novel, and in that respect it would be best to think of the works as companion pieces. But as a stand-alone film, Dead Europe is beautiful, visceral, and utterly remarkable. It is arguably one of the best Australian films we've seen in recent years. Read our interview with director Tony Krawitz here. https://youtube.com/watch?v=XrNnofw8CQw
Forbidden love — so much more appealing than ordinary, feasible love. Centuries ago a Frenchman called Jean Racine adapted a play by Euripides which British poet laureate Ted Hughes later spent the last few months of his life translating, perhaps as a sort of self-imposed penitentiary act for not protecting his partner in poetry, Sylvia Plath, from her own passionately wrought fantasies. Hughes' highly regarded free verse translation of Phedre has been adapted for the stage by the Bell Shakespeare Company. The plot is a psychologically compelling, proper Greek tragedy complete with pathos, jealousy and screaming frustration. The character Phedre is a cursed, cougar-esque queen afflicted with an all-consuming passion for her stepson Hippolytus — ignore the name, he's a handsome if diffident 'objet d'adoration'. Fatefully, Phedre's husband Theseus is missing, presumed dead. At the encouragement of her well-meaning nursemaid Oenone, Phedre decides to confess her dangerous and libidinous obsession to the boy in the hopes that he will respond with equal passion. Instead, Hippolytus backs away from the raving madwoman in her stilettos and tight pants in horror, as his pursuer stumbles across the stage, half-crippled by her unrequited lust. It's an unfortunate time for Theseus to return unexpectedly home — literally from Hell. Hell hath no fury like a woman forced to think on the spot of how she became so visibly distressed. Phedre accuses Hippolytus of rape and Theseus promptly invokes the power of Neptune to curse his son, who retreats quite understandably to the blonde and barefooted Aricia with a view to intertangling limbs and lives. Director Peter Evans highlights how our lives can become defined by destructive relationships — both with ourselves and with others — if we allow them to. From the scratchy heartbeat of the fitful soundscape to the frenzied intensity of an apparently powerful woman seeking control in a world where female control just isn't possible, it's easy to identify with her quest and subsequent failure to achieve fulfillment. Her powerlessness turns love into mania and passion into a destructive force. The male characters are victims, too; Theseus too readily believes his son is a rapist, perhaps because of his own philandering history. His realisation that he's got it fatally wrong comes much, much too late. Some stories transcend space and time and Phedre remains a remarkably compelling psychodrama in the context of contemporary life. Anna Cordingley's set is as damaged as the characters' hearts and Hughes' translation is lean, mean and lyrical. The most tragic thing about Phedre is that she realises how the contamination of her consciousness is self-induced: the foregone conclusion of forbidden love. This review is based on the Melbourne run of the production, which ran in May 2013. Photo by Rush.
Forgetting, fixating, flailing, fraying: that's The Father. Anthony's (Anthony Hopkins, Westworld) life is unravelling, with his daughter Anne (Olivia Colman, The Crown) springing the sudden news that she's about to move to Paris, and now insistent that he needs a new carer to replace the last home helper he's just scared off. He also can't find his watch, and time seems to jump suddenly. On some days, he has just trundled out of bed to greet the morning when Anne advises that dinner, not breakfast, is being served. When he brings up her French relocation again, she frostily and dismissively denies any knowledge. Sometimes another man (Mark Gatiss, Dracula) stalks around Anthony's London apartment, calling himself Anne's husband. Sometimes the flat isn't his own at all and, on occasion, both Anne (Olivia Williams, Victoria and Abdul) and her partner (Rufus Sewell, Judy) look completely different. Intermittently, Anthony either charms or spits cruel words at Laura (Imogen Poots, Black Christmas), the latest aide hired to oversee his days. She reminds him of another daughter, one he's sure he had — and preferred — but hasn't heard from for years. When he mentions his other offspring, however, everyone else goes silent. More than once, Anthony suspects that someone has pilfered his beloved timepiece, which just keeps disappearing. Largely, The Father remains housebound. For the bulk of its 97 minutes, it focuses on the cardigan-wearing Anthony as he roams around the space he calls home. But this is a chaotic film, despite its visual polish, and that mess, confusion and upheaval is entirely by design. All the shifting and changing — big and small details alike, and faces and places, too — speak to the reason Anne keeps telling Anthony they need another set of hands around the house. His memory isn't what it used to be. In fact, it's getting much worse than that. Anthony knows that there's something funny going on, which is how he describes it when his sense of what's happening twists and morphs without warning, and The Father's audience are being immersed in that truth. Anthony has dementia, with conveying precisely how that feels for him the main aim of this six-time Oscar-nominated stage-to-screen adaptation, which novelist and playwright turned first-time director Florian Zeller has helmed based on Le Père, his own play. In a looping, winding, structurally savvy screenplay by Zeller and Christopher Hampton (an Academy Award-winner for Dangerous Liaisons) that plays out like a puzzle, disorientation is the key tool. Sometimes the change in details is subtle, as one well-appointed, high-ceilinged abode with views of the street below gives way to another. At other times, the contrast is sharp and jarring, and Anthony reacts accordingly. The Father does an extraordinary job of placing its viewers in the octogenarian's head, making them endure the same jolts and jumps, and share the same disarray and loss. And make no mistake: to feel as though your grip on what's real and right in front of you is slipping is something to be mourned. Also superbly handled in the script, and in Hopkins' powerhouse performance, is the fact that Anthony is caught between two extremes. Not only to himself, but to Anne, Laura and that man that's sometimes present, he often seems enough like his old self that little appears wrong. That sensation can linger, but it can also pass in an instant — just as he can segue from fact to fantasy in the blink of an eye as he spins stories and reflects upon memories, and from merriment to menace in his mood as well. Bearing witness to Anthony's experience doesn't just inspire horror in an empathetic fashion. Feeling for anyone in such circumstances is an innate reaction, so it still does just that, but it also evokes a visceral response. Ageing is something that we all aspire to, given that the alternative is dying young — and the physical and mental deterioration that comes with the passing years is one of life's universal fears. The Father reflects this not only by putting its audience in Anthony's shoes, but also by observing how both of its two main characters handle this simultaneously evolving and devolving situation. While Anne bears the weight of her father's decline in a dissimilar way, obviously, her life has been equally affected. Balance is one of The Father's masterstrokes, getting its viewers thinking of their own futures as well as of those they love. No one can escape this subject matter, after all, and no one can evade the film's devastating and heartbreaking gaze, either. A titan of cinema for decades — with 2021 marking 30 years since he frightened his way into celluloid history as Hannibal Lecter — Hopkins is similarly unavoidable. He's an actor with physical presence, inescapable command, that booming voice and a way of demanding that every set of eyes peers his way, and his well-established talents and traits are all on offer in The Father. As Anthony's condition worsens, he also displays remarkable fragility and vulnerability. Aided by Ben Smithard's (Downton Abbey) incisive cinematography, he can tower over everyone in the room and then shrink into its corners. In one late shot — the movie's most haunting — he's infantilised by the scenario and the camerawork in tandem, and it's utterly shattering. In the film as a whole and in Hopkins' performance, sentiment has no place. Indeed, The Father and its star are ruthless in conveying Anthony's inner state and overall journey. The more recent Oscar-winner among cast (and a nominee this year again, alongside Hopkins), Colman is remarkable in a different manner. Her version of Anne is weary, plagued by sorrow and trying to soldier on all at once, and hers is the epitome of a layered portrayal. She weathers Hopkins' charisma, savagery and uncertainty, but she's unselfish in every scene. This is a generous film all-round, even in its darkest moments. As overwhelming as The Father can be as it wades through Anthony and Anne's lives, its unflinching and unsparing approach is anchored in kindness and compassion — because to truly see something as tough as this is to give it the attention and focus it deserves. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g0ox9ExOA1M&feature=youtu.be
Ever been on a bushwalk or beach stroll and and wondered if you can eat that shrub or flower? Maybe it was a pepperberry or some type of edible beach succulent — but who really knows. Well, now you can now go foraging for wild food more easily than ever, thanks to a new app developed by René Redzepi, chef and co-owner of Noma. He made the announcement yesterday at World's 50 Restaurants 15th anniversary talks event in Barcelona. The app, which is called VILD MAD (meaning 'wild food' in Danish), shows you what edibles are nearby according to landscape. There are also instructions (in both Danish and English) on how to eat and cook them, including a few recipes. Plus, you can record your foraging adventures and keep notes on what you find. Redzepi is perhaps the most famous champion of native foods, and, as well as cooking with them at his Copenhagen restaurant, he made the most of Australia's native ingredients when Noma popped up in Sydney in 2016. "Knowing your ABCs in nature, the flora and the fauna, the patterns in the landscape, and the rhythms in the seasons is as important, we believe, as learning math, learning to read, learning to write — especially today when people think cacao milk comes from brown cows," Redzepi said at the 50 Best Talk, as reported by Eater. The app is just one part of a bigger initiative led by the Danish chef. Along with lots of useful resources on his MAD website, Redzepi is also leading some serious foraging education opportunities, including workshops to be delivered all over Denmark by park rangers and a curriculum for Danish school kids. His aim? To get people to pick food from nature like they do from supermarket shelves. While a lot of the content is specific to Denmark, anyone can download VILD MAD for free at the App Store or Google Play and identify some ingredients. While we'd love an Australian and New Zealand app like this to be developed, in the meantime, you can get acquainted with Australian native foods and which restaurants use them over here. Via Eater.
Hear ye, hear ye. News just in that Bondi is set to get its own classic British pub this October. The Beekeeper will open on Hall Street, in the heritage-listed Fellworth Flats, serving lunch and dinner seven days a week. The Beekeeper is an ode to owners Ben Campbell and Brendan Darcy's Northern English heritage. The boys behind the Northern Hospitality group are well-versed in operating welcoming and lively spaces, with their much-loved dive bar Chuck Trailer's recently expanding to a second location in Sydney's CBD. The owners want The Beekeeper to serve as a hive of community activity where people can come together over a Guinness and some classic grub. Head Chef Kevin Davis intends to bring a taste of his English roots to Bondi with scotch eggs, fish and chips, Ploughman's Lunches and traditional Sunday roasts served with all the trimmings. Ben and Brendan explain that the "name The Beekeeper is a tip of the hat to Manchester's famous worker bee — a symbol of hard work and community. We want the Beekeeper to be the heart of the local community — a place where people come together over a proper pint and a warm welcome." Images: Supplied. The Beekeeper will open its doors this October at 45 Hall Street, Bondi. Follow @thebeekeeperbondi on Instagram to stay up to date with the latest information.
UPDATE, December 21, 2021: Black Christmas is available to stream via Netflix, Google Play, YouTube Movies, iTunes and Amazon Video. A fun, feisty remake with a female perspective and a refreshing sense of sisterhood, Black Christmas is a college-set slasher flick for the #MeToo era. The latter gets thrown around a helluva lot of late — with Unsane, Ocean's 8, Booksmart and last year's latest Halloween instalment among those recently earning the label — but with this updated version of a 1974 cult movie, writer/director Sophia Takal (Always Shine) firmly leans into the term. Indeed, Black Christmas circa 2019 lives and breathes its #MeToo mindset, particularly in its story and characters. Here, a masked predator stalks women as the festive season swings into gear, specifically targeting sorority sisters at a stately university. There's a mounting body count, but these gals aren't merely a parade of powerless, disposable victims. It all starts with a setup that's familiar by design: a silent night, an empty street and a woman walking home alone. Hawthorne College student Linday's (Lucy Currey) pace quickens when her phone starts jingling with creepy messages from someone using the 200-year-old school's founder as an avatar — and, when a man pops up right behind her shortly afterwards, she even threads her keys through her fingers. This all happens in Black Christmas' opening reel, so it's no spoiler to say that she's soon making snow angels in a rather gruesome way. But the winter break carnage is just beginning, ramping up after MKE sorority members Kris (Aleyse Shannon), Marty (Lily Donoghue), Jesse (Brittany O'Grady) and the very reluctant Riley (Imogen Poots) attend a Christmas party held by fraternity DKO — and sing a traditional ditty that's been rephrased to call out campus sexual assault. In too many by-the-numbers horror films gone by, the way in which women are killed and the perpetrators behind their deaths are given more attention than most of the ladies themselves, but not in this new take on Black Christmas. From the moment that Takal introduces MKE's sisters, they're lively, interesting and sport distinctive, sometimes clashing personalities — especially when debating the best way to address the college's historic male leanings, such as petitioning for the inclusion of women authors on literature Professor Gelsen's (Cary Elwes) reading list. Kris is fearless about fighting for equality and empowerment, and about making as much noise as possible while doing so; however Riley has seen firsthand what speaking up can bring. Earlier in her studies, she was attacked by a DKO frat boy, but her assertion that she was raped fell on deaf ears. Accordingly, before these MKE ladies even twig to the psychopathic ho-ho-horror in their midst, Takal and co-writer April Wolfe fill Black Christmas with different renderings and facets of modern womanhood that are all highly relevant to the broader conversation today. The constant battle against societally entrenched misogyny, the quest to be seen as more than an object for male gratification, the fact that victims are routinely disbelieved — these notions all find a place among the film's multi-faceted key characters. Also pondered strongly and thoughtfully is the pain and terror of falling prey to shattering violence, then attempting to pick up the pieces afterwards, a struggle that Poots conveys with weight and substance in a textured and engaging performance. This is a movie that's keenly empathetic towards those usually treated like fodder by the savage and entitled, and Poots' Riley is far more than just a final girl. In a film that throws a hatchet through the idea that women constantly compete and squabble amongst themselves, too, she has plenty of company. Still, this is unashamedly a slasher movie. And while it's based on an ahead-of-its-time example of the genre — just forget the dire first 2006 remake with Mary Elizabeth Winstead, Katie Cassidy and Lacey Chabert — Black Christmas has tropes to play with and conventions to toy with. The mood is knowing and winking, with the film not quite venturing into Scream territory, yet clearly deploying well-worn elements on purpose and with a smile. So, when cliched lines of dialogue are shouted by various women in states of duress (including old favourites like "there's someone inside the house!"), this slick flick knows what it's doing. It knows that audiences might roll their eyes briefly as well, but reshaping the slasher formula to make a statement requires a hearty bout of nodding to all the genre's usual components. Admittedly, taking a few cues from forgettable 2000 horror film The Skulls doesn't prove the best move, but it's one of the picture's few mis-steps. Well-executed bumps and jumps, including inventive slasher scenes and creative use of Christmas decorations; a smart reworking of a classic with an incredibly timely message; fleshed-out female characters with flaws, complexities and agency played by a great cast — thanks to all of these, Black Christmas overflows with entertaining festive horrors. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gF4yRYbo1WE
Initiated by Sydney Institute students and presented by A Series of Fortunate Events, Bizarre Bazaar has a cult following of style-conscious Sydneysiders. The twilight fashion market reclaims a Sydney laneway (or, on colder occasions, an indoor space) on odd Thursday eves to showcase the quirky garments and new collections of numerous local designers. The next Bizarre Bazaar will be held in Angel Place as part of Art & About 2012. A vehicular influence will be on show with the addition of food from Eat Art Truck and a Guerilla Gigs-fuelled Little Napier performance also taking place on the back of a truck. Read our handpicked list of the 10 best things to see and do at Art & About here.
Sydneysiders can start plotting their swim sessions for summer 2020, with the announcement that work will begin next month on the city's biggest aquatic centre to be built since the 2000 Olympic Games. The City of Sydney has confirmed locally-based CPB Contractors will head up the construction of its new $84 million Gunyama Park Aquatic and Recreation Centre in Green Square, with plans for the development to open in just over two years. The design by Sydney architect Andrew Burges was chosen as part of a council-run design competition back in 2014. The centre looks set to be one very schmick operation, with a heated 50-metre outdoor pool inspired by Sydney's iconic ocean pools, as well as a heated indoor leisure water area, a hydrotherapy pool and a 25-metre indoor pool. There'll be a co-generation scheme supplying heating and power, a multipurpose sporting field, a gym and outdoor training area, while celebrated Aboriginal artist Jonathan Jones is lending his talents to a new public artwork for the site. Just be prepared to share — with a huge 61,000 residents expected to call the surrounding 278-hectare Green Square area home by the year 2030, Gunyama Park and Aquatic Centre sure won't be the most secluded spot to swim in Sydney. The Gunyama Park Aquatic and Recreation Centre will open on Joynton Avenue, Zetland in early 2020. We'll keep you updated on its progress. Image Credit: City of Sydney and Andrew Burges Architects with Grimshaw and TCL.
Like two peas in a pod, there’s no uncoupling art from wine. Alongside their respective solo shows during Art Month, artists and educators Bill Sampson and Christopher Orchard will be participating in 'Getting It! A fool-proof guide to understanding contemporary art forever, and why the relationship between art and wine was made in heaven'. Todd Slater of Five Ways Cellars will share the secrets of this happy marriage while Orchard and Sampson will provide an insider’s account of contemporary art. Luckily for you, the exhibition opening at Paddington’s Wagner Gallery includes the opportunity to sample some award-winning wine from Leeuwin Estate. This event is one of our top ten picks of Art Month. Check out the other nine here. Image: Bill Sampson, A Sunny Day twixt Heaven and Hell (detail), 230 x 170cm.
Into every generation, a slayer is born — and into What We Do in the Shadows, too. The TV series based on Jemaine Clement and Taika Waititi's 2014 vampire sharehouse mockumentary of the same name has spent two seasons so far pondering the dynamics of its Staten Island household; however, it has also slowly started to explore an existential threat to its bloodsucking protagonists: a vampire killer in their midst. That's where the US television show's third season promises to pick up, all while still mining its concept for as many laughs as possible. So, Nandor (Kayvan Novak, Four Lions), Laszlo (Matt Berry, Toast of London) and Nadja (Natasia Demetriou, Eurovision Song Contest: The Story of Fire Saga) once again navigate the usual undead housemate tussles, including with energy vampire Colin Robinson (Mark Proksch, The Office). And, they endeavour to live with the knowledge that Nandor's familiar Guillermo (Harvey Guillen, Werewolves Within) has a very particular family history. Also part of this upcoming season: power struggles within the key group of vampires, after they've ascended to the head of the Vampiric Council. Another promising batch of episodes in a fantastically funny horror-comedy sitcom will hopefully be the result — based on the just-dropped full trailer for the third season and an earlier teaser trailer, at least. When the original film hit cinemas, viewers instantly yearned for more, which this American spinoff has been delivering in just as smart, silly and hilarious a fashion as its big-screen predecessor. Thankfully, spending time in this supernatural realm isn't going to end any time soon, either — with US network FX, which screens the show in America, announcing that What We Do in the Shadows has been renewed for a fourth season before its third even airs. What We Do in the Shadows is the second TV series in this specific on-screen universe, after the New Zealand-made Wellington Paranormal — which follows the movie's cops (Mike Minogue and Karen O'Leary) as they keep investigating the supernatural. It proved a hit as well, and has already returned for both a second and third season. Back with the vamps, What We Do in the Shadows' new episodes are due to start streaming in Australia via Binge from Friday, September 3 — which is at the same time as the US. Check out the full season three trailer below: It's a game of...throne. Watch the official Season 3 trailer for #ShadowsFX, returning Thursday, Sept. 2nd on FX. Next Day #FXonHulu pic.twitter.com/cRRJLEXaLq — What We Do In The Shadows (@theshadowsfx) August 13, 2021 What We Do in the Shadows' third season starts streaming in Australia via Binge from Friday, September 3.
This time two years ago, across the weekends of April 28–30 and May 5–7, 2017, a new music festival was supposed to take place. Spearheaded by the now-incarcerated Billy McFarland, Fyre Festival was slated to take over a Bahamian island, treat attendees with luxury facilities, boast musicians such as Blink-182 and Major Lazer on the bill, and live up to its plethora of celebrity endorsements. Because model-filled viral marketing campaigns can prove to be just that — glossy marketing — we all know what came next. If you didn't read about Fyre Festival when it happened (or, to be more accurate, didn't), you probably discovered its shady tactics, wholesale lack of planning, emergency tent setup, paltry cheese sandwiches and all-round failure via Netflix's documentary Fyre: The Greatest Party That Never Happened, which dropped internationally on the streaming platform in January. Rival service Hulu also released their own take, Fyre Fraud, the very same week — but it hasn't been available to watch in Australia until now. Channel 7 has now aired Hulu's doco, and also made it available on its online service 7plus. Prepare to step back into a tale so astonishingly ridiculous that it can only be true, featuring everyone from Ja Rule to Bella Hadid to Emily Ratajkowski. If you're wondering about the difference between Fyre: The Greatest Party That Never Happened and Fyre Fraud, other than being made by competing streaming services (and by different filmmakers, obviously), that's understandable. They cover similar material, of course. Fyre was also co-produced by Jerry Media, who happen to be the social media agency responsible for promoting Fyre Festival, while Fyre Fraud paid conman McFarland to give a lengthy to-camera interview. Each film has its highlights and flaws; however if you just can't get enough of this trainwreck of an event, or want to keep pondering what it says about today's influencer and FOMO-saturated culture, you'll absolutely want to watch both. Check out the Fyre Fraud trailer below: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ljkaq_he-BU Fyre Fraud is now available to stream on 7plus.
Do you feel like each week flies past in an uncontrollable blur? Friday afternoon comes and you can't remember what you have achieved but you still somehow feel exhausted? If yes, then it's time for a change. Each day you can elevate your life by aiming for just one easy win — even small tweaks to your routine will help take your week up a notch. To help you out, we've teamed up with our mates at Coopers Dry to bring you a list of 'easy wins' — small things that will enrich your life without you needing to stage a full-scale overhaul. MONDAY: CLEAN OUT YOUR CLOSET Kick off the week with a closet cleanse and rid thyself of unnecessary clutter. If it no longer fits, you don't like it or it's in poor condition — donate or chuck it. Those jeans from when you were 19, yeah, they've got to go. Set aside a couple of hours — grab a beer, crank your favourite tunes, channel your inner Cersei Lannister and be merciless. Clearing out the unworn clothes from your wardrobe frees up physical and mental space that you didn't even know you needed. Take your haul to a charity shop to help out the community, reduce waste and give yourself some good karma. TUESDAY: SIP A SMOOTHIE IN THE SUN Forget eating lunch at your desk, at least for today. Instead, head to your local park, let the sun work its magic and get a nice dose of vitamin D. Catching some rays each day can help to clear up your skin and improve your mood — but do it safely, of course. Boost your nutrient intake and add a smoothie to the mix, you'll be smiling for the rest of the afternoon. WEDNESDAY: DISCUSS SOME LITERATURE WITH A FRIEND Tagging your mates in memes is fun, but why not discuss something a little deeper. The aim of the game is simple: both of you choose an article, read the respective pieces, then discuss over an after-work beer. It's like a two-member book club, minus the effort of getting through an entire novel. For inspiration, check out Alex Tizon's 'My Family's Slave' — which is about a Filipino-American family who kept a slave for 56 years — or Gay Talese's 'The Voyeur's Motel' — a creepy true story about a guy who buys a motel just so he can secretly watch his guests. Both are fascinating and somewhat divisive reads sure to generate conversation. THURSDAY: HIT UP A PUB TRIVIA NIGHT An easy win is bonding with your colleagues over a set activity with a built-in competitive element. The team that plays together stays together, and all that jazz. Just make sure you've got someone to cover each element — geography, film, music, history, current events and sport. Get the beer rounds flowing and test your collective smarts. On Thursdays in Sydney, head to the Botany View Hotel in Newtown for trivia with a cash prize. In Melbourne, make your way to The Penny Black for trivia in the beer garden, and in Brissie, you can catch beer garden trivia at The Wickham. [caption id="attachment_691868" align="alignnone" width="1920"] Lentil as Anything, Abbotsford.[/caption] FRIDAY: EAT FOR A GOOD CAUSE Cop a tasty feed and support charitable endeavours in the process — it's an easy win for altruism, and your taste buds. The not-for-profit vegan chain Lentil as Anything has four thriving stores in Melbourne and one in Sydney. The restaurants operate via a unique pay-as-you-feel model, with contributions going towards a number of education programs and social projects, as well as keeping the Lentils running. For those in Brisbane, sink your teeth into a slow-cooked beef shank or baked huevos rancheros at Hope Street Cafe. Hope Street employs people who have difficulty finding work and helps them to acquire new skills and gain hands-on experience. [caption id="attachment_659655" align="alignnone" width="1920"] Maroubra to Malabar, Sydney.[/caption] SATURDAY: GO FOR AN EARLY MORNING WALK Start the weekend in a wholesome manner with a brisk walk by the water's edge. No matter where the day takes you thereafter, you'll feel good. Honestly, it's just science — exercise releases endorphins, endorphins make you happy —the crisp ocean breeze and stunning views also help. Stroll along the river in Brisbane, check out the stunning headlands on the Maroubra to Malabar coastal track in Sydney or wander along the Yarra in Melbourne. While it's a little too early for beer, find your favourite spot along the track and return later for a few sundowners (provided alcohol is permitted, of course). [caption id="attachment_555015" align="alignnone" width="1280"] Fatto, Melbourne.[/caption] SUNDAY: ENJOY A LONG LUNCH WITH FRIENDS The Ancient Greek philosopher Epicurus spent his days pondering what made life worth living, eventually, he concluded that great food shared among even better friends resulted in a good life. We will happily cosign that. Enjoy an Epicurean moment of your own with a Mexican feast at SoCal Neutral Bay (Sydney), riverside modern Italian at Fatto Bar & Cantina (Melbourne) or head to the grassy courtyard of Lokal & Co for an indulgent Norwegian spread in West End (Brisbane). Daytime hangs are perfect for spring and summer when the weather is beautiful. Kick off your 'easy wins' by enjoying a Coopers Dry, or two, with your mates.
Since Iron Man first flew onto cinema screens back in 2008, the Marvel Cinematic Universe has banded its movies together in phases, with each group of films telling a particular part of the broader story. The initial phase ran through until the first Avengers movie, the second spanned Iron Man 3 to Ant-Man, and the third kicked off with Captain America: Civil War and ended with Spider-Man: Far From Home. Now, the fourth phase is upon us — and it includes TV shows as well. So far, you might've been watching WandaVision; however, it's about to have company on streaming platform Disney+. Once the Mouse House is done telling Wanda Maximoff/Scarlet Witch (Elizabeth Olsen) and Vision's (Paul Bettany) story (and nodding to classic sitcoms in the process), it's moving on to The Falcon and the Winter Soldier. Clearly, no one at Marvel and Disney+ has been taxing themselves while naming these series — so you instantly know who this one is about. Anthony Mackie and Sebastian Stan reprise the eponymous characters, with their characters teaming up and heading off on a global adventure. That tests their patience — as the initial sneak peek back in 2020 illustrated, and the just-dropped full trailer for the series now shows in more detail. The pair's exploits will span six episodes, and will bring back Daniel Brühl as Baron Zemo and Emily VanCamp as Sharon Carter. Wyatt Russell (The Good Lord Bird) will also join the MCU as John Walker. As for when you'll be able to see all of the above in action, the series starts streaming on Friday, March 19, just after WandaVision wraps up its nine-episode run. And yes, the MCU's fourth phase will include more TV shows — such as Loki, which hits in May; Secret Invasion, starring Samuel L Jackson as Nick Fury; and a series set in Wakanda. It'll kick off the film side of things with 2021 movies Black Widow, Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings and Eternals. Check out the new full trailer for The Falcon and the Winter Soldier below: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IWBsDaFWyTE The Falcon and the Winter Soldier will hit Disney+ on Friday, March 19. Top image: Chuck Zlotnick, ©Marvel Studios 2020. All Rights Reserved.
If you're anything like us, you're probably hard at work making a list of what to see at Vivid 2019. A word of advice, though: keep Wednesday nights free. Why? Because each hump day throughout the duration of the festival, the Art Gallery of New South Wales will keep its doors open late for a free evening of music, discussion and art. The first Art After Hours, on the evening of May 29, will explore spirituality and inner life in a conversation between Meshel Laurie and Benjamin Law before a musical tribute to the films of Spike Lee (a Vivid Ideas speaker this year). Week two will feature a talk from poet-rapper Omar Musa and artist Abdul Abdullah on expressing culture and identity in Australia, along with a striking performance from Okenyo, while week three will go back to the moon landing by reimagining songs from the cassette played during the moon landing. There'll be heaps to do each night, with free mindfulness sessions, drawing workshop and artist-led talks. They're also a good opportunity to catch the gallery's current exhibitions: The Archibald Prize, Duchamp and The National.
If you're chasing more of a thrill from nature, check out the white water kayaking along the surging rapids of the mighty Barrington River. Fed by the pristine, fresh waters that run from Barrington Tops, these rapids rush after periods of heavy rainfall, when the river swells to cover ground it ordinarily wouldn't. Kayaking and rafting tours are readily available, but are subject to rainfall prior, so keep an eye on the weather and get booking when the rain falls. If you want to sleep close to the water, there's camping available at Barrington Reserve. And if you're after something less thrilling, there are lots of spots for a calm dip or a riverside picnic. Image: John Spencer
There's nothing overtly amusing about Daniel Day-Lewis' performance in Phantom Thread. As '50s-era London dressmaker Reynolds Woodcock, he's tenacious in his attitude but delicate in his approach, inhabiting the demanding, obsessive and fastidious figure to absolute perfection. And yet, there's a joke behind his character that says much about this meticulous, mesmerising melodrama. In trying to find a name for the protagonist in their second big screen collaboration, Day-Lewis and There Will Be Blood writer-director Paul Thomas Anderson were simply trying to make each other chuckle. Mission: accomplished. Similarly, Phantom Thread isn't a film that drips with laugh-out-loud humour, but the comic origins of Woodcock's moniker — and their contrast with the movie's tense and refined air — really couldn't be more appropriate. Far removed from his last wander through the ups and downs of romance in Punch-Drunk Love, here Anderson plunges into the depths of a dark, difficult and devious love story. That said, given the story concerns a volatile couple who turn power plays and tussles for control into an intense form of foreplay, it's only fitting that he imbues proceedings with a sly, mischievous streak. When Woodcock first encounters Alma (Vicky Krieps) in a countryside restaurant, it seems a simple case of sophisticated man meets shy young woman; of opposites attracting in familiar circumstances. While he usually only has room in his life for his work, his no-nonsense sister Cyril (Lesley Manville) and his dead but never forgotten mother, Woodcock is drawn to the clumsy waitress, as she is to him. But it soon becomes clear that his designs on their relationship aren't the same as hers. Though he's fond of having a live-in muse, dress model and sometime lover, despite appearances she's not the type to meekly bend to his moody whims. With Cyril ever-present, the House of Woodcock soon starts to unravel — something that'd never happen to one of the high-end frocks his ceaselessly fusses over, obviously. Every textile metaphor you can think of applies to Phantom Thread. It's a film that's carefully woven from the fabric of human urges, teeming with hidden layers and positively bursting at the seams with emotional detail. It's also one made by the finest possible craftspeople, with Anderson and his three stars fashioning the cinematic equivalent of haute couture. In a role he says will be his last, three-time Oscar-winner Day-Lewis shows just why that's such utterly devastating news for audiences and the acting profession alike. Matching him immaculately are Krieps and Manville. Think of the former as the intricate beading that attracts the eye on an already breathtaking gown, and the latter as the painstaking stitching attentively holding everything together. As for Anderson, the filmmaker behind Boogie Nights, Magnolia and The Master sews another unique patch into his filmography. Making a movie about a perfectionist dressmaker, he's as exacting as Reynolds — and possesses the same eye for exquisite beauty in a film he shot on 35mm himself. Marvel at the way he infuses the household's breakfast routine with palpable tension over something as routine as buttering toast, and try to tear your gaze away from his stunningly framed images and the exceptional frocks within them. Even the ornate wallpaper manages to captivate. Anderson again finds his musical match in Radiohead's Jonny Greenwood, who provides the equally effective, darkly seductive score. Sensuous, evocative and completely entrancing, if the end result was a garment, you wouldn't want to take it off. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wCYB28iknIM
Among the wealth of new content that Netflix drops on viewers each and every year, Dead to Me proved one of the streamer's 2019 hits. Taking a few cues from 2018 film A Simple Favour, the show's ten-episode first season told the tale of two women who meet, become friends despite seemingly having very little in common, and help each other with their daily lives — then find themselves immersed in more than a little murky business. Now, the twisty dark comedy is returning for another season — and stars Christina Applegate and Linda Cardellini are back as well. The former once again plays a just-widowed woman trying to cope with losing her husband in a hit-and-run incident, while the latter pops up as a positive-thinking free spirit. It has been some time since they initially crossed paths at a grief counselling session, though, so this definite odd-couple situation has evolved to feature more secrets, lies and complications, as well as more than one murder cover-up. When the show's first season ended, it did so with a huge cliffhanger. As the just-dropped full trailer for Dead to Me's second season shows, this new batch of episodes will see Applegate's Jen Harding and Cardellini's Judy Hale dealing with the aftermath of that big event. And, it also reveals that fellow series co-star James Marsden is back — although you'll obviously have to wait for the new season to find out just what that means. Created by 2 Broke Girls writer Liz Feldman, the series marks Applegate's first lead TV role since 2011-12 sitcom Up All Night. For Cardellini, it's a return to Netflix after starring on the streaming platform's drama Bloodline — and she also featured in A Simple Favour, too. Check out the full trailer for Dead to Me's second season below: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HmU7ylnmn_M Dead to Me's second season hits Netflix on Friday, May 8. Images: Saeed Adyani / Netflix.
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.
They're taking to hobbits to Isengard at the Orpheum this November, with one movie marathon to rule them all. Round up the Fellowship, stock up on lembas bread for sustenance and hide your finest pipe-weed from the Southfarthing for one sitting of all three of Peter Jackson's beloved OG Tolkien film adaptations at the Hayden Orpheum. Kicking off with The Fellowship of the Ring and ending with The Return of the King, this cave troll of a marathon clocks in at 558 minutes, starting the journey at 11am and including two 30-minute meal breaks (breakfast and second breakfast, if you will). If you make it to the final handful of endings, you can pat yourself on the back and smash a ringwraith screech at the nearest Cremorne resident on your way home (note: do not actually screech at the residents). Tickets are the precious and come in at $25 for the whole ordeal.
Summer has returned to Chippendale's Old Clare Hotel. The luxury inner-city lodgings, which opened for business back in 2015, has a stylish interior and a lineup of food offerings so good they border on offensive. With A1 Canteen, Automata and Barzaari already in the building, we didn't really need another reason to want to pay it a visit. But then who are we to say no to a high altitude pool and bar? The Old Clare Rooftop Pool and Bar, located on the fourth floor of the boutique hotel, has just reopened to the public for the warmer months. Visitors can once again enjoy killer views of the city while lounging around on deckchairs in the sun, sipping refreshing cocktails and eating snacks prepared by Barzaari downstairs. Expect summer cocktails a plenty with the Pain-Killer ($21) — tequila, pineapple and maraschino, served in either a glass or an actual coconut — watermelon spritz ($19) and an extra-boozy rosé cocktail dubbed Rosey All Day ($18). All the classics will be available, too, as well as beers, spirits and G&Ts. Eastern Mediterranean-inspired snacks start with Sydney Rock oysters covered in colourful roe and harissa-spiked chicken wings served with pickled chilli, then move on to prawns with falafel and two pizza-style pita breads topped with the likes of chermoula, toum (a garlicky yoghurt), pickles and lountza (smoked pork). If you're famished, order the next-level bagel — filled with smoked brisket, pickles, iceberg and labneh — and a slice of sticky baklava served with a scoop of salted caramel ice cream. [caption id="attachment_706205" align="alignnone" width="1920"] Nikki To[/caption] The Old Clare will also use the rooftop space for group fitness sessions, which will be open to both hotel guests and the general public. The program has not yet been announced, but last time it included yoga, cardio boxing, circuit and personal training. We'll let you know as soon as it drops. The bad news for those wanting to take a sky-high dip is that you can only swim in the pool if you're a hotel guest. But maybe that means it's time to plan a staycation (or a night away for V-Day). The Old Clare Hotel can be found at 1 Kensington Street, Chippendale. The poolside bar is open from 3–9.30pm Wednesday and Thursday, and from midday–9.30pm Friday through Sunday. Images: Nikki To.
Whiplash is a film about a drummer, and it might just be the scariest thing you see all year. It's not Annabelle scary, as in paranormal pant-soiling scary, nor is it Silence of the Lambs scary, aka psychological pant-peeing. It's more disturbing, a sort of 'do whatever it takes', Talented Mr Ripley kind of film, chronicling the terrifying lengths people will go to in pursuit of a goal. It's a 'jazz thriller', really, and it's an exceptional, engrossing movie. Narrow in its focus, Whiplash concerns an ambitious young drummer named Andrew Neyman (Miles Teller), a first-year student at a prestigious New York music academy. When the school's premier conductor, Terence Fletcher (JK Simmons), invites him to join the marquee jazz ensemble, Neyman quickly finds himself embroiled in a gripping, exhausting, unsettling and even violent clash of egos driven by Fletcher's unyielding pursuit of excellence and Neyman's own determination to be the next musical great. Chairs are thrown, punches are thrown, and in any given practice session the trinity of 'blood, sweat and tears' becomes almost mandatory. The one small mercy for panic-stricken viewers who found The Exorcist to be an exercise in endurance rather than enjoyment was that the terror occurred predominantly within the confines of the bedroom. You knew when to be afraid, and in Whiplash that room is Fletcher's rehearsal space. What ought to be the epitome of cool is instead the Roman colosseum, with Fletcher its sitting Emperor. One of the bad ones. More Caligula than Caesar. He rules through fear and exploits his students' aspirations as a means of ensuring his own reputation remains one of excellence and achievement. A few minor roles notwithstanding (Paul Reiser has a nice turn as Neyman's softly spoken father), this is a movie focussed on the performances by Teller and Simmons, and they're both first rate. Teller spent hours on the kit every single day rehearsing for the role, and his percussive skills are as impressive as his acting ones. Both arrogance and insecurity bubble just beneath his character's surface, and his descent into physical and mental ruin is painfully believable. Opposite him, Simmons is a powerhouse of brute force and bravura; a fedora-wearing, baton-wielding drill-sergeant right out of Full Metal Jacket. He bullies, he abuses and he hurls bigoted slanders so often it's almost as though that's how he breathes. The explanation he offers is as unapologetic as it is simple: greatness only comes from being pushed beyond the comfort zone and penetrating the unknown. For a jazz movie there's surprisingly little of it, and while the final performance is nothing short of extraordinary, the lack of jam sessions and gigs feels at odds with Neyman's professed love of the art and his dogged pursuit of pre-eminence. The film's conclusion, too, is troubling, for while it delights on the musical front, conceptually it appears to reinforce what is plainly a flawed and dangerous approach to nurturing talent. Still, this a showcase of two outstanding performances and a clear standout in what has otherwise been a largely mediocre run of films in 2014. Must see. https://youtube.com/watch?v=8J6JH-R-TN0
Ever spent the day holed up in your 9-5 cubicle musing on the lack of creativity in your life? Wondering where you could go to just make and do? Feel like you don't really have an artistic bone in your body but would love to just give it a go? Well, have we got the safe family environment for you. Hyde Park. Sunday. September 18. 12pm. It is here that the very first World Fingerpainting Day will be held. And if the social media kids behind RepoSocial have their way it will be a global event with guerilla finger painters around the world taking to their civic parks and getting their hands dirty with all and sundry. As the press release states, 'the goal is to get the forty year old banker painting next to the four year old girl.' Sound dodgy? Yeah, parks already have that rep. Either way, it's this writer's cyncial and jaded view that probably needs a touch up from that great God Creativity and his spawn, Free and Open Thought and Inner Child. Australia is an incredibly over-regulated country and as such I think it is probably a good thing to take advantage of events such as these which don't necessitate OHS heavy handedness or rigid rights and wrongs. Be flexible. It is actually much easier to be cynical than not (as much a speech to myself as to you). So get your fingers warmed up, don your oldest t-shirt and get ready to get messy. With the kids. With the bankers. With the shop keepers. With your locals. It is your city, Sydneyites, get boundless.
Suffocating repression and blind religious fervour underscore an atmosphere of stomach-clenching dread, in the much-hyped arthouse horror flick that took last year's Sundance Film Festival by storm. The disquieting debut of writer-director Robert Eggers, The Witch unfolds on the very edge of civilisation, where puritanical devotion inevitably gives rise to the very evil it so desperately fears. The Witch isn't a horror film in the way that modern viewers may expect, with Eggers mostly steering clear of graphic violence and sudden scares. Yet while the film's gnawing brand of terror may not be particularly immediate, its lingering effects are also far less easily dispelled. The film takes place in New England in the early days of pilgrim settlement, and concerns the unfortunate affairs of a family of colonists who find themselves exiled from their community for an unspecified religious offence. Travelling into the wilderness, they establish a farm on the edge of an ominous forest, only for further misfortune to befall them when newborn baby Samuel mysteriously disappears. As winter creeps closer and hope stretches thin, suspicion is cast upon eldest daughter Thomasin (Anya Taylor-Joy), who the rest of the family fear may have made a sex pact with the devil. On a production level, The Witch is immaculate. Close attention to period detail – from the threadbare costumes and setting to the carefully researched era-specific dialogue – lends the narrative an authenticity that in turn makes its supernatural elements feel uncomfortably real. A muted colour palette, dominated by greys, off-whites and faded greens, seems to drive home just how grim the family's situation has become, while leaving little doubt in our minds that evil lurks just around the corner. Combine that with a nerve-jangling orchestral score, and it's clear Eggers wishes to unsettle you from the moment the film begins, and leave you feeling that way for many hours after the house lights come up. He's aided in that eerie ambition by the fine work of his cast. As the family patriarch William, Ralph Ineson embodies the world-weariness and internal conflict of a man who believes it's his duty to provide for his family, but whose pride prevents him from seeing that he is leading them to ruin. As his wife Katherine, Kate Dickie captures the calcified intensity of a woman from whom all pity has been driven. So hard has been her life that even her religious conviction is rooted in bitterness. But it is to 19-year-old Taylor-Joy that all eyes will be drawn, her pale, striking features and compelling performance speaking to the true source of the film's terrifying power. For while Eggers makes it clear that there is indeed a witch lurking in the shadows of the woods, her supernatural powers are far less frightening than the threats – both real and imagined – that lie within the four walls of the farmhouse. The true terror of The Witch is that our family might turn against us, for reasons that are entirely beyond our control. The mere fact that Thomasin is a young woman is enough to make her the subject of suspicion, as Eggers explores in no uncertain terms society's ongoing fear of female sexuality. Tellingly, the film's mesmerising final few moments depict exactly what such a society fears most: a woman unchecked by repression, with full control of her body, finally embracing her dark, seductive powers to the ruin of the world. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iQXmlf3Sefg
When trouble strikes, tragedy gets a catchphrase: "life goes on." You might hear it from well-meaning acquaintances, or even loved ones. As accurate as those words may be, however, the reality is far less simple. In the case of Lee Chandler (Casey Affleck) in Manchester by the Sea, pain and heartbreak become like a second skin, numbing him to the outside world. As he goes about his job as a Boston janitor he encounters complaints, advice and even awkward romantic advances, and yet he can barely bring himself to react. "You're rude, you're unfriendly, you don't say good morning," his boss tells him after a complaint is lodged. Lee remains unfazed. Manchester by the Sea tackles heavy subject matter as Lee is forced to return to his hometown and take custody of his teenage nephew (Lucas Hedges) after the death of the boy's father (Kyle Chandler). From this relatively simple dramatic premise, writer-director Kenneth Lonergan (Margaret) masterfully pieces together fragments of past trauma, present malaise and future uncertainty, delivering a complex portrait of a haunting but rarely acknowledged reality. Whether we've charted the same journey as Lee or endured ordeals of our own, most of us are broken in our own way. Surviving that pain, rather than fixing it, is perhaps all we can really ever hope to manage. Lonergan stresses this idea in a number of different ways. Stellar performances from Hedges and Michelle Williams (as Lee's ex-wife) seethe with inner turmoil. The snowy Massachusetts setting, meanwhile, provides further obstacles. And then there's the filmmaker's approach to filling in Lee's backstory, via flashbacks that slip into the main storyline so seamlessly that it takes a moment to realise that the timeline has changed. Of course, that's how everyday pain manifests itself. It coats life with an extra layer, even when things otherwise appear fine. It intrudes seemingly at random, even when you're not expecting bad memories and heartache to rear their ugly head. In an Oscar-nominated performance, Affleck broods, frowns and furrows his brow. Don't think he's just serving up his own version of Sad Affleck though. Here, despair runs much deeper than a bad interview about a superhero flick. Conveying the deep-seeded misery that can only come from years of suffering and regret, Affleck plays Lee with naturalistic agony of the festering variety, while also providing a glimpse at something more. An exploration of grief and loss, Manchester by the Sea is undeniably bleak. But don't be surprised by the movie's sense of humour, either. Laughter is a necessary cathartic device even in the darkest of situations, and here it makes the drama feel that much more real. Combined with the movie's commitment to laying bare inescapable inner struggles, and Lonergan's latest proves both devastatingly relatable and sincerely affecting. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gsVoD0pTge0
Another Mardi Gras institution Fair Day is the educative, daytime, community-focused, counterpart to the seductive glitz and glamour of The Parade. Come on down and join more than 80,000 people who converge on leafy Victoria Park for a giant LGBTIQ love-in. There’s always amazing food on offer, a multitude of wares from local community vendors for your perusal, and countless opportunities to engage with Sydney’s vibrant queer community. Whether you’re out-and-proud, questioning, or just an ally, there’s something for everyone with educative stalls, stellar entertainment on the mainstage, everyone's favourite Doggywood pet pageant and even an all-day dance tent. Think of Fair Day as a giant picnic in the park to celebrate all things queer. Now doesn’t that sound nice? Image: Ann-Marie Calilhanna.
If you're a fan of chicken wings, then you might already have July 29 marked in your calendar. It's your annual excuse to tuck into plenty of chook, because that's what National Chicken Wing Day is all about. At Rockpool Dining Group's various German-themed venues — aka Munich Brauhaus, The Bavarian and Beerhaus — you won't just find a whole heap of chicken, however. Wings will also be on special all day for just ten cents each. You can nab up to 20 at a time for just $2, although you will also need to buy a full-priced drink. If you fancy more than 20, that's fine — you'll just need to get more drinks, which we're sure no one will be complaining about. All wings come with buffalo sauce, but if you're keen on ramping up the heat, you can also take part in the Hot Wing Ghost Chilli Eating Challenge at Munich Brauhaus and The Bavarian. Those wings will be smothered in cayenne, habanero and ghost pepper, and if you can eat more than anyone else in a minute, you'll receive a $100 voucher. Ten-cent wings are available at all Sydney outposts of Munich Brauhaus, Beerhaus and the Bavarian.
Whether you're looking to catch up with the Oscar nominees, or just can't say no to the idea of cheap movie tickets, you might want to pay a visit to Palace Central over the Australia Day long weekend. That's because the 14-screen complex at Chippendale's Central Park centre will be offering $10 tickets to all its regular sessions for three days, from Saturday, January 26 to Monday, January 28. And all the big flicks are screening — from The Favourite, which picked up ten nominations, to A Star Is Born (eight), Bohemian Rhapsody (five) and Green Book (five). If you're really dedicated, you could almost ticket off all the nominees for Best Motion Picture in one weekend. The inner-city cinema will also be serving up limited-edition lamington choc tops (because, Australia) and extra-large glasses of wine to celebrate the additional day off work.
UPDATE, August 3, 2020: Mary Poppins Returns is available to stream via Disney+, Google Play, YouTube and iTunes. Floating in on the wind with her umbrella in hand, Mary Poppins is back — in a most delightful way. More than half a century since the magical nanny made the leap from page to screen, this lively, loving sequel explores a notion that's already fuelled seven books. Directed by Rob Marshall (Into the Woods) and scripted by David Magee (Life of Pi), Mary Poppins Returns asks: what if the seemingly prim-and-proper governess worked her wonders on the Banks children once more? The answer both does and doesn't play out as expected. Imaginative songs, animated flights of fantasy and a friendly labourer all feature, as does the Banks house on Cherry Tree Lane. Kids learning life lessons and to embrace their creativity are part and parcel of the film as well, and so is the warmest of moods. But, letting time pass in the story as it has in real life, Mary Poppins Returns introduces adult versions of the tykes that Poppins once cared for. They need her help yet again, and so does the next generation snapping at their heels. Struggling to make ends meet during the Great Depression, widower Michael Banks (Ben Whishaw) is about to lose the family home. He's behind in the mortgage and, despite working for the bank as his late father did before him, the financial institution's president (Colin Firth) won't offer an extension. Michael's only option is to find proof that he own shares, with his sister Jane (Emily Mortimer) and his children Anabel (Pixie Davies), John (Nathanael Saleh) and Georgie (Joel Dawson) all doing their part in the search. Enter Poppins (Emily Blunt), as radiant and no-nonsense as ever – except when she's the source of the nonsense. If that idea seems like a conundrum, the nanny explains the predicament herself in one of the movie's catchy musical numbers. Reviving not only a long-beloved character, but one engrained in the youth of multiple generations, is far from an easy task. Thank the heavens that Poppins descends from for Blunt. Fresh from putting in a powerhouse performance in the virtually dialogue-free horror flick A Quiet Place, she charms and captivates stepping into Julie Andrews' shoes. Always entrancing, it's the kind of singing and dancing showcase that audiences mightn't have realised that the English actor could deliver. Whether she's schooling and being silly with the Banks poppets, or leading them into adventures with kindly lamplighter Jack (Lin-Manuel Miranda) by her side, Blunt fits the part perfectly. More than that — she practically perfects the film's infectious air of fun in every way. While a spoonful of sugar isn't needed to make the movie go down a treat, it comes in the form of Marshall's love and care. The filmmaker's output can be hit and miss, with Chicago falling into the first category and Into the Woods the second, but Mary Poppins Returns is a winning effort. There's a juggling act at the picture's core, as the movie endeavours to pay homage to its popular predecessor without becoming a mere rehash. In a playful and well-judged manner, Marshall finds the necessary balance. His film deploys elements of the original — reflecting, reshaping, inverting, referencing — and yet it flies high as a kite on much more than nostalgia. Among the few elements that don't soar, nothing threatens to send the picture tumbling. The slight story feels like it could be whisked away by a breeze, but it's aided by the frequent diversions into song and dance. Rarely at her best in music-heavy scenarios (as the Mamma Mia! movies have shown), Meryl Streep is forgettable as the magical nanny's cousin, however her part is brief. And even when the film falters momentarily, Mary Poppins Returns has quite the distraction up its sleeves. From the eye-catching costuming to the colourful sets to the gorgeous animation, the movie serves up a visual wonderland. First Paddington, then Winnie the Pooh and now Mary Poppins, British treasures just keep coming back to the screen. But when they're this enjoyable, they're more than welcome. We're sure Poppins herself would approve of that sentiment. Among her many life lessons: realising when to relish what's in front of you. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hMe7hUb3TpI
It's been more than two decades since Baz Luhrmann's Romeo + Juliet changed the game when it came to screen adaptations of Shakespeare — and delivered a stunning soundtrack along with it. There are many things that make the 1996 movie great, from its stellar casting to the filmmaker's inimitable style. But tracks by everyone from The Cardigans to Radiohead to Everclear to Garbage rank right up there with its biggests strengths. It's no wonder, then, that Vivid Sydney is throwing quite the soiree to celebrate one of the best-ever collections of movie tunes. At Young Hearts Run Free, the Enmore will become a rock masquerade, with patrons dressing up, dancing the night away, and listening to live performances of the entire soundtrack. And as for the lineup, it's suitably epic — with Quindon Tarver, the original choir boy from the film, belting out his 'When Doves Cry' cover. He'll be joined by Tom Dickins, Ella Hooper, Jonathan Boulet, Abby Dobson, Hayley Mary, iOTA, Jordan Raskopolous, Billie Rose, Cash Savage, Laura Imbruglia, Andy Golledge, Jake Stone and Bad Bitch Choir.
Viennese electronic producer and ambient guitar wunderkind Fennesz is back in Sydney for the first time in over ten years. For those of you who aren’t already connoisseurs of underground electronica, Fennesz — the eponymous nom de guerre of Christian Fennesz — is a pioneer of genre-bending electronic music. Armed with only a guitar and a computer, he creates shimmering, swirling compositions that, while transcendent, remain firmly rooted in a natural sonic world. The inherent naturalism of Fennesz’s work may initially seem at odds with his chosen media, however it's a testament to his preternatural talent that this marriage of the natural and the electronic is at once organic and utterly engrossing. As the Rochester City Newspaper put it: “imagine the electric guitar severed from cliché and all of its physical limitations, shaping a bold new musical language". Fennesz is playing in Sydney for one night only at Carriageworks, and will be joined onstage by his ongoing collaborator, visualist Lillevan. American electronic music icon Keith Fullerton Whitman, whose epic soundscapes are similarly inventive and experimental, will precede the duo with a synthesizer set. This sumptuous audiovisual feast is not to be missed. [embed]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h-F5Bt4A-Aw[/embed] Image: Maria Ziegelboeck
If your end-of-month plans included a trip to the Gold Coast to see Travis Scott, Logic, Chvrches and Carly Rae Jepsen, then we have bad news: Sandtunes, the new festival with all three leading the lineup, has been cancelled. The event has endured a tumultuous run since it was first announced in July, when it was billed as a two-day seaside music fest at Coolangatta Beach. In September, "after listening to responses from the local community", organisers moved the festival to the definitely not-by-the-shore Metricon Stadium. But it seems that patrons weren't impressed with the change of venue, even when ticket prices were slashed to help reignite interest. As the event notes, "without sand between our punters' toes, the very notion of the beachside festival in a stadium meant low sales". As a result, the debut fest won't be going ahead — on its scheduled dates of Saturday, November 30 and Sunday, December 1, or at all. https://www.facebook.com/SandTunesFestival/photos/a.352133325459956/410100329663255/?type=3&__xts__%5B0%5D=68.ARApmpGdy5jXx8Xi-9m6RCcZxSnRhY1fQxz9d-ZUZpM7EGPBFrtO1wf-gOYL8tJ0qZ-nxEwmhqno3z-rlZM-1sSPnoKyC5l7CHaq6J3pSmrLQJIrBQeGrziAYhbHJ5qYUVDLaE9HMU8sR6BvffsvLOyKj-cqCrTvjyqnZ0tgaCJJGEe_A9cL_17b23XlTQ3vUg5ZYjn2tqg7MInBAQmSmgVc84QzoHWNgXd7QloG2ER7vWs4JS7GH35iCwI9kS34Fj6jcSGwONORmWpmiUJbF3zmmzzTifplLQWUUoq4rAk-chmpA1emaWuC3FsBe-MsT0GUvOHyEE1oq0wZH3r3dGU&__tn__=-R That also means that the fest's plans not just to run this year, but to become an annual part of southeast Queensland's event calendar, have fallen by the wayside. "This whole concept started with bringing a great music festival to the beach which we see happening the world over in major locations like Spain (Barcelona Beach Festival) and Alabama (Hangout Music Festival). I'm disappointed because I believed this could have grown year-on-year into something really big but unfortunately, we weren't even able to get it off the ground here," said Paul Dainty, president and CEO of promoters TEG Dainty. While it's hardly surprising that the change of location away from the beach dampened music fans' enthusiasm, Sandtunes' timing in general wasn't fantastic, with the fest's dates overlapping with part of Schoolies. The rest of event's lineup was also slated to feature Juice WRLD, Dean Lewis, Sampa the Great, Tkay Maidza, Cub Sport, Kait, Kwame, WAAX, Kian, Alice Ivy, Genesis Owusu and Saint Lane. For folks keen to see Scott, it's especially unwelcome news — Sandtunes would've been the Texas-born rapper's only Australian performance this year. It seems that Carly Rae Jepsen's Aussie tour will still go head, just not in Queensland, with tickets for her Sydney and Melbourne shows still on sale at the time of writing. As for Logic, Sydney and Melbourne ticket sales have "been postponed while we work through some tour logistics", although co-presenter Triple J reports that his visit won't be going head. Sandtunes ticketholders who purchased by credit or debit card will receive refunds automatically within ten working days, while those who purchased in an agency will be contacted by phone with a fortnight to make refund arrangements. For more information about Sandtunes' cancellation, visit the festival website.
UPDATE, December 17, 2022: White Noise screens in Australian cinemas from Thursday, December 8, and streams via Netflix from Friday, December 30. We're all dying. We're all shopping. We're all prattling relentlessly about our days and routines, and about big ideas and tiny specifics as well. As we cycle through this list over and over, again and again, rinsing and repeating, we're also all clinging to whatever distracts us from our ever-looming demise, our mortality hovering like a black billowing cloud. In White Noise, all of the above is a constant. For the film's second of three chapters, a dark swarm in the sky is literal, too. Adapted from Don DeLillo's 1985 novel of the same name — a book thought unfilmable for the best part of four decades — by Marriage Story writer/director Noah Baumbach, this bold, playful survey of existential malaise via middle-class suburbia and academia overflows with life, death, consumerism and the cacophony of chaos echoing through our every living moment. Oh, and there's a glorious supermarket dance number as one helluva finale, because why not? "All plots move deathward" protagonist Jack Gladney (Adam Driver, House of Gucci) contends, one of his words of wisdom in the 'Hitler studies' course he's taught for 16 years at College-on-the-Hill. Yes, that early declaration signals the feature's biggest point of fascination — knowing that eternal rest awaits us all, that is — as does White Noise's car crash-filled very first frames. In the latter, Jack's colleague Murray Siskind (Don Cheadle, No Sudden Move) holds court, addressing students about the meaning of and catharsis found in on-screen accidents, plunging into their use of violence and catastrophe as entertainment, and showing clips. In the aforementioned mid-section of the movie, when White Noise turns into a disaster flick thanks to a tanker truck colliding with a train — because its driver was distracted, fittingly — you can bet that Murray's insights and concepts bubble up again. Before there's a tangible calamity blowing in, life is still mayhem, as Baumbach stresses in White Noise's opening third. The professors natter all at once, with Jack and Murray even joining forces for a rapturous session on Hitler and Elvis Presley's commonalities — Baz Luhrmann's Elvis, this isn't — that's one of the film's tour-de-force scenes. Chatter awaits at home, too, where Jack's fourth wife Babette (Greta Gerwig, 20th Century Women) sports important corkscrew hair and mothers a blended brood spanning his kids Heinrich (Sam Nivola, With/In) and Steffie (May Nivola, The Pursuit of Love), her daughter Denise (Raffey Cassidy, Vox Lux), and their shared boy Wilder (debutants Henry and Dean Moore). Recalling Steven Spielberg's fondness for small towns and family dynamics, White Noise is both cosy and intricate in its everyday details (and oh-so-80s). The fact that everyone is always spouting and blasting something, again all at once, speaks volumes; little here, be it good, bad, sudden or expected, can be escaped. Baumbach keeps close to his source material, so much so that DeLillo's voice lingers in the dialogue; however, the director is no stranger to perceptively unpacking intimate bonds himself. Indeed, each one of his features across more than a quarter-century so far — including breakout flick The Squid and the Whale, quarter-life-crisis gem Frances Ha, the similarly arrested development-centric While We're Young, coming-of-age caper Mistress America and the adult sibling-focused The Meyerowitz Stories (New and Selected) — has done just that. Only White Noise boasts "The Airborne Toxic Event", though, which tests its characters and relationships through apocalyptic horror, a frantic evacuation, and detouring ambitiously and hilariously into madcap National Lampoon's Vacation-esque territory. That ominous feathery plume makes the fear of death physical, as scary movies have for a century-plus. And, it makes it unavoidable, no matter how much the film's motley crew would rather divert their attention anywhere else. Also, it briefly turns it comical in a 'what else are you going to do but laugh?' manner. How does humanity, en masse and individually, trick ourselves into forgetting that our time alive is finite, fleeting, fickle and fragile — and that it could fade to black at any second? White Noise is that question in anxious filmic form with a satirical and savage bite. Accordingly, Murray waxes lyrical about grabbing groceries, and also about being someone who either kills or dies, while Jack and the teenage Denise start noticing the usually perky Babette's secret pill-popping. The Gladneys' patriarch and matriarch already proclaim how they couldn't live without each other as bedroom talk, but they're really ruminating on what it'll mean when they simply can't live. Buying and medicating your way away from that train of thought, and ignoring warnings and doctors, are all firmly in the movie's sardonically scathing sights. So is seeing how danger, terror and death inevitably bring people together — and, although set in the 80s, working with a novel penned in the 80s, the striking pandemic-era parallels sting (masks, conspiracy theories and all). In Baumbach's hands, White Noise is anything but unadaptable, but it is jam-packed. The themes, ideas, emotions, neuroses and tones flow as fast as all the talk — itself overflowing with big-thinking yet also screwball dialogue with a zippy rhythm — and then there's the always colour-saturated production design and costuming, the hypnotic choreography of bodies and vehicles, and the dream cast. Both Driver and Gerwig have already shown their sublime talents under Baumbach's guidance before, and both perfect the crucial-but-rare skill of conveying a world of character minutiae via their presence. Driver's size instantly makes him tower over the Gladneys' mania, just not as much as that black cloud, and soar over his college discussions. Gerwig, missed on-screen for six years while directing Lady Bird, Little Women and the upcoming (and Baumbach co-written) Barbie, is the face of soldiering on until you aren't or can't — equally warmly and heartbreakingly so. Impressive turns by Cassidy and Sam Nivola as the eldest two of the precocious children stand out, too, and Jodie Turner-Smith (After Yang), André 3000 (High Life) and Lars Eidinger (Irma Vep) also make an imprint in small appearances. Again, there's a lot to White Noise. Again, that's all by design, stems from the page, happily comes with built-in lurches and veers, and a hefty part of the point. (Life is a lot, death is a lot and confronting is a lot, after all.) As Danny Elfman's (Wednesday) score adapts nimbly to the many changes in mood, and cinematographer Lol Crawley (The Humans) helps make everything a spectacle, bearing life's transience keeps proving wildly careening, spiralling, amusing and entertaining. And when the closing credits roll, fancy footwork breaking out to LCD Soundsystem's 'New Body Rhumba' in an infectiously engaging display, a clear message has beamed in through the static: everything in life, like in supermarkets, has an expiration date, but knowing that fact means enjoying what you have while you have it. Top image: Wilson Webb/NETFLIX © 2022.
A visit to the north coast of NSW would not be complete without experiencing the striking underwater world that exists off the coast of Brunswick Heads. Julian Rocks is widely recognised as one of the region's premier dive sites, with the craggy outcrop providing several moorings that make reaching this location a relatively straightforward affair. There are suitable spots here for divers of all experience levels, meaning just about anyone can explore the surrounding waters frequented by manta rays, leopard sharks, and yes, the occasional great white, too. While this subtropical oasis certainly isn't for the faint-hearted, diving at one of Australia's top scuba locations will give you plenty of stories to tell. Head to Blue Bay Divers to book your trip now. Image: Sebastian Pena Lambarri, Unsplash
Everybody loves a luau, and everybody loves a rooftop party. So, on February 1, the Young Centenary Foundation have put together a genius combo of the two to kickoff the fundraising year. Featuring bright young Sydney-based DJ ROOF, the party in the sky will feature tasty treats from Brasserie Bread and Haverick Meats and delicious drinks from Tsingtao, Kopparberg and a slew of other sponsors, and it all goes to a good cause. The Young Centenary Foundation is a youth-focused organisation that raises awareness of and funds for research into diseases like cancer, cardiovascular conditions and others affecting our world. They’ve had massive success with events bringing in the coolest cats in town in their droves, like last year’s Low Rollers Party. Tickets will include food and booze, as well access to some sweet prizes from places like Yulli’s and Golden Age Cinema, so that should be all the reason you need to get down on a rooftop whilst helping out a charity.
Don't think about it too much. Hold your air guitar with pride and belt out 'Livin' on a Prayer' like you were born in the 80s. This power ballad party is throwing it back to cocktails at noon, boxy pinstripe suits and cans of hairspray longer than your forearm. There'll be epic singalongs to Toto's 'Africa', Journey's 'Don't Stop Belivin'' and Whitney Houston's 'I Wanna Dance with Somebody (Who Loves Me)'. Don't cringe — it'll be fun. The December 21 party takes place at the Metro, where the space will be filled with closeted Aerosmith fans and out-and-proud Queen tragics. Expect emotions to run as high as Houston's top notes — and Bon Jovi's best to be blasted maximum volume. Ultimate Power is a UK/Ireland export and the nostalgic night has been rocking rooms since 2006. They've even wooed Glastonbury's crowds, so you're in for a festival-tested treat.
When Lou Reed's Metal Machine Trio played Vivid LIVE 2010, half the audience walked out within a half hour. For the Velvet Underground fans in the house, a “Night of Deep Noise" didn’t quite cut it, and with clearly no chance of hearing 'Heroin' or 'I'm Waiting for That Man', it simply wasn't worth hanging around for. It was a harsh reminder, for some, that our favourite artists do change with time, even if our playlists don’t — whether it be a change in musical direction, lifestyle or simply faded talent. Which is why, when Vivid LIVE announced The Cure on this year’s bill, I was suspicious. Having seen Robert Smith and co. at a festival in Spain in 2005 play only music from a recent and rather obscure new-direction album, I presumed the worst. It wasn’t that they were bad, it’s just that they weren’t my The Cure, the band that seduced me with 'Closer' and '10:15 Saturday Night', The Cure that I, and the thousands of Spanish fans screaming “Curé! Curé!” had anticipated. Thankfully all fears were obliterated with an announcement that the band will play 'Reflections' — a 180min (yes three hours) programme of music from their first three albums including punk-rock inspired The Imaginary Boys (1979), their second, darker album Seventeen Seconds (1980) and thoroughly gloomy gothic-rock album Faith (1981). Even better, each album will be performed by its original members including Robert Smith, Simon Gallup and Jason Cooper. Which means you'll hear 'Fire in Cairo', 'Boy’s Don’t Cry', 'A Forest' and 'Faith', all within the walls of the brilliant Concert Hall. There's probably no chance of hearing later upbeat mainstream hit 'Friday I’m in Love' but that wouldn't make for pure early Cure torment and gloom would it? Tickets go on sale on May 12th . One worth setting your alarms for!
Accidentally hit 'reply all' in that email your boss really shouldn't have seen? We understand. The good news is that Concrete Playground may just have an opportunity for you to earn some extra office brownie points. CP and the fine-dining chefs turned mobile restauranteurs at Eat Art Truck are giving you the chance to win an exclusive food truck lunch for you and 10 of your workmates. Marrying the joys of scrummy dude food with street art, Eat Art Truck is usually found filling the bellies of city workers and night revellers at some of their regular haunts like Queen's Square, Customs House and Barangaroo. And now, for one lunch only, chefs Stuart McGill (last seen at Tetsuya's) and Brenton Balicki (formerly of Quay) will bring their custom truck directly to you. The truck is restricted to specific trading locations, however if you work in the CBD you could be tucking in to a smoky pulled pork bun with mustard cabbage or BBQ beef bun instead of that soggy sanga. We know, we know - time is money as they say, but that's no biggie for the truckies, as CP's Jessica Keath found out, Stu and Brenton aim for a five minute turn around for each order they whip up, and they'll be by your side by 12 noon. To be in the running to win lunch for you and 10 friends: Subscribe to Concrete Playground (if you haven't already)Make sure you work within 5km of the Sydney CBD and have access to private parking (i.e. company carpark or forecourt) or are nearby one of Sydney's approved food truck locationsEmail your name and office location, plus details of private parking available for the truck, to hello@concreteplayground.com.au Don't work in the city? Forward it to a friend that does and get them to enter for you, or hop on Eat Art Truck's Facebook page and beg them to add your suburb to their lunch beat.
Kids these days. What will they think of next? To find out, be sure to check out ARTEXPRESS at the AGNSW this month, showcasing the most outstanding works created by the 2014 year 12 cohort for the HSC. This is an exhibition that never ceases to amaze, and also to incite inferiority complexes in everyone over the age of 18. From traditional painting, drawing and sculpture to photomedia, textiles and time-based forms, this is an annual favourite for all ages and remains open until April 19. Image: Alexia Psaltis, Hunter School of the Performing Arts, SUBSUMED.
There's never been a shortage of reasons to adore Better Call Saul. It's one of the best shows of the past decade, it's a rare spinoff that's as exceptional as the series it hails from — and, frequently it's even better — and its lets Breaking Bad fans spend even more time with Saul Goodman (Bob Odenkirk, Nobody) and Mike Ehrmantrout (Jonathan Banks, The Commuter), for starters. It also boasts the phenomenal Rhea Seehorn (Veep) as Saul/Jimmy McGill's girlfriend, never makes an obvious move even though we all know what's coming for its titular character, and continually proves television's greatest tragedy for the same reason. After a two-year break, Better Call Saul will finally return this month to start its sixth and final season — and, from the trailer, it's set to keep ticking all of the above boxes. That said, it is about to do something viewers knew would have to happen one day: bringing Walter White (Bryan Cranston, Your Honor) and Jesse Pinkman (Aaron Paul, Westworld) into the story. Better Call Saul showrunner and executive producer Peter Gould confirmed the news at a panel session held at PaleyFest LA, saying "I don't want to spoil things for the audience, but I will say the first question we had when we started the show was, 'are we gonna see Walt and Jesse on the show?' Instead of evading, I'll just say yeah." He continued: "how or the circumstances or anything, you'll just have to discover that for yourself, but I have to say that's one of many things that I think you'll discover this season." Of course, it's worth remembering Mike's words in the season six trailer right now: "whatever happens next, it's not gonna go down the way you think it is," he utters in his inimitable gravelly voice towards the end of this first sneak peek at the new season. So, while we all know now that the thing the show was always heading towards will occur, trust in this outstanding series — and in creator Vince Gilligan — to still deliver oh-so-many surprises. The same is bound to prove true of Jimmy-slash-Saul breaking bad and embracing his "s'all good, man" new persona as a criminal lawyer (and not just because he represents criminals) in Better Call Saul's final season. Again, that doesn't mean that we know exactly how the season will play out. The sixth season will arrive in two parts — with the first seven episodes airing from Tuesday, April 19 in Australia, and the final six arriving from Tuesday, July 12. We'll also see more of post-Breaking Bad Saul's story, where he's known as Gene. Best break out the cinnamon scrolls, obviously, amid all that Pinkman-inspired cheering about science and magnets. Check out the Better Call Saul season six trailer below: Better Call Saul's sixth season starts streaming in Australia via Stan and New Zealand via Neon from Tuesday, April 19. Images: Greg Lewis/AMC/Sony Pictures Television.
South Korean cinema has been thrust into the global spotlight in a big way over the past year, all thanks to the enormous success of Bong Joon-ho's Cannes Film Festival Palme d'Or-winning, Sydney Film Festival prize-winning and four-time Oscar-winning film Parasite. Of course, the country has been serving up stellar cinema for decades, which is great news for movie buffs — who can either revisit excellent flicks such as the 1960 standout The Housemaid, the Park Chan-wook-directed likes of Oldboy, Thirst and The Handmaiden, and even Bong's own hefty back catalogue; or watch all of the above and more for the first time. Add Yeon Sang-ho's instant classic Train to Busan to the list, too. First hitting screens back in 2016, the frenetic zombie-filled thrill ride became an instant classic, following a father (Gong Yoo) and daughter (Kim Su-an) forced to fend off the shuffling hordes while in mid-transit. Not only did the movie flesh out its protagonists more than most undead flicks manage, but it also painted a probing picture of modern-day South Korean society. And, it's part of a franchise, with fellow 2016 release Seoul Station exploring another aspect of the outbreak in an animated prequel. Now, as promised for years, a sequel to Train to Busan is coming to screens — set four years after the first film. While just when it'll hit theatres hasn't been announced (which is completely understandable given that cinemas around the world are currently shuttered), the action-packed first teaser trailer for Train to Busan presents: Peninsula has just dropped for cinephiles looking for more pandemic-based viewing options. This time around, former soldier Jung-seok (Gang Dong-won) is in the spotlight. With the Korean peninsula devastated by the outbreak, he has escaped overseas — but is given a secret mission to return to retrieve an object. Because that's the way these kinds of tales go, his trip back home throws up plenty of expected zombies, unexpected survivors and grim fights for survival in an abandoned, post-apocalyptic world. That said, with Yeon returning as the film's writer and director, it's unlikely that Peninsula is going to follow an easy formula. Check out the trailer below — and if you need to catch up with Train to Busan, it's available to stream on Netflix. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yVucSRLLeIM&feature=emb_logo Train to Busan presents: Peninsula doesn't yet have a release date — we'll update you when one is announced. Images: Well Go USA Entertainment
After a huge success at its Sydney debut last year, Beer Fest is returning in 2019 to help you ease your way into the first weekend of summer. The festival is set to descend on Centennial Parklands on Saturday, November 30 and Sunday, December 1, in a heady blaze of music, comedy, food and, of course, beer. For this year's Sydney event, BeerFest will round up over 40 artisanal breweries and deliver hundreds of craft drops, all alongside a stack of great ciders, cocktails and wines. You'll kick off the season with tastings, food and beer matchings, and free, brewer-led masterclasses showcasing one-off creations. While the brewer list is yet to be announced, last year's event featured Sydney's Young Henrys and Sauce Brewing Co, ACT's BentSpoke, Melbourne's Edge Brewing Project and WA's Colonial Brewing. What's more, this little shindig also packs a serious punch in the entertainment department — and while it's yet to drop the full bill there as well, Art vs Science will be headlining the whole thing. They'll also team up with Burnley Brewing and CryerMalt to create their own one-off beer, which you'll obviously be able to drink at the festival. There'll be plenty of laughs to be had, too, with the BeerFest Sydney comedy stage also set to return. Tickets go on sale on Tuesday, August 6, with entry to the festival ranging between $20–50.
When the final season of Game of Thrones aired, it earned its fair share of detractors. So, around a million people hopped online and signed a petition asking for the show's last batch of episodes to be remade. That might seem like a silly and implausible reaction but, when it happened in 2019, that kind of fan outcry wasn't new. Just a couple of years earlier, DC Comics aficionados had tried to get Rotten Tomatoes shut down when the reviews for Suicide Squad weren't as positive as the'd like — or positive at all. They're just two examples of fan responses to either beloved properties going awry in their eyes, or not getting the treatment they think they deserve — and of entitlement-driven campaigns asking for those supposed misdeeds to be corrected or punished. Another big instance over the past few years involves fellow DC Extended Universe flick Justice League, which wasn't well-received when it first hit cinemas back in 2017, and deservedly so. The superhero team-up movie definitely isn't the best entry in its franchise. It was also plagued by struggles before it reached the screen, including the replacement of director Zack Snyder with Joss Whedon during post-production. Accordingly, there's been an online push for Snyder's version of the movie to be released — and, because that's the kind of world we live in, it's actually happening. The director also filmed new footage for what's now being called Zack Snyder's Justice League, and the four-hour end product is dropping in March. In the US, HBO Max will be streaming the film; however, given that the service isn't available Down Under, just how Australian viewers would get their chance to see the flick hadn't yet been revealed. Until now, that is, with Aussie streaming platform Binge announcing that it'll add Zack Snyder's Justice League to its catalogue at the same time that it drops in America. Whether you actually liked the original and are keen to see what's changed, you completely hated it and you've been eager for a new version, or you're just bemused and/or bewildered by the fact that the Snyder Cut — as it has long been called online — has actually come to fruition after years of internet pleading, you can head to Binge from 6pm AEDT on Thursday, March 18 to check it out. Following on from the events of 2016's Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice — including how that film ended for Superman (Henry Cavill, ) — Zack Snyder's Justice League sees Bruce Wayne (Ben Affleck) join forces with Diana Prince (Gal Gadot) to band together DC Comics' superheroes to stop a potentially world-ending threat. As well as Batman and Wonder Woman, Aquaman (Jason Momoa), Cyborg (Ray Fisher) and The Flash (Ezra Miller) all make an appearance, teaming up to try to save the planet from a trio of villains. And, as the trailer shows, Jared Leto's version of the Joker also pops up. Check out the trailer for Zack Snyder's Justice League below: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1r_EQ_8JPyU&feature=youtu.be Zack Snyder's Justice League will be available to stream via Binge from 6pm AEDT on Thursday, March 18.
For those of us who don't remember what photography looked like before the selfie, the Art Gallery of NSW is giving us a reminder in the most beautiful of ways. The gallery's newest exhibition, the brainchild of senior curator of photographs Judy Annear, turns the camera lens back onto itself to explore how photography, as a medium, has shaped and influenced the identity of Australia. The Photograph and Australia will be the biggest exhibition of Australian photography seen in 25 years, showcasing more than 400 photos taken by more than 120 artists around the country and dating back to the 1840s. Work by big wigs Morton Allport, Richard Daintree and Olive Cotton (just to name a few) will sit side by side with the photos of lesser known artists as well as cool pieces of photographic history such as domestic albums and some of Australia's earliest X-rays. From daguerreotypes to digital, this exhibition explores the evolution of photography and the development of a nation with a beautiful collection that celebrates them both. It's like the picture book of Australian history we never saw.
New Years's Eve is approaching and there's no better place to be than in Sydney, arguably one of the most beautiful New Year's Eve celebrations in the world. Scarborough Wine Co. will serve over 13,000 glasses of its Hunter Valley wines, including the signature Yellow Label Chardonnay, to Sydneysiders at the prestigious Lord Mayor’s Party at Sydney Opera House, Barangaroo and the Dawes Point VIP Viewing Area. Want to sip on one of the 13,000 glasses that will be poured? Well, you can. Luckily, the Scarborough Wine Co. are giving you and three friends the chance to win tickets to Sydney's home grown celebration, watching the fireworks at Dawes Point (a million dollar view). To enter into the competition simply tell them in 50 words or less about your most memorable home grown (or local) New Year's Eve celebration, here. Don't spend another New Year's Eve half-asleep on your couch. Make your New Year's resolution early, make plans, and join the famous celebrations. As the Official Wine Sponsor of City of Sydney 2012 New Year's Eve, Scarborough Wines Co. is urging everyone to go local, supporting local businesses and the talent that is right in front of you. From December 1-31, you can post your pledge on the Scarborough Wine Co. Facebook page, and show how you will help our local talent come 2013. Not forgetting those who are holding celebrations at home, Scarborough Wine Co. has also put together Home Grown Cellar-bration packs of their wines so people can celebrate at home with great local wines: Home grown Celebration Starter Six pack for $125 Home grown Dozen of Delights Twelve Pack for $300
Whoever said bouncy castles were just for kids clearly never encountered The Monster. Clocking in at 270-metres and boasting 30 different obstacles, this thing takes the title of the world's largest inflatable obstacle course. Oh, and it's just casually coming to Melbourne next month, as part of its own three-day 18+ festival of fun. Taking over the Grand Pavilion at Melbourne Showgrounds across the Australia Day long weekend, The Monster is the bouncy castle experience of your wildest kidult dreams. Punters are invited to run, jump, dance and scramble their way through the course, with sessions running from noon–10pm each day. It'll likely take you somewhere between five and 20 minutes to complete, depending on speed, coordination and how indulgent your festive season was. What's more, the fun extends beyond the final bounce, with the festival also pulling together a program of DJs, street food vendors and pop-up bars to see you sticking around long into the night. Melbourne's just the first stop on The Monster's soon-to-launch Aussie tour, with organisers TEG Life Like Touring expected to announce more cities next year. The Monster arrives in Melbourne from January 26–28, with access to the obstacle course from 12–10pm daily. Tickets are $39.90 and available from Monday, December 18. You can buy tickets at themonster.com.au.
Praise be, Handmaid's Tale fans. The series' third season is due to hit the small screen in June, and the first proper trailer has arrived. Blessed be not only the fruit but the sneak peek, obviously. Revolution looks set to sweep the fictional society of Gilead in the two-minute-long clip, which follows on from the teaser released in February during the Superbowl. That fiery preview told us that it's time to wake up, and it looks like that's exactly what's happening when we rejoin this dystopian world, its creepy and oppressive way of life, and the chaotic existence of Offred/June (Elisabeth Moss) and her fellow subjugated women. Of course, meaty details about the third season are as scarce as a happy woman in red — but expect to spot Yvonne Strahovski's Serena Joy, Joseph Fiennes' Fred Waterford, Ann Dowd's Aunt Lydia, Max Minghella's Nick and new series regular Bradley Whitford as Commander Lawrence, as well as plenty of handmaids. Given how the second season wrapped up, expect the story to get even darker, too. The 13-episode series will hit soon, airing on SBS and becoming available to stream on SBS On Demand at 8.30pm on Thursday, June 6, then continuing weekly. Lucky for us Down Under, this is the same time as it'll be dropping on Hulu in the States, so hopefully no spoilers will crop up. And, there's plenty more Handmaid's Tale bleakness to enjoy this year (well, not that enjoy is necessarily the right term). Margaret Atwood, author of the original 1985 novel that started it all, is releasing a long-awaited sequel. Called The Testaments, it'll hit bookshelves comes September. Check out the new Handmaid's Tale season three trailer below — under his eye: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ig3h2JdQDI0 The Handmaid's Tale's third season will screen on SBS and SBS On Demand in Australia, airing weekly from 8.30pm on Thursday, June 6.
When you're a mask-wearing superhero, you've made an active choice. Everyone's favourite friendly neighbourhood Spider-Man wanted to keep his web-slinging identity a secret, for instance, which is why he started covering up his face long before the entire world began doing the same during the pandemic. But, in Spider-Man: Far From Home, that decision was taken out of Peter Parker's hands — leaving the Tom Holland (Chaos Walking)-starring, Marvel Cinematic Universe version of the character exposed to the world. Set to arrive two-and-a-half years after that big — and literal — revelation, Spider-Man: No Way Home will pick up with Parker struggling to deal with the fact that everyone now knows who he is, and that he can't now just be an ordinary high schooler when he's not acting the hero. So, as the just-dropped first trailer for the new film shows, he calls in some help. Cue Doctor Strange (Benedict Cumberbatch, The Courier), a time- and space-twisting spell, and the beginnings of some multiverse chaos. Wong (Benedict Wong, Nine Days) is also on-hand to warn against messing with the status quo, but obviously if that advice was followed, the movie wouldn't have a plot. Two important things to remember: one, the MCU will keep spinning its interconnected web forever (or so it seems); and two, in March 2022, a little film called Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness is set to drop. It's the next movie in the franchise after No Way Home hits on Boxing Day Down Under, in fact, so expect the two to link closely together. Also popping up in the No Way Home trailer: Zendaya (Space Jam: A New Legacy), Marisa Tomei (The King of Staten Island) and Jacob Batalon (Let It Snow). Behind the lens, Jon Watts returns after previously helming both Spider-Man: Homecoming and Spider-Man: Far From Home as well. And, there's another familiar face that'll make you think not just about this current iteration of Spidey, but also of past versions that've graced the big screen over the years — because that's what tinkering with the multiverse is all about. No Way Home isn't as likely to get as playful as the phenomenal animated Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse, though, if that's what's just popped into your head. In a nice piece of symmetry, when Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness does hit cinemas next year, it'll be directed by Sam Raimi — who also directed the Tobey Maguire-starring Spider-Man movies in 2002, 2003 and 2007. Check out the No Way Home trailer below: Spider-Man: No Way Home opens in Australian cinemas on December 26.
