Of all the country-specific film festivals that reach Sydney's big screens each year, the British Film Festival might have the weakest reason to exist. Rather than showcasing flicks from a particular part of the world that viewers probably won't get the chance to see in cinemas otherwise, it screens a number of movies that are destined for a bigger release — and a heap of films with very well-known stars, too. But if you want to spend a few weeks immersed in the latest and greatest that UK cinema has to offer, all at once, it's definitely the event for you. And, in 2020 as it does every year, it features a jam-packed lineup. Hitting Palace Norton Street, Palace Verona, Chauvel Cinemas and Palace Central from Tuesday, November 10–Sunday, November 29, this year's BFF boasts one of the most anticipated movies of 2020: Ammonite, the Kate Winslet and Saoirse Ronan-starring romance set in 1840s England, as directed by God's Own Country's Frances Lee. The tender tale only premiered overseas in September, so it's coming to Australia rather quickly — and yes, it's already garnering awards buzz. From the 22-film lineup, other highlights include Misbehaviour, in which Keira Knightley helps recreate the true story of feminist protesters at the 1970 Miss World competition in London; thriller The Nest, with Jude Law playing a British entrepreneur who moves his American family to an English country manor; and Summerland, a World War II-set romantic drama led by Gemma Arterton. There's also opening night's Blithe Spirit, based on the Noël Coward's comedy and starring Dan Stevens, Isla Fisher, Judi Dench and Leslie Mann — plus folk-horror thriller Fanny Lye Deliver'd, about a woman in 17th-century Shropshire whose unhappy marriage gets a shake up by a younger couple on the run. The British Film Festival also looks back at British greats gone by, so expect to check out 80s sci-fi flick Flash Gordon, and watch Sir Alec Guinness and Peter Sellers in The Ladykillers for its 65th anniversary. Something extra special: a 40th anniversary screening of David Lynch's The Elephant Man, which earned him the first of his three Oscar nominations for Best Director, and is a movie that everyone genuinely needs to see at least once. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cp3WjuJJYB8
Until 2020 hit, heading to a trivia night usually involved sitting in your favourite watering hole, sipping a few drinks and answering questions while a pub rock soundtrack played in the background. This year, however, that ritual has had a makeover — but in Isolation Trivia's latest online quiz night, those pub rock tunes remain. If you have a head full of otherwise pointless tidbits about the kinds of tunes usually blasted in pubs and bars around town, then this is a live-streamed trivia evening for you. Pub Rock Virtual Trivia is being held in collaboration with the current Pub Rock exhibition at the National Portrait Gallery, so get ready to show just how much you know about everyone from AC/DC and Jimmy Barnes to Midnight Oil and Paul Kelly. If you're wondering how it works, you'll join the event from your couch, jot down your answers at home and everyone can compare scores virtually — and battle for trivia supremacy. Pub Rock Virtual Trivia takes place on from 7pm ADST Thursday, October 8. To play along, head to the event's Facebook page. And if you need some inspiration, this video just might help: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oLBfdyJ3cpw Pub Rock Virtual Trivia takes place online from 7pm ADST on Thursday, October 8. Top image: Not On Your Rider.
Germany has a museum dedicated to dachshunds. New York has a similar kind of site, but celebrating all kinds of canines. And, in Sydney, we have the Woof Art Prize — the annual award for paintings, drawings and sculptures of those barking four-legged cuties that have long been considered humanity's best friend. Firstly, art- and pooch-loving folks submit their pieces, which, in 2020, were judged by artist Harrie Fasher. Next comes the free exhibition of said pupper-centric works — aka the fun part for everyone else — which is currently on display at Art Est in Leichhardt until Monday, October 12. More than 80 works are presently available to view, so get ready to peer art doggo-focused masterpieces of all shapes and sizes. We're assuming that none of them feature dogs playing poker, but you will see portraits of rescue dogs, pictures of dogs watching TV, contemplative pupper paintings and just a whole heap of adorable canine faces covering the venue's walls. And, yes, you can take your dog along to take a look. The Woof Art Prize 2020 is on display until Monday, October 12 at Art Est, 4/67-69 Lords Road, Leichhardt.
Talented pooches have been barking their way to big screen stardom since the birth of the medium, and Cannes Film Festival even gives out awards for ace pupper performances. Now, Australia has a dog-themed cinema showcase. At the Top Dog Film Festival, doggos and puppers cement their status as humanity's favourite movie stars in a touring program of pooch-centric shorts. For more than two hours, dogs will leap across screens in a curated selection of heartwarming flicks about humanity's best friend. Over the last few years, the lineup has included films about dog-powered sports, dogs in space, dogs hiking through the desert, senior dogs and more. The festival hits Sydney's Ritz Cinemas in Randwick on Sunday, October 18 and the Hayden Orpheum Picture Palace on Sunday, November 1 as part of its 2020 run, and rushing after tickets the way your best four-legged friend rushes after a frisbee is recommended. Given how much we all love watching dog videos online, not to mention attending pupper-centric shindigs in general, this one-night-only event is certain to be popular. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1wkw03cngo4&feature=emb_logo Top Dog Film Festival takes place at the Ritz Cinemas in Randwick on Sunday, October 18 and the Hayden Orpheum Picture Palace on Sunday, November 1.
Staying motivated to keep crushing your exercise goals can be a challenge at the best of times, let alone in the middle of a pandemic. To provide a little incentive for all those runners out there, Lululemon is hosting a virtual version of its annual Seawheeze run. With both a half marathon (21.1 kilometres) and ten kilometre available, the digital races can be completed anywhere you like. On a treadmill? Yep. By doing ten laps of your one-kilometre block? Sure can. How about 500 laps of your 20-metre balcony? Whatever floats your boat. The races just need to be recorded in a single activity on the Strava app (which you can download for free) between Saturday, August 15 and Sunday, August 23. It costs $28USD to sign up (about $36AUD and $43NZD), which includes a training plan by Lululemon Global Ambassador Rob Watson, a digital badge for your Strava trophy case, an IRL finisher medal and a $2USD donation to Vinyasa Yoga for Youth and Red Clay Yoga. Of course, depending on where you are in the world, there may be some other restrictions you need to abide by while completing the challenge. If you're in metropolitan Melbourne, you can only leave your house for exercise once a day for up to an hour — and you can only venture up to five kilometres from your house. When choosing your distance, keep in mind that the world record for the half, set by Geoffrey Kamworor late last year, is 58.01.
The spookiest time of the year is here, which means different things to different people. Perhaps you think you're never too old to don a costume and go trick-or-treating. Maybe you just like the excuse to eat plenty of lollies. Or, you could enjoy diving headfirst into as much horror viewing as you can manage. For folks in the latter category — and those who like dressing up, too — the Georges River Council is hosting the type of event you'll want to add to your calendar. Across the evenings of Friday, October 30 and Saturday, October 31, it's celebrating Halloween by setting up its own Frightful 80s Drive-In Cinema, which'll be free to attend at Donnelly Park in Connells Point. Even better — rather than just screening horror flicks, which pretty much every cinema around town will be doing, this pop-up drive-in is showing the entire first season of Stranger Things. Prepare to revisit the Upside Down and learn all about demogorgons. If you want to bring some waffles with you to eat, well, Eleven would clearly approve. Entry opens at 5pm each night, with screenings running from 7–10pm. There are no bookings or tickets, so arriving early to nab a spot is recommended. Also, if you deck out your car in a costume — yes, you read that correctly — and you can win a prize for the best-dressed vehicle. Clearly, given what's showing, someone is going to cover their ride with Christmas lights. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b9EkMc79ZSU Top image: Elder.
Whether it's via a post or tweet or message, in a comment or status update, thanks to a Notes app screenshot or in an email, mean words aren't hard to share two decades into the 21st century. Click a few buttons, slide your finger across a touchscreen, then vitriol can be directed virtually instantaneously worldwide. Countless people — too many, all sticklers for unpleasantness — do just that. Such behaviour has almost become a reflex. A century ago, however, spewing nastiness by text required far more effort. Someone had to put ink to paper, commit their hatred to physical form in their own handwriting, tuck it into an envelope, pay for postage, then await the mail service to deliver their malice. Wicked Little Letters isn't an ode to that dedication, but there's no avoiding that sending offensive missives in its 1920s setting was a concerted, determined act — and also that no one could claim just seconds later that they were hacked. Times change, and technology with it, but people don't: that's another way of looking at this British dramedy, which is indeed based on a true tale. Director Thea Sharrock (The One and Only Ivan) and screenwriter Jonny Sweet (Gap Year) know that there's a quaintness about the chapter of history that they're bringing to the screen, but not to the attitudes behind the incident. In Sussex by the sea on the English Channel, spiteful dispatches scandalised a town, with the situation dubbed "the Littlehampton libels". Today, much worse than the swearing and insults initially sent to Edith Swan, then to other villagers as well, can be seen on social media constantly. Someone can fire off unhinged pettiness in seconds. No one in another 100 years will be making a movie about wicked little letters of the 2020s, then — where would they start, or end? Right now, in this flick about disagreeable and distressing communications, contrasting the reality of the human penchant for mud-slinging across a century springs from a well-told story. In Wicked Little Letters' account of the Littlehampton events, Edith (Olivia Colman, Wonka) keeps receiving notes that overuse vulgar terms, and the God-fearing, prim-and-proper spinster, who lives with her strict father (Timothy Spall, The Heist Before Christmas) and dutiful mother (Gemma Jones, Emily), is certain that she knows the source of her unwanted mail. Living next door, Rose Gooding (Jessie Buckley, Fingernails) is an Irish single mother to Nancy (Alisha Weir, Roald Dahl's Matilda the Musical), has Bill (Malachi Kirby, My Name Is Leon) as her live-in boyfriend, and is fond of a drink at the pub and of sharing her opinion. The two neighbours are as chalk and cheese as women of the time could get, but were once friendly. When Edith blames Rose, the latter's pleas that she's innocent — and that she'd just tell the former her grievances to her face, not send them anonymously — fall on deaf ears among most of the resident police. The reaction from the constabulary isn't astonishing. Papperwick (Hugh Skinner, The Witcher) and his chief Spedding (Paul Chahidi, Chad) think that it's an open-and-shut case, arrogantly and pompously so. Initially, "woman police officer" (as her colleagues insist on calling her) Gladys Moss (Anjana Vasan, Black Mirror) shares the same conclusion. But when your very presence as the first female cop is treated as a novelty day in and day out at work, it isn't a leap to spot how preconceived prejudice dictates the use of the law — sparking Gladys into investigating whether there's more afoot, going against Spedding's orders, but with a trio of local women (Saltburn's Lolly Adefope, Boat Story's Joanna Scanlan and Doc Martin's Eileen Atkins) assisting. As Wicked Little Letters spins a whodunnit around its expletive-filled correspondence and lapses in accepted propriety — albeit one with low stakes, given that the culprit is largely obvious regardless of whether you know the real-life details going in — it does so with top-notch casting. Watching any Colman-starring film means seeing one of Britain's best actors put on a show, as everything from The Favourite to The Father attests. Here, it also involves witnessing a layered portrayal, not that that's unusual for the Oscar-winner. Edith is the picture of Catholic piety, but yearns for constant approval (being called a "pretty young Christian woman" gets her beaming with pride) after spending her entire existence under her abusive father's thumb. Envy also clearly courses through her veins towards the former acquaintance that she's sending to jail. Enjoying Colman's turn also means revelling in her ability to sling profanities when the narrative calls for it ("piss" and "foxy-arsed" are high among the scribe's terms of choice). Buckley, also as always, is as spirited as she is earthy — and expertly balances Rose's bold forthrightness with her inner vulnerability as the village witch-hunt keeps pointing its pitchforks Rose's way (primarily for daring to be unmarried, a mother, cohabiting with a man, known to curse and nothing but her irrepressible self). She's having as much of a ball as Colman with her part, in just-as-stellar a performance. The dynamic between Edith and Rose spells out the narrow-minded societal mindset about women at the time, including how such judgements and expectations were internalised, but neither Buckley nor Colman are stuck playing mere symbols or subversions of regressive attitudes. Also excellent is Vasan, in a role that's no less crucial, conveying a process that is never as easy to experience as it is to witness: realising how flawed the status quo is, how your existence has been shaped by it (female police officers weren't even permitted to marry or have children), then challenging it no matter the consequences. As shot with the warm hues typical of period-set English fare by cinematographer Ben Davis (The Banshees of Inisherin), this poison-pen story doesn't send much that's surprising to the screen — as a mystery, a satire, a bundle of character studies, a cop and courtroom drama, or a portrait of the era that it depicts. It also leans heavily on its strong language being entertaining. But Sharrock, comedian Sweet and their cast have such a handle on the scenario, its amusing potential, and everything that this true-crime tale says about the 1920s, 2020s and humanity's worst impulses regardless of the year, that it always works. When Colman and Buckley last appeared in the same movie, The Lost Daughter had them playing the same person; getting them sharing a frame, and swearing in it, is also worth watching.
They don't call it movie magic for nothing, as plenty of Hollywood's leading lights have made it their mission to stress. A filmmaker's work should ideally make that statement anyway — seeing any picture and taking any trip to the pictures should, not that either always occurs — but overt odes to cinema still flicker with frequency. Across little more than 12 months, Kenneth Branagh's Belfast has featured a scene where his on-screen childhood alter ego basks in the silver screen's glow, and Damien Chazelle's Babylon made celebrating Hollywood and everything behind it one of its main functions. With The Fabelmans, Steven Spielberg revisited his formative years, following the makings of a movie-obsessed kid who'd become a movie-making titan. Now 1917, Skyfall, Spectre and American Beauty director Sam Mendes adds his own take with Empire of Light, as also steeped in his own youth. A teenager in the 70s and 80s, Mendes now jumps back to 1980 and 1981. His physical destination: the coastal town of Margate in Kent, where the Dreamland Cinema has stood for exactly 100 years in 2023. In Empire of Light, the gorgeous art deco structure has been rechristened The Empire. It's a place where celluloid dreams such as The Blues Brothers, Stir Crazy, Raging Bull and Being There entertain the masses, and where a small staff under the overbearing Donald Ellis (Colin Firth, Operation Mincemeat) all have different relationships with their own hopes and wishes. As projectionist Norman, Toby Jones (The Wonder) is Mendes' mouthpiece, waxing lyrical about the transporting effect of images running at 24 frames per second and treasuring his work sharing that experience. Empire of Light is that heavy handed, and in a multitude of ways. But duty manager Hilary (Olivia Colman, Heartstopper) and new employee Stephen's (Micheal Ward, Small Axe) stories are thankfully far more complicated than simply adoring cinema. Actually, despite spending her days slinging £1.50 tickets and popcorn, Hilary has never seen a movie at The Empire. That might seem unlikely, but it's a crucial and thoughtful character detail. Navigating a journey with her mental health, her conscientiousness at work helps her to keep busy away from her lonely apartment. Having spent a lifetime thinking little of herself, she doesn't for a moment contemplate enjoying what her workplace sells (the fact that it's where she's being taken advantage of sexually by Donald also leeches joy from her view of the place). Accordingly, she has a stronger affinity for the venue's empty third and fourth screens, both of which have been shuttered — plus the upstairs bar that services them — and allowed to fall into pigeon-filled disrepair. When Empire of Light begins, Hilary has recently returned from a hospital stint, too, and the lithium her doctor has prescribed since is stifling. Watching someone go through the motions in a place that's all about motion, possibility, and shiny visions of other lives and realms paints a powerful portrait, with Mendes — who writes his first-ever solo feature script in addition to directing — crafting a keen character study layered with symbolism. Welcomely, when Stephen arrives to break up The Empire's routine, he's never merely a catalyst in another's tale or an emblem of Britain's struggles with race. Empire of Light takes the time to chart his path as well, including the discrimination he faces walking down the street; his devotion to his single mum, Trinidadian nurse Delia (Tanya Moodie, The Man Who Fell to Earth); and his growing romance with Hilary. Stephen's story is a coming-of-age story, all about finding himself in and through a space where audiences flock to find everything imaginable. So too is Hilary's, of course. That said, it's easy to see how Stephen could've just been a device, helping to keep the plot turning and Hilary's tale progressing, if someone other than Ward had taken on the part. His is a rich, sincere and soulful performance, playing a young Black man with the clearest of eyes as he surveys a hostile Thatcher-era England, yet remaining kind and caring — to people and injured birds alike — and perennially optimistic. Holding one's own against Colman is no mean feat; this film's own light largely beams from the pair. Whether they're sharing a frame or taking centre stage alone, they're always a key force drawing viewers in, no matter how forceful Mendes is with his cinema-conquers-all message (and how adamantly the score by Bones and All's Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross is telling the audience what to feel). What a stunning portrayal Colman delivers beside Ward; Hilary was written specifically for her, unsurprisingly, and plays that way at all times. Saying that the Oscar- and Emmy-winner — for The Favourite and The Crown, respectively — is phenomenal in any role is like saying that popcorn is salty, but it doesn't make it any less true (as her recent work in Landscapers, The Lost Daughter and The Father also demonstrates). Deep-seated sorrow and heartbreak lingers in Hilary in Empire of Light, and not just because the screenplay says it must. The talented actor is a marvel at not only opening up a character's inner tussles and emotions in her gaze and stance, but making them feel hauntingly real, which Mendes makes exceptional use of. It's no wonder that the movie peers at her face often — a face that makes its own case for movie magic whether it's staring intently at Hilary's latest cinema task, revelling in Stephen's company or breaking down at The Empire's big moment: the glitzy regional premiere of Chariots of Fire. Alongside Colman and Ward, the man responsible for Empire of Light's gaze — and lighting it — is the feature's other immense and essential asset. Just like the film's two key actors, Roger Deakins' impact is so pivotal that this'd be a completely different movie sans his input. Earning the picture's only Academy Award nomination — his 16th, fresh from consecutive wins for Blade Runner 2049 and 1917 — he ensures that every shot speaks volumes about The Empire and the people who consider it a type of home. Sometimes, he achieves that by mirroring the big screen's frame, finding other frames to place around the picture's characters where possible, and stressing that everyone's tale is worth telling. Sometimes, too, he actively seeks out reflections, nodding to how cinema interacts with the world around it while also literally showing multiple sides of a character at once. That's movie magic alright, and Empire of Light is at its best when it lets its craft demonstrate cinema's glory itself.
As the latest venture from hospitality heavyweight Andrew McConnell (Cumulus Inc, Supernormal, Marion), elegant bar and bistro Gimlet has been causing quite the splash down in its hometown of Melbourne. And come Sunday, April 18, Sydneysiders are being invited in on some of that magic, as the venue's cocktail bar heads north for a one-night appearance at Icebergs Bar. Across two 90-minute sittings (6–7.30pm and 8–9.30pm), guests will score an all-encompassing taste of Gimlet via a menu of snacks and signature sips — all courtesy of McConnell, Head Chef Allan Doert Eccles and Bar Manager Cameron Parish. You'll find yourself tucking into sophisticated bites like the rock oysters done with seaweed butter and rye, fried cheese morsels, and dainty yellowfin tuna sandwiches with pickled rock samphire and salted onion. Meanwhile, in the drinks corner, expect the likes of a mai tai reworked with green almond and macadamia, and a riff on the gimlet (of course) featuring moscato and Geraldton wax. To nab a spot on the night, you'll need to book one of the limited tickets for $60. It's a pay-as-you-go affair, so that $60 will be taken off your evening's final bill. [caption id="attachment_806769" align="alignnone" width="1920"] Gimlet's signature Gimlet by Jo McGann[/caption]
In the hustle and bustle of Sydney, a good cold brew is like liquid gold — or at least it can be priced that way. A cold brew in the CBD can set you back anywhere up to $7. And, even if you're constantly on the lookout for a good caffeine fix, that won't always fit into the budget. Luckily, coffee roaster Industry Beans is celebrating the second birthday of its York Street store with a special deal. This Friday, March 19 and Saturday, March 20, Industry Beans is offering up its famed cold brew for just $2. All you need to do is download the Industry Beans app, then head down to York Street and order a cold brew via the app. Plus, when you do download the app, you're given $5 to spend on your next purchase. You can head down before work on Friday — or, if you have a big night planned to start the weekend, set a reminder for yourself Saturday morning. That's when an ice-cold coffee might just be what you need to bring yourself back to life.
Sydney Opera House's UnWrapped festival is returning with a dynamic season of new works from independent artists. Ranging from First Nations cabaret to Iranian-influenced jazz, the May program features six attention-grabbing performances, including Sky Blue Mythic — the latest full-length work by acclaimed choreographer and dancer Angela Goh. The award-winning performer is considered to be one of the country's most daring artists, creating boundary-pushing work that captivates and entertains. You can witness Goh's otherworldly choreography come to life in Sky Blue Mythic — which interrogates the space between the familiar and the alien. It'll be performed to a live soundtrack by accompanying producer Corin Ileto, too. Catch Sky Blue Mythic from Wednesday, May 26–Saturday, May 29. For more information — and to book — head to the Sydney Opera House website.
When Murder on the Orient Express became a big box office hit back in 2017, it wasn't the first time that the Agatha Christie novel had reached the silver screen. That honour goes to the 1974 movie of the same name, which starred Albert Finney as Hercule Poirot, and featured everyone from Sean Connery and Lauren Bacall to Vanessa Redgrave and Ingrid Bergman. And if you're keen to explore its whodunnit thrills, you can at Dendy Newtown's new Murder Mysteries Film Festival. From, Thursday, March 18–Wednesday, March 31, this six-title fest is all about sleuthing through blasts from the past. Before the next new Poirot flick, Death on the Nile, reaches cinemas — hopefully at some point this year — you can see the 1978 version with Peter Ustinov, Angela Lansbury, Mia Farrow and Maggie Smith, too. Also on the bill: Humphrey Bogart-starring classic The Maltese Falcon, Orson Welles in The Third Man and the aristocratic dramas of Kind Hearts and Coronets. There's also Alfred Hitchcock's masterpiece North by Northwest, which everyone needs to see at least once on the big screen. Like all of Dendy Newtown's festivals, different movies screen on different dates — and multiple times — so checking out the session listing is the best way to schedule your viewing. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ek7T9Gyl_J4
Call it the SNL effect: in two of their past three films, Julie Cohen and Betsy West have celebrated pioneering women who've been parodied on Saturday Night Live. They've referenced those famous skits in RBG and now Julia, in fact, including their subjects' reactions; Ruth Bader Ginsburg was seen howling with laughter when she first saw Kate McKinnon slip into her robes, and Julia Child reportedly played Dan Aykroyd's blood-soaked 1978 impersonation to friends at parties. Cohen and West clearly aren't basing their documentaries on their own sketch-comedy viewing, though. Instead, they've been eagerly unpacking exactly why a US Supreme Court Justice and a French cuisine-loving TV chef made such a strong impact, and not only in their own fields. Julia makes an exceptional companion piece with the Oscar-nominated RBG, unsurprisingly; call it a great doco double helping. Julia arrives nearly two decades after its namesake's passing, and 12 years since Meryl Streep earned an Oscar nomination for mimicking Julia in Julie & Julia. If you've seen the latter but still wondered why Julie Powell (played by The Woman in the Window's Amy Adams) was so determined to work her way through Julia's most famous cookbook — first published in 1961, Mastering the Art of French Cooking completely changed America's perception of printed recipe collections — let this easy-to-consume doco fill in the gaps when it comes to the culinary wiz's mastery and achievements. Let it spark two instinctual, inescapable and overwhelming reactions, too: hunger, due to all the clips of Julia cooking and other lingering shots of food; and inspiration, because wanting to whip up the same dishes afterwards is equally understandable. In their second film of 2021 — after My Name Is Pauli Murray, another portrait of a woman thoroughly deserving the spotlight — Cohen and West take a chronological approach to Julia's life. The two filmmakers like borrowing cues from their subjects, so here they go with a classic recipe that's been given slight tweaks, but always appreciates that magic can be made if you pair a tried-and-tested formula with outstanding technique. Julia's entire cooking career, including her leap to television in her 50s, stirred up the same idea. Her take on French dining was all about making delectable meals by sticking to the right steps, even while using supermarket-variety ingredients, after all. Julia boasts a delightful serving of archival footage, as well as lingering new food porn-esque sequences that double as how-tos (as deliciously lensed by cinematographer and fellow RBG alum Claudia Raschke), but it still embodies the same ethos. Born to a well-off Pasadena family in 1912, Julia's early relationship with food is painted as functional: the household's cooks prepared the meals, and wanting to step into the kitchen herself was hardly a dream. In pre-World War II America, the expectation was that she'd simply marry and become a housewife, however, but a hunger for more out of life first took her to the Office of Strategic Services — the US organisation that gave way to the CIA — and overseas postings. While stationed in the Far East, she met State Department official Paul Child. After a berth in China, he was sent to France, where the acclaimed Cordon Bleu culinary school eventually beckoned for Julia. From there, she started her own cooking classes in Paris, co-penned the book that made her famous, turned a TV interview into a pitch for her own show and became an icon. There's more to each ingredient in Julia, of course, and to the dish that is its towering central figure (alongside her two siblings, Julia measured over six feet tall, causing their mother to joke that she'd given birth to 18 feet of children). This is an affectionate film that's as light and fluffy in tone as a souffle, but it still packs its menu with the bio-doc equivalent of a full meal. The use of text from Julia and Paul's letters — both to and about each other — seasons its collage of photographs and cooking show snippets with personality. Weaving in sensual shots of cooking in action speaks to the depth of the Childs' marriage, too; in Paris, she'd fashion him up a lavish lunch followed by a sojourn to the bedroom, the movie informs. That said, many of Julia's highlights come from simply watching Julia on TV, including when things didn't always go as planned. Talking head interviews from colleagues, friends, relatives, and other big cooking names such as José Andrés, Ina Garten, and Marcus Samuelsson help flesh out all the necessary biographical minutiae, but viewing Julia in action is the film's version of a main course and dessert all in one. She's unflappable, earthy, humorous and informative, her distinctive voice booming away as she talks through making everything from boeuf bourguignon to roast chicken — and it's easy to glean why America warmed to her as much as the butter-fuelled French fare she taught them to make. Why she sparked an entire genre of cuisine-focused television is just as plain to see, as is her trailblazing status as a female in the industry and a harbinger of better American dinners. The leap from jell-o salads to French omelettes and bouillabaisse was sizeable — and necessary. Julia does come with one spot at the table that's missing a dish. When it trifles with thornier topics than its eponymous cook's career, upbringing, marriage and influence, such as her contentment with being a homemaker pre-TV stardom, her tricky relationship with feminism despite her pro-choice views, and her early homophobia before becoming an AIDS activist, it can feel like it's snacking quickly and moving on. The film savours the good, the great and the extraordinary, but these brief notes still leave a taste. In general, though, it's still the kind of appetising movie that'd have Julia herself exclaiming "bon appétit!". Top image: Photo by Fairchild Archive/Penske Media/Shutterstock (6906383b) Julia Child on the set of her cooking show, 'The French Chef Julia Child, Boston.
The Dolphin is offering you the opportunity to sample some fruity and fizzy pet nats at its weekend wine mixer on Saturday, November 21. The party will offer up free tastings of the 20-strong list of pét-nats curated by Point Group Wine Director Shun Eto, with wine by the glass available to buy. "When we first were allowed to have picnics in Sydney my mates begged me to bring delicious pét-nat!" Eto says. "So I was inspired to bring that same bubbly refreshment to the Dolphin Hotel but bigger and better! Pét-nats are great because they aren't too serious and it's a great sesh vino for a long day in the sunshine." Kicking off at 2pm, the mixer will be led by DJ-turned-winemaker Charlie Chux who will be showcasing his new release Moonlight, an organic wine made with his company Acid Wines. Also on hand will be vino experts Tom from Viticult and Jamie from Principal Wines to guide you through the drops you'll be tasting. Best of all, entry is free to the mixer and there are no bookings, so all you have to do is rock up and be ready to sample some wines. This is the second wine mixer The Dolphin is hosting, so if you can't make this one, keep your eyes on the pub's social channels for info on any upcoming events.
Take a deep dive into the wondrous cinematic worlds of Wes Anderson — symmetry, quirkiness, pastel cinematography and all. From January 6–27, Golden Age Cinema is dedicating every Wednesday night to the acclaimed director's work. The series is called Wes Days, because of course it is. Film buffs can enjoy a weekly serve of Anderson's distinctive visual stylings, compelling soundtracks and all-star casts, with the Surry Hills venue playing a different flick or two each week. First up, catch the family dramas of The Royal Tenenbaums on the season's opening day, before opting for a Moonrise Kingdom and Rushmore double, the top-notch pairing of Fantastic Mr Fox and The Grand Budapest Hotel, and a showing of Isle of Dogs. Fancy seeing The Life Aquatic With Steve Zissou? That's also screening, but as part of another of the cinema's seasons — so you'll need to head along on Saturday, January 9. As for The Darjeeling Limited, it's planned to hit the venue sometime in February. Fingers crossed that 2021 is the year we all finally get to see Anderson's latest, the pandemic-delayed The French Dispatch, too. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rs7mIoG8ffI
Already known for its bottomless vegan pizza and pasta feasts, Italian restaurant chain Salt Meats Cheese is upping its cruelty-free food game at a monthly special event. Called Soul Meets Cheers, it serves up an entirely plant-based menu, featuring vegan versions of Italian classics. For the feast's November outing — taking place at all Sydney venues from 5pm on Tuesday, November 10 — it'll be focusing on bites to eat inspired the coastal region of Liguria in Italy. Think cauliflower steak with salsa verde, celeriac puree and burnt lemon; kale pesto with sun-dried tomato chips and pine nuts; and a tiramisu made from drunken cherry compote and toasted coconut. And yes, that just a few of the dishes on offer. Your $49 ticket also includes a glass of vegan wine or or Young Henrys beer or cider upon arrival. Or, you can pay an extra $15 at all venues other than Cronulla and get bottomless vegan wine and beer.
It starts with television. It takes place in a Sydney apartment. It lets you watch, and also keeps you away from other people. Yes, when it rolls out its November and December season, You Can Have It All might be the most 2020 event there is. This part-art installation, part-escape room happens inside a Potts Point flat, where director Laurence Rosier Staines unfurls a tale of drama, blackmail, murder and love triangles. One at a time, attendees will step inside the three-room event, begin by listening to someone tell you about the show they've been binge-watching, and work their way through the other two spaces. As for the rest of the details, discovering what's going on is part of the fun — and it's unlikely to resemble anything else you've been to. Head along between Wednesday, November 25–Sunday, December 6, with the exact Potts Point meeting spot only revealed once you've bought a ticket. Sessions begin every five minutes — from 6.30–10pm Wednesday–Friday, 3–6pm Saturday and 3–8pm Sunday. And the whole thing will take a minimum of 20 minutes, although most folks decide to stay longer.
Christmas may not be on your mind just yet, but it's definitely on the mind of the Four Pillars owners, whose pop-up gin store at Myer Sydney City is returning for the festive season this weekend. Located in the George Street department store, it's sticking around straight through to New Year's Eve and includes a store full of exclusive Four Pillars goodies. The gift shop will offer the entire Four Pillars core range of gins and merch, along with a few very limited releases from Four Pillars distillery and the Sydney Lab, including the much sought after 2020 Australian Christmas Gin and new double-barrelled negronis. You'll also find a heap of gin-spiked products, including Christmas puddings, cranberry and orange relish, and a new dry gin salt created by Four Pillars and Olsson's Salt. This year's store won't have tasting or cocktails, unfortunately, but Sydney is now blessed with its own Four Pillars bar in Surry Hills, which you can visit when you've finished shopping. Four Pillars' pop-up store is open 10am–6pm Sunday–Wednesday, 10am–9am Thursday, 10am–7pm Friday–Saturday.
Add Ireland to the list of places that you won't be jetting off to in 2020, but you can still visit via your screen. And, add Australia's annual Irish Film Festival to the growing ranks of cinema events making the jump online — so Aussies around the country can pop their own popcorn, scoop themselves some ice cream and watch along from their couches. In its virtual-only guise, the 2020 Irish Film Festival runs from Thursday, November 19–Sunday, November 29, with a lineup of features, shorts and documentaries on its bill. It's serving up something for everyone, so if you're keen on a dark comedy set in a small Irish town (thanks to Dark Lies the Island) or a doco about Nobel Prize-winning author Seamus Heaney (as seen Seamus Heaney and the Music of What Happens), you'll find both on the program. Among the highlights, horror-comedy Extra Ordinary stands out — as you'd expect of a movie about a driving instructor with supernatural powers, and one that co-stars Will Forte and Aussie comedian Claudia O'Doherty, too. Or, there's also grim and involving gang drama Calm with Horses, as led by Lady Macbeth's Cosmo Jarvis and The Killing of a Sacred Deer's Barry Keoghan. Tickets are on sale now — for individual sessions, in three-movie passes and as an all-access festival-long pass. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i4MRcUzmFv8&feature=emb_logo
Whoever said an old dog can't learn new tricks has never met The Dolphin. The decades-only pub received a makeover in 2016 from Icebergs' Maurice Terzini (who has since stepped away from the project), housed a pop-up bar from one of the world's best bartenders in 2019 and is now trying something it has never done before: brunch. Brunch itself is not new, of course, but it's a new concept for the Surry Hills favourite. Unlike many other iterations of brunch, this one has natural wines, cheese and bacon rotolo and not a single avo toast in sight. The brunch (yes, singular) is happening on Sunday, November 29 in the Surry Hills pub's dining room. Roll in at the leisurely hour of 10am and you'll be loaded up with coffee, food and a cocktail for $65. Coffee comes courtesy of Sydney favourite Mecca, while the food lineup has been designed by Head Chef Josh Carrick. You'll start with a toasted prawn crumpet, avocado and asparagus cracker (see, no toast) and the aforementioned rotolo, then continue with the likes of roasted beetroots, prosciutto and melon, bacon potato waffles and ocean trout, and finish with peaches and cream. Bar Manager Josh Reynolds will be mixing up two cocktails, one of which comes included in the price tag. You can pick from either a smoky bloody mary or a rum punch. Only one session of the brunch is running at 10am.
Somehow, entirely inexplicably, we're already thinking about Christmas. And, we suggest rather than schlepping to the typical department stores or your go-to online shops to get your friends, family or yourself a well-deserved gift, instead you could pick out unique goodies at The Big Design Market. The independent designer extravaganza has moved online this year, so you can nab all the top-quality, handmade, ethical and sustainable wares from your couch. With such a wide range of products, you're sure to find something for even the pickiest people on your list. As it's all virtual in 2020, The Big Design Market is combining its (usually) separate Sydney and Melbourne fairs into one epic 12-day event, featuring more than 200 makers, designers and small creative businesses. Acting as a gateway to each maker's store, the online edition will ensure 100 percent of profits go back to the designer, too, so you can support local while crossing off your Christmas list. It's win-win. Running from Wednesday, November 18 till Sunday, November 29, The Big Design Market Online's interactive catalogue will feature everything from locally made threads to jewellery, furniture, art, textiles, homewares, puzzles, festive food and drink packs, stationery, leather goods and much more. There'll also be a bunch of virtual activities and experiences, plus daily showbag giveaways (valued $300-800), filled to the brim with gorgeous goodies. Just head here for details. The Big Design Market has moved online this year and will take place from November 18–29. Check out all the designers involved — and get a head start on your Christmas shopping — via the website. Lead image: Amelia Stanwix
Every second, minute, hour, day, week, month and year could use a little more David Bowie. For one night in December, Sydneysiders can add a big dose of the music icon's tunes to their evening — and in a mighty fine way, too. iOTA, Jeff Duff, Chris Cooke and The Church's Steve Kilbey will all sing Bowie's tunes, and a 24-piece symphony orchestra will back them up. It's called We Can Be Heroes — The Music of Bowie Orchestrated, because of course it is. It'll be a greatest hits package, so prepare to revisit everything from 'Space Oddity', 'Starman' and 'Rebel Rebel' to 'Fame', 'Changes' and 'Ashes to Ashes'. 'Heroes' will get a spin, because of course it will, and 'Let's Dance' will probably resonate differently this year — as might 'Under Pressure'. It all takes place on Saturday, December 19 at the State Theatre across two performances, with tickets on sale now and capacity capped at 1000 people per gig. Expect to celebrate everything that made the man also known as Ziggy Stardust and the Thin White Duke such a unique marvel — and to add something fun, live and with a crowd to your 2020 calendar. If you need a little more motivation, check out the music video for the track that gives this gig its name below: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lXgkuM2NhYI&list=LLcaY6bbaXYxfYABVdRh7fYw&index=1419
How'd you like to populate your Christmas feast with local, artisanal goods to make your relatives impressed and your in-laws floored? Carriageworks is bringing back its Christmas Market, where you can buy fresh seasonal produce just a couple of days before Christmas. Importantly, you can also buy gifts just days before the big day — because we know what you're like. Taking over Carriageworks on the evening of Wednesday, December 23, the market will go all Christmas with a cornucopia of the spoils of more than 70 of Australia's best producers, restaurants and designers — think homemade plum puddings, succulent hams, fresh cherries, smelly cheeses and more. Expect the best from the weekly Carriageworks Farmers Market and more, including Christmas hams from Linga Longa Farm and Melanda Park (you'll need to pre-order these), cherries from Kurrawong Organics and Drive In Orchards, mince tarts from Flour and Stone and GF baker Nonie's, oysters from Mimosa Rock, floral beauties from Jonima Flowers and much festive beer from Wildflower and Yulli's Brews. Plus, there'll be plenty more joining the party — so expect to see wine from Eloquesta, truffles from Hartley, cured meats from LP's, desserts from Saga and fermented goodies from Cornersmith. This year, in a bid to keep the capacity COVID-safe, the market will be ticketed, with festive Sydneysiders required to register for a one-hour shopping slot between 4–8pm. Registrations will open on Tuesday, December 1. It's an exciting end to the year for the embattled multi-arts precinct, which was saved from voluntary administration by a multimillion-dollar lifeline, thanks to a group of philanthropists, back in July. Carriageworks Twilight Christmas Market runs from 4–8pm. Images: Jacquie Manning
Idris Elba fights a lion. That's it, that's Beast, as far as film pitches go at least. This South Africa-set thriller's one-sentence summary is up there with 'Jason Statham battles a giant shark' and 'Liam Neeson stares down wolves' — straightforward and irresistible, obviously, in enticing audiences into cinemas. That said, the latest addition to the animals-attack genre isn't as ridiculous as The Meg, and isn't a resonant existential musing like The Grey. What this creature feature wants to be, and is, is a lean, edge-of-your-seat, humanity-versus-nature nerve-shredder. Director Baltasar Kormákur (Adrift) knows that a famous face, a relentless critter as a foe, and life-or-death terror aplenty can be the stuff that cinema dreams and hits are made of. His movie isn't completely the former, but it does do exactly what it promises. If it proves a box office success, it'll be because it dangles an easy drawcard and delivers it. There is slightly more to Beast than Idris Elba brawling with the king of the jungle, of course — or running from it, trying to hide from it in a jeep, attempting to outsmart it and praying it'll tire of seeing him as prey. But this tussle with an apex predator is firmly at its best when it really is that simple, that primal and, with no qualms about gore and jump scares, that visceral. Elba (The Harder They Fall) plays recently widowed American doctor Nate Samuels, who is meant to be relaxing, reconnecting with his teenage daughters Mare (Iyana Halley, Licorice Pizza) and Norah (Leah Jeffries, Rel), and finding solace in a pilgrimage to his wife's homeland. But Beast wouldn't be called Beast if the Samuels crew's time with old family friend Martin (Sharlto Copley, Russian Doll), a wildlife biologist who oversees the nature reserve, was all placid safaris and sunsets. Kormákur doesn't even pretend that bliss is an option, or that the stalking, scares and big man/big cat showdown aren't coming. Ramping up the tension from the outset, his feature begins with the reason that its main maned (and unnamed) creature wants to slash his way through Nate and company: poachers hunting, with the culprits sneaking in at night to elude human eyes and snuff the light out of every feline in a targeted pride, which leaves one particularly large animal, the patriarch, angry and vengeful. Arriving unknowingly in the aftermath, the Samuels family have just chosen the wrong time to visit. Their first encounter with another pride, which Martin helped raise, leaves them awestruck instead of frightened; then they spy Beast's killer beast's handiwork at a nearby village, and surviving becomes their only aim. Swap out Elba from the 'Idris Elba fights a lion' equation and Kormákur would've had a far lesser film on his hands. His premise, wonderfully concise as it is, wouldn't work with any old actor. His entire movie wouldn't, and Beast works on the level it's prowling on — mostly. Screenwriter Ryan Engle (Rampage), using a story by Jaime Primak Sullivan (Breaking In), gives Nate grief and guilt over his past mistakes to grapple with as well as that persistent lion. Yes, the script is that cliched, because action heroes almost always seem to be wooing, worrying about or mourning a woman while they're endeavouring to save something, be it the world, their families or themselves. Elba dances the bereaved absent father dance well, though, with the Beast's depths springing from him rather than the material and its deceased spouse/regretful dad/seize-the-day tropes. Whether coming to widespread fame in one of the best TV dramas ever made, cancelling the apocalypse in a different on-screen altercation with critters, or playing a complicated detective, the man with The Wire, Pacific Rim and Luther on his resume (but not yet Bond) excels at playing people juggling problems and worries beyond their immediate threats. As sure as any feline, big, small, wild or domesticated, will swipe when it's being aggressive, that's what makes Elba brawling with Beast's revenge-seeking big cat such an appealing idea. The other troubles his character weathers here are both formulaic and thinly written, as they were always likely to be in a 93-minute lion attack flick — but, reliably as ever, Elba imparts Nate with the unflinching sense that this bout of king-of-the-jungle chaos is just one of many burdens he's had to face. Elba would've brought that complexity to his part even if Beast didn't saddle Nate with an obligatory dead wife, and often that trauma feels like every other animal in the feature — merely there because the film needs to be about more than Elba feuding with a lion. Nate's thorny relationship with his daughters could've still prickled, then softened and resolidified in the throes of panic, anyway; indeed, both Halley and Jeffries are at their finest when Mare and Norah have to be resourceful, brave and in the moment amid such ever-lurking danger. Kormákur makes that peril palpable, too. With cinematographer Philippe Rousselot (an Oscar-winner three decades ago for A River Runs Through It), he keeps the camera moving and roving amid eye-catching surroundings, letting the beauty of the place linger but rarely allowing a minute's peace in lengthy, unbroken shots. The Samuels' new nemesis is fast, savage and erratic, after all — even if lions are majestic creatures — and also willing to lay in wait, and the director of disaster movies Adrift and Everest wants his viewers to feel all of the above. Perhaps it's apt that when Beast struggles, it's because it's doing more than it needs to, but also with not enough effort — over-plotting Nate, Mare, Norah and Martin's backstories, and yet keeping them so well-worn. The pixels behind the film's animal antagonist also suffer a touch of the same fate; in trying to truly terrify, this CGI cat looks photorealistic as the live-action The Lion King's creatures did, but also preternatural. Nonetheless, the narrative's inherent silliness and illogical leaps aside, too — yes, including Elba punching the movie's bloodthirsty namesake — Beast remains as ruthlessly proficient as a lion at drawing, demanding and grabbing attention. Add it to the menagerie alongside alligator flick Crawl, another wholly predictable, sparse, taut, menacing and effective effort that's never Jaws but never Sharknado. It also isn't 1981's Roar, the wildest lion picture that'll ever exist and one plagued by animal attacks off-screen as well, but nothing else is.
What do two nuns in the throes of sexual ecstasy gasp? "My god" and "sweet Jesus", of course. No other filmmaker could've made those divine orgasmic exclamations work quite like Paul Verhoeven does in Benedetta, with the Dutch filmmaker adding another lusty, steamy, go-for-broke picture to his resume three decades after Basic Instinct and more than a quarter-century since Showgirls. His latest erotic romp has something that his 90s dives into plentiful on-screen sex didn't, however: a true tale, courtesy of the life of the movie's 17th-century namesake, whose story the writer/director and his co-scribe David Birke (Slender Man) adapt from Judith Brown's 1986 non-fiction book Immodest Acts: The Life of a Lesbian Nun in Renaissance Italy. For anyone that's ever wondered how a religious biopic and nunsploitation might combine, this is the answer you've been praying for. Frequently a playful filmmaker — the theories that Showgirls is in on its own joke keep bubbling for a reason — Verhoeven starts his first film since 2016's Elle with that feature's more serious tone. The screen is back, the words "inspired by real events" appear and the score is gloomy. When Benedetta's titular figure appears as a girl (played by Elena Plonka, Don't Worry About the Kids), she's the picture of youth and innocence, and she's also so devoted to her faith that she's overjoyed about joining a convent in the Tuscan village of Pescia. But then villains interrupt her trip, and this pious child demonstrates her favour with the almighty by seemingly getting a bird to shit in a man's eye. It isn't quite as marvellous as turning water into wine, but it's its own kind of miracle. As an adult (Virginie Efira, Bye Bye Morons), she'll talk to strapping hallucinations of Jesus (Jonathan Couzinié, Heroes Don't Die), too, and use her beloved childhood statuette of the Virgin Mary as a dildo. There is no line between the sacred and the profane in Benedetta: things can be both here, and frequently are. Case in point: on her first night at the convent, after a bartering session between her father (David Clavel, French Dolls) and the abbess (Charlotte Rampling, Dune) over the girl's dowry for becoming a bride of christ, a statue of the Virgin Mary collapses upon Benedetta, and she shows her sanctity by licking the sculpture's exposed breast. So, 18 years later, when she's both seeing Jesus and attracted to abused newcomer Sister Bartolomea (Daphné Patakia, Versailles), they're the most natural things that could happen. To Benedetta, they're gifts from god, too. She does try to deny her chemistry with the convent's fresh novice at first, but the lord wants what he wants for her. Unsurprisingly, not everyone in the convent — the abbess' daughter Sister Christina (Louise Chevillotte, Synonyms) chief among them — agrees, approves or in believes in her visions. Verhoeven puts his own faith in crafting a witty, sexy, no-holds-barred satire. That said, he doesn't ever play Benedetta as a one-note, over-the-top joke that's outrageous for the sake of it. His protagonist believes, he just-as-devoutly believes in her — whether she's a prophet, a heretic or both, he doesn't especially care — and he also trusts her faith in her primal desires. His allegiance is always with Benedetta, but that doesn't mean that he can't find ample humour in the film or firm targets to skewer. The hypocrisy of religion — "a convent is not a place of charity, child; you must pay to come here," the abbess advises — gets his full comic attention. Having the always-great Rampling on-hand to personify the Catholic Church at its most judgemental and least benevolent (at its money-hungry worst, too) helps considerably. Indeed, what the veteran English actor can do with a withering glare and snarky delivery is a movie miracle. The filmmaker behind RoboCop, Total Recall and Starship Troopers' futuristic visions has also long trusted in sex and violence. Here, he trusts that thrusting them together in a story about a lesbian nun who shows signs of the stigmata and scandalises her convent several times over will create his favourite kind of on-screen chaos. He's right, but there's always a smart and scathing point to Benedetta's nudity, fornication and physical altercations, and to how viciously the church responds. Humanity is messy. People are flesh and pulsating urges, no matter who they deify. Those who grasp power by instilling fear and demanding unquestioning allegiance will never put the masses ahead of their own dominance. Amid the boobs, blood and potential vaginal splinters — and communal defecation, farts lit on fire and gynaecological torture tools — these truths are steadfast. While Rampling is clearly having a ball as the abbess — and still gives the figure vulnerability — it's the committed and spirited Efira who goes deep. She visibly relishes her role as well, and brings depth, nuance and poignancy to every swoop and swirl in its tonal rollercoaster ride. The skill required to slide from religiously rapturous to sexually euphoric can't be underestimated, but Efira ensures it looks seamless and never silly, even when the film swings between soapy Jesus makeout sessions, matriarchal power struggles, porn-style sapphic tumbles in the convent sheets and comets in the sky. As Verhoeven already does, his French lead makes Benedetta's audience believe in her, too. She's fervent, bold, intelligent, rebellious and passionate, all traits her character shares, and exposes as much of Benedetta's emotional landscape as she does skin. As she navigates a torrid affair, beatific faith, the worst of Catholicism's scorn and even the looming threat of the plague (everything's a pandemic movie now), Efira is a beaming vision herself. That's part of the self-aware altar that Verhoeven worships at, knowing the glamour his star brings to a film that's always going to be known as "that lesbian nun flick" — and actively embracing the 'hot lesbian' on-screen trope while using his lead character and entire movie to subvert everything they come into contact with. He's also visually meticulous to a painterly degree; Benedetta is ravishing in multiple ways, including in the contrasting colour palette its bodies, habits and 17th-century convent life in general affords. That the feature ultimately avoids hitting just the obvious spots, embraces mayhem, gleefully provokes and doesn't completely penetrate as far as it could feels like an appropriate climax, and it's also the result that only Verhoeven could've bestowed.
When a show gets programmed for a second season you can expect it to be top-tier. And that's exactly what you'll get with Outhouse Theatre's incredible production of Ulster American which is set to return this June. After sold-out shows in 2021, the blistering comedy will take to the stage at the beloved Riverside Theatres in Parramatta from Wednesday, June 8 till Saturday, June 11. The story follows an encounter between a playwright, an ambitious theatre director and an Oscar-winning actor who all meet to discuss the career-propelling potential of a new play. But what starts out as a promising opportunity for the trio quickly descends into chaos. It's a play that doesn't shy away from the big topics either, tackling issues surrounding privilege, power and consent head-on. Keen to check it out? Ulster American will play at Riverside Theatres from Wednesday, June 8 till Saturday, June 11 with tickets starting from $49. For more information and to book, visit the website.
According to a 2019 report by Foodbank Australia, one in five Australians experienced food security at some point in the past 12 months — and that was before COVID-19 hit and an estimated 600,000 Aussies lost their jobs. To help put food on the tables of those doing it rough at the moment, ten Asian Australian singers, comedians and rappers are coming together for a one-off live-stream to raise money for Foodbank NSW and ACT. Going down on YouTube from 9–11.45pm on Saturday, June 27, the live-stream will feature comedian Harry Jun, singers Krista Monica, Yura and Christine, and rappers Andy, Rako, Mike Choe, Cooee, Goyo and Saint. The YouTube link will be published on the event's Facebook page. While the live-stream will be free to watch, those bopping along in their living rooms are encouraged to donate to Foodbank over here. The group is hoping to raise $1000 — and has a strong start with $387 garnered before the live-stream has even begun. If you'd like a taste of what to expect, have a listen to Saint's single 'Kumbaya', which features fellow live-stream artist Cooee. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PQH53ioF7hc
Food-themed days are threatening to become the culinary equivalent of the boy who cried wolf: so many manufactured eating occasions, only so much stomach space. Still, no matter how frequently they seem to pop up, there's one thing that always grabs attention. Boy oh boy do we all love cheap chook. Perhaps that's why El Camino Cantina is celebrating National Wing Day by giving the people what they love. On Wednesday, July 29, buffalo wings will be ten cents each all day across the chain's Sydney stores — as long as you buy a Cadillac margarita, beer or wine to wash them down with. Feeling brave? Like your poultry pieces not just super affordable, but extra spicy? El Camino is also doing 'wing roulette'. Here's how it works: you order a serving of 20 wings (for a sum total of $2), and two will come marinated in 'face-melter' sauce; however you won't know which ones until you eat your way through them. [caption id="attachment_742916" align="aligncenter" width="1920"] Tom Ferguson[/caption] El Camino Cantina's National Wing Day special is available all day onWednesday, July 29 at its Manly, The Rocks, Entertainment Quarter and Westfield Miranda stores.
If you've spent the past few months working from home in trackies and hole-ridden t-shirts, it's probably time to elevate your wardrobe. Thankfully, minimalist Australian clothing brand Assembly Label is hosting an online warehouse sale for a limited time this week, so you can buy some new linen pants, simple tees and big cosy jumpers without going too hard on the wallet. Known for its cool-yet-comfy timeless pieces, Assembly Label is a go-to for top-quality staples that'll take you from your morning coffee to working in your living room (aka the office), lounging around on weekends and going out for lunch with mates — really, you won't need much else. The online warehouse sale kicks off today, Wednesday, June 17, with a wide range of both men's and women's wear on offer. You'll find lots of winter essentials such as denim, basic tops, jumpers and jackets, plus its signature summery linen dresses, swimwear, skirts and shorts if you're already dreaming of hitting up the beach. Best of all, the selection will be on sale at up to 80 percent off — for a limited time only — with free shipping across Australia, too. Assembly Label's online warehouse sale kicks off on Wednesday, June 17 and will run until stocks last. To check what you can nab for up to 80 percent off, head here.
For some reason I always think RAFW stands for Royal Australian Fashion Week, like how the racing course is Royal Randwick. Maybe because there's a certain amount of competitiveness and a lot of young leggy creatures involved in both? But no, it is Rosemount Australian Fashion Week and it means that Circular Quay is going to be full of people wearing terrifying and amazing shoes. The fact that it's not a Biennale year makes the conceptual wardrobe thing a little harder ("I see a post-industrial textural inflection!" "I see Lady Gaga dressed up as someone who is dressing up as Lady Gaga!"), but fashion is hard work. It is a serious business. Do you know how many hours some of these garments take to make? Quite possibly you do, but I don't imagine you spend much time thinking about it. Or, to put it another way, have you ever seen Karl Lagerfeld smile? No. Like fashion weeks everywhere, RAFW is an exciting intersection of fashion as art and fashion as celebrity culture, with basically everything and everyone in the general area of it being a photo-op waiting to get blogged. 56 Australian designers, including some official household budget threats like Manning Cartell, Therese Rawsthorne, Michael Lo Sordo, Yeojin Bae, Saint Augustine Academy, Stolen Girlfriends Club and Kirrily Jonston, will be showing their Spring/Summer 2011 collections to local and international buyers, press and people who've finagled invitations or are famous. Luckily, if none of the aforementioned include you, the collections will appear on various fashiony blogs and websites before you can say 'get me out of these shoes. Now. https://youtube.com/watch?v=Gd5vlU_pM0E
With the days getting shorter and a perceptible nip in the air, autumn is definitely on its way. Despair not, help is at hand! The Rocks Ultimate Foodie Experiences should provide a welcome and comforting distraction from the impending colder months. Become a chef in a day with a masterclass from head chef at Bel Mondo , Andy Ball. Learn the fine art of macaron making at Baroque Bistro, or if you prefer not to work for your food, book an exclusive chef’s table at Rockpool or Kable’s to get a unique look behind the scenes at these top restaurants. For the adventurous gourmet, learn how to match food with wine (not the other way around!) to create taste explosions, thanks to the clever team at Wine Odyssey. Or if beer's more your tipple, tuck into a 'BeerGustation' menu at Harts Pub, which combines beer and food expertly. Oh, and don’t miss out on the handcrafted and boutique ales on offer at Australia’s oldest pub brewery, The Lord Nelson Hotel. If it’s a brew of the leafy variety you’re after, let the Observatory Hotel’s tea master tutor you in tea etiquette and correct preparation. Budding clairvoyants might enjoy the Mystic Afternoon Tea also taking place there, and learn the art of tea leaf reading. Can't decide? Then the Tour de Foodie could be just the ticket for you. It showcases seven of The Rocks' and Circular Quay's best kept gourmet secrets, including the Guylian Belgian Chocolate Café, a must for chocoholics. And the best bit is, you’ll get a $100 voucher at the end, to spend at one of the venues featured. For more tasty events, check out the website.
Forget the arena spectacular. The new frontier of public art is found in the dimension of the intimate, in those tiny stadiums behind our eyes where imagination and emotion achieve more than the most exorbitant budgets. For the next week you have the opportunity to experience such works by a new generation of artists in the village of Erskineville. Curated by Quarterbred and produced by PACT, Tiny Stadiums overtakes public and performance spaces throughout Erskineville with live, sound, visual and participatory projects. Let's hover for a moment on that word "participatory". Long feared by audiences across the world, the concept of participation has shifted significantly for Tiny Stadiums. Rather than a forced exposure in front of your peers, this style of participation is about an invitation for the public to engage with the work on a tactile or task-based level. In this 2011 program, Tiny Stadiums will have audience members promoting shows with flyers, writing postcards to old friends, being awoken by industrial alarm clocks and competing with one another to achieve corporate success. For those not wanting to do much more than watch, Tiny Stadiums also presents works that contain a sense of intimacy without actually touching your flesh. Nat Randall's solo piece, Cheer Up Kid, is a disarming encounter with three characters whose comic idiosyncrasies become tragic revelations of quite melancholic realities. Elsewhere, Bennett Miller (of Dachshund UN fame) has created a film designed to welcome and honour the ibis birds that decorate Sydney bins, parks and playgrounds. Definitely stretch your imagination this week, and get active in rebooting your world with this third installment of Tiny Stadiums.
Story Club has been happening, like so many stories in Sydney do, in a tiny bar in the Inner West. It's been going on for over a year, like the duller of these stories can end up feeling like. But the Story Club stories are good, honest! They've put all the energy they didn't use on making up a name into sourcing the finest tellers and tales, and have ended up with a writing-performance-comedy kind of mash-up that's found itself a definite following. People, it seems, love stories. And that's really for the best, given that we can't get along without them: we need stories for our history, for making architectural metaphors about communication, so not all pornography is 'Gonzo' style (same for journalism), and generally to explain and to understand. We all hear them; we all tell them — some of them more than others, or so Story Club's story goes. That One Story scoops up some of the talent from the Sydney Comedy Festival alongside their regular participants and gets them to tell their go-to story, the one you tell when you want to say something good, or you just don't know what to say but you've got to say something. See what Felicity Ward, Dan Ilic, Chaser alums and Penguin Plays Rough readers-aloud say when they get nervous or cute.
Niels Shoe Meulman describes his art as “traditional handwriting with a metropolitan attitude”. Fusing the art of beautiful writing with the art of getting his (pseudo) name up in an urban environment, Meulman’s unique brand of art makes graffiti more accessible and calligraphy far more cool. Meulman’s career began in Amsterdam in 1979, far before tagged laneways were listed in Lonely Planet as tourist attractions. After spending a few years tagging all over Amsterdam, ruling supreme as a Crime Time King and meeting New York artists like Dondi, Rammellzee, Haze, Quik and Keith Harring, he developed his technique working in graphic design before being partner in an advertising agency-turned-brand for silk scarves. At age 40 he had the artistic version of a mid-life crisis, ditching the corporate world to return to drawing stuff on walls. Meulman’s unique mash-up of inspirations and experience results in artwork that hits you in the face before making you appreciate its traditional beauty. Who said you can’t indulge your inner typography nerd and design a range of luxury silk scarves while retaining a rebellious street edge? Calligraffiti will be touring as follows: Wednesday, 25 January – Monday, 30 January at Kind of Gallery Wednesday, 25 January – Tuesday, 7 February at Kinokuniya Bookstore Live calligraffiti show on Friday, 27 January at May’s Lane Street Art Project
In Wunderkammer, acrobats catapult themselves from one side of the stage to the other in fantastically creative and awe-inspiring ways. Human bodies become skipping ropes, hands become just another pair of feet to walk on, and the physically impossible looks effortless. All at once you feel wooden and inflexible in your theatre chair, realising that, for all your wishful thinking, your flesh is fundamentally unwilling to bend, flex and twist in on itself like a pretzel. The Circa troop are circus 'freaks' in the truest sense, fizzing with effervescent energy and carnivalesque camaraderie, flipping from hula hoop hijinks to high-voltage tumbling to aerial striptease to burlesque routines. They tease and titillate the audience, gleefully flaunting their phenomenal bodies and shared fetish for spike-heeled red patent heels. They will make you believe that they can fly as they flirt with aerial suspension — and hey, why limit themselves to flight alone; why not explore aerodynamics while they're up there? A 'wunderkammer' is, according to Wikipedia, a cabinet of curiosities or a chamber of rarities, a collection of wonders whose categorical boundaries have yet to be defined. This description fits the Circa crew perfectly. While you may feel corporeally frustrated after the show and think 'damn, my neck is sore', it's a staggeringly sexy display of strength and skill that is simply unmissable. https://youtube.com/watch?v=pbY9yvWsmHc
Coming up with a solid indie-pop band name used to just be a case of slapping a "The" in front of a noun, but now some seem so nonsensical they could only have been generated by inserting a keyword into www.bandnamemaker.com. Architecture In Helsinki's band name, despite sounding like a very successful Internet-generated band name (we got "Helsinki Custard" and "Cursed Helsinki And The Monosyllabic Ennui" amongst other disasters), is actually very fitting. These guys have been doing modernist indie-pop since the turn of the century, and they're not trying to reinvent the wheel any more than Finland's unconsciously cool capital itself. Architecture In Helsinki (the band) is unadulterated bubbly electro-pop that still manages to appear fresher than a blast of Finnish winter air. Since their early days producing a sound as endearingly mish-mash as architecture in Helsinki (the city) they've dropped a few horns and acoustics along with a few band members. The result is a soundscape equally kaleidoscopic but far more polished. On 1 September, they'll be supported by New Zealand indie power-pop group Cut Off Your Hands, who's own name implies classic Kiwi sarcasm rather than anything morbid. https://youtube.com/watch?v=IxjcszKEcHE
Surely by now you've been to the White Rabbit gallery. You've stumbled upon its minimalist exterior, tucked away behind the old brewery, and have played for a few hours on its shiny floors. Once inside you've marveled at its collection, which seems to capture a mixture of three elements: playfulness, political dissection and virtuoso craft, and you've had a chat with the engaging and helpful staff. Maybe you've even had a chance to drink a cheeky oolong in the White Rabbit Teahouse. Now if you haven't done any of this, you have the fantastic opportunity to discover the world of contemporary Chinese art when the White Rabbit reopens its doors to launch Beyond the Frame. As the name suggests, White Rabbit's new exhibition aims to shuck all sense of boundary - whether it be the wooden frame of a canvas or the crisis of national borders. Ai Weiwei (polymath visual artist, political activist and man of many millions of sunflower seeds) will have his Oil Spill porcelain work on display, tempting eco action with its lush, hand-crafted pollution. Switching to the two-dimensional are the documentary photos of Lu Nan, whose empathic eye has entered Burmese prison camps to observe the day-to-day existence of these forgotten souls, while the completely playful is found in the absurdly over-sized animals hanging out in Liu Di's urban scenes. The level of inspiration in this space is pretty staggering, so much that you'll probably come away dreaming in Chinese. Image: Daily Shapes (2009) by Dong Yuan
Narrative and film are two long-term bed partners that have convinced a lot of the world that their union is unbreakable. But this has not and will not always be the case. Back in 1929, the Russian filmmaker Dziga Vertov did his best to burn that marital bed with his documentary works, of which Man with a Movie Camera is the most famous. Vertov despised narrative in film, saying that it was the corrupting influence of theatre and literature, and presented his films as capturing "life caught unawares". He went so far in his quest to divorce narrative from film that he shot his material without any script or structure, creating a database of footage that his wife later edited into Man with a Movie Camera. Vertov's crusade failed in his lifetime, with most films since growing out of scripts (and developing well-worn story formulas in the process), but his protest did not fall on deaf ears. In 2003, British polymath Michael Nyman was commissioned to compose a score for Vertov's silent masterpiece and it was at this point that an intriguing comparison was made between the two artists. Nyman had for years been shooting his own database of stock footage, collecting a selection of humanity caught "unawares" before the camera. The product of what was to follow is now screening at Carriageworks - NYman with a Movie Camera. Nyman edited his footage to a strict set of rules. He would match the subject matter and special effects shot for shot to Vertov's original. Even the rhythm of editing cuts was taken from the Russian film, giving NYman with a Movie Camera a hyperactive feel in contrast to Nyman's usual style. Even the score — composed by Nyman back in 2003 — was carried across. NYman with a Movie Camera is a great opportunity to see a conversation with the past, especially when you place its predecessor in context with later films, such as the epics Baraka and The Qatsi Trilogy.
From the newly formed Animal Farm Collective comes a surreal Orwellian vision. This take on the modern tale of power and exploitation features bears instead of a pig dictatorship, sex rather than politics and humans in the farmyard. More specifically, the set up is this: the head of the food chain is not the humble human, as we typically tend to suspect, but the bear. These meddlesome predators occupy themselves by masterminding psychological traps, in order to test the humans' animal instincts. What follows is sexual and social chaos. This bizarrely seductive vision is the perfect excuse for the heads of Animal Collective, Gavin Webber and Grayson Millwood, to bask in surrealism and to push their unconventional choreography to its limits. Expect the unexpected. Image by Maurice Korbel
News flash, Bush and Co did have it wrong, the internet and digital photography are the real axis of evil in this crazy 21st century existence of ours. Somehow I don't think many people would disagree with either of those statements (for the record I am no Taliban/Hussein sympathiser) but I will argue my case just in case. As soon as I walked in the door of the Blender Gallery's current Greatest Hits exhibition I was surrounded by intimate portraits — impossibly private moments shared between lucky photographers and some of the worlds most acclaimed musicians. The Beatles, the Doors, Queen, Hendrix, Jagger, Dylan, Joplin, the various incarnations of Bowie and many more. The scenarios vary from Woodstock to a plane cockpit to a Frisco park to a dark room where an orange haired Bowie glares at you through a mirror while his back is turned. Many were shot in studios and others captured iconic moments on and back stage. It is a catalogue of the bad old days with a rock overtone, nothing blatantly lewd although the smirk of Keith Richards could hardly be described as anything but. So what's the problem you ask? Life is saturated with photos, so much so that it took me a minute to adjust and realise that I was looking at some amazing moments in history, not the latest inane saturday night Facebook photo album or the omnipresent blogs full of whimsical gibberish and the borrowed images that accompany them. The exhibits are not cheap, perhaps a statement in order to distinguish themselves from the dime a dozen album that is the internet, perhaps not. But if you appreciate any of the aforementioned artists then you will definitely appreciate this.
The Laurels and Domeyko/Gonzalez must surely be two of the standout acts of the musical moment. Both bringing their own unique and terribly clever spin on traditional sounds. Together with ethereal, brooding Sydney favourites, Dark Bells, this is one quality triple bill you most certainly do not want to miss. The Laurels are a four-piece Sydney band of the psychedelic/shoegaze persuasion whose collection of guitar pedals — used to create the sweeping effects and big, richly textured guitar sounds they’re famous for — may border on a hoarding problem. Likened to My Bloody Valentine and the Jesus and Mary Chain, The Laurels' Piers Cornelius, Luke O’Farrell (both vocals/guitar), Conor Hannan (bass) and Kate Wilson (drums) have been earning massive media acclaim and gathering a harem of devoted fans since they formed in 2006. Domeyko/Gonzalez are innovative purveyors of live electronics in possession of (probably) illegal amounts of musical talent. Multi-instrumentalists James Domeyko and Jaie Gonzalez create beautifully layered and looped electronica using a huge range of synthesthised and instrumental sounds from keyboards, guitars, drums, and even violins and glockenspiels. Signed to Sydney label Death Strobe Records, they've released an inspired EP The Circle Trilogy to glowing reviews, and have been blowing minds with their engaging live sets at some of Sydney's top venues. Those in the know will be scooting down to Goodgod to catch these guys live with The Laurels and Dark Bells, and for all who have yet to have the pleasure, do yourselves a massive favour and begin your inevitable fan-dom now. Image: The Laurels
The Western is brought back to exhilarating life by debut feature filmmaker Patrick Hughes. Lifting a few pages from the Coen Bros' No Country for Old Men, as well as a wink to Sergio Leone, Hughes has executed a stylish modern Western, which doles out a dose of fun alongside all the bloodshed. When police officer Shane Cooper (True Blood's Ryan Kwanten) relocates with his pregnant wife Alice (Clare van der Boom) to the small town of Red Hill for some quiet country life, well, this is a Western, so we all know that's not going to happen. Indeed on his very first shift, Shane barely gets through copping flack from is new boss Old Bill (Steve Bisley), before the proverbial scheisse hits the ceiling fan and Shane gets to learn country law the hard way. The daring jailbreak of erstwhile Red Hill resident Jimmy Conway (Tommy Lewis) has the entire town spooked, and for good reason; Conway's out for blood and there's seemingly no stopping him. As the writer, producer, director and editor, you've got to be impressed by Hughes' tenacity (and versatility!) in bringing this story to the screen. His revisioning of generic conventions for the modern day are handled with a tongue-in-cheek humour that sees Shane forced to ride, awkwardly, out on horseback. So too is Hughes unafraid to play up to the Western, with wonderfully hammy hero shots of Conway's brutal antics. For the most part the performances also manage to walk this line, with Bisley at his grisly best, Kwanten proving himself an impressive lead and the wryly-reflexive casting of Lewis harking back to The Chant of Jimmie Blacksmith. Unfortunately, a few confounding edits, a slight inconsistency in tone, and a frankly ridiculous 'mysterious beast' subplot do manage to distract from Red Hill's manifold strengths. It may be enough to pull you out of the film, but then again, at 96 minutes, Hughes is careful not to overstay his welcome. Red Hill might be a bit of a mixed bag, but as a striking introduction to Patrick Hughes and a big screen Ryan Kwanten, it's certainly an exciting new frontier for Australian cinema. https://youtube.com/watch?v=9vafKLgdg94
Film fans, it's time to get up in arms. Last year celebrated Iranian film director Jafar Panahi (The White Balloon, The Circle) and fellow filmmaker Mohammad Rasoulof, who were sentenced to six-years in jail for making films that threatened the Iranian regime, and who have been banned for a further twenty years from leaving Iran, making films or talking to the press. This unconscionable imprisonment has been condemned by Hollywood heavyweights such as Steven Spielberg, Martin Scorsese, Sean Penn, Robert Redford, Oliver Stone, Terrence Malick and the Coen Brothers, with Paul Haggis heading up an online petition via Amnesty International. Now the Australian film community is doing their bit, with Sydney, Adelaide and Melbourne film festivals joining forces for the first time to host fundraising screenings of Panahi's remarkable football dramatic comedy Offside. Audaciously shot during Iran's 2005 World Cup qualifying match against Bahrain, Offside follows various women as they dress as men in an attempt to circumvent their enforced exclusion from the stadium. Charming, funny and intelligent, Offside is the perfect introduction to Panahi's filmography; the future of which we all need to fight for.
Bradford Cox is a taut wire of a man. His vocal quality may have softened very slightly over the past ten years of his leading Deerhunter, but the dangerous tension is certainly still present. Bursting out of Atlanta, Georgia, Deerhunter have struck reverbing chords with lovers and haters alike. Their sound is exploratory, taking dark ambience and giving it a jolting rock spine that is breaching maturity after six albums. The first time they officially came to our shores was in 2009, setting bones a-rattling in anticipation for their return this year. Deerhunter is in Sydney for a flash, playing at the Laneway Festival and this, their only sideshow at the Metro theatre. Previous Deerhunter gigs have shown frontman Cox's skeletal frame thrashing in fake blood and sundresses, so it is highly anticipated that their Sydney outing will be worth cramming into. https://youtube.com/watch?v=G5RzpPrOd-4
The last of the summer festivals are heading this way. Laneway, Playground Weekender, and, of course, Good Vibrations. Good Vibes has been counting some of the best, brightest and most exciting Aussie and international acts on its stages since it began. This year's lineup has a particularly dance-happy good feeling to it with the likes of Kelis, Faithless and Rusko. Did we also mention Phoenix, The Ting Tings, Miike Snow and Friendly Fires? Or Erykah Badu, Fat Freddy's Drop and Mike Posner? The lineup just continues to get better and better. If you're feeling a bit flush since your first pay after Christmas, why don't you splurge on a VIP ticket as well? While the rest of the gang are getting sweaty in the middle of the crowd, you can sit drinking cocktails, catching up with friends and enjoying that most elusive of festival commodities, a VIP toilet. Wandering around the green surrounds of Centennial Parklands as your favourite dance anthem is being pumped through those amazing festival, body thumping speakers, you'll appreciate the beauty that is a summer music festival - the sights, sounds and smells of hundreds of slippery bodies gyrating and throwing their arms in the air. Ah summer in Sydney. We do it so well. https://youtube.com/watch?v=RulP4OXxFbM
The Next Three Days is a film you could easily damn with faint praise. Written and directed by Paul Haggis (Crash, In the Valley of Elah) and staring ‘our own’ Russell Crowe, this remake of the French film Pour Elle is a good story well told: solid, meticulously crafted, with that similar, slightly old-fashioned feeling you got from watching a film like Salt. The result is a thoroughly enjoyable thriller, but one that barely lingers in your memory once you've left the cinema. Crowe plays John Brennan, a college professor with a sizable middle age spread, happily married to Lara (Elizabeth Banks) and father of an adorable son Luke (Ty Simpkins). This picture-postcard familial contentment is obliterated when Lara is arrested then found guilty of murder — where her innocence casts an impressive question mark over the film. Three years down the track, with all appeals denied, John has radicalised into a desperate man, determined to instigate Lara’s prison break. A blatant, if handy scene articulates this transformation as John lectures his class on Don Quixote. Unfortunately Haggis doesn’t so much mine this vein as lean on the allusion and allow it to do all the thematic heavy lifting. But then again, the plan that unfolds certainly has its heart-in-your-mouth moments, excluding a distracting cameo from Liam Neeson that is. Crowe carries The Next Three Days like a sturdy packhorse. He can do downtrodden but steely very well, and moreover he’s believable as an everyman following his nose, and using dubious YouTube tutorials to learn the tricks of the trade necessary to enact his daring jailbreak. After all, this isn’t Jason Bourne we’re talking about. Banks gets convincingly jail ugly and emotionally distraught, while Olivia Wilde and Brian Dennehy provide worthy if underwritten mirrors of John’s increasing dislocation from the real world. No one can fault the precision of this film (there’s that faint praise again), but for all the life-or-death stakes, The Next Three Days seems to lack some spirit. Perhaps Haggis and Crowe are taking the material a tad too seriously, or perhaps there really isn’t anything wrong with a good story well told.
Ballet taught us that the human body can be sculpted into an organic machine. And for a while that was enough, especially when it was coupled with garish sets and costumes (yes, yes, Ballet Russes) and men with questionable cheekbones and crotch mesas. But something new came onto the scene, something that seduced the meat model of almost perfection: silicon technology. Taking a look at Wayne McGregor's Sydney Festival piece, Entity, reveals an ensemble that is not so much a collection of individual dancers as it appears to be one form, of flesh and data combined. McGregor's dancers appear to move to mathematical algorithms, giving the impression that their performance is architectural rather than psychological. The result is a mesmerising panorama of more-than-humans, surrounded by the nurturing structures of mechanical screens that seem to dance alongside their living cohort. A commissioned electronic score by Jon Hopkins is also definitely worth the ticket price alone, with his ability to inject digital euphoria into your marrow. No wonder the dancer-machines move so beautifully here. Image by Ravi Deepres
There are a lot of people who don't like being called up on stage when someone needs a volunteer. These are the people who never enjoy the limelight. They never wanted their fifteen minutes. These are the boring and unfortunate souls who will never see their name in lights. Unlike the rest of us, who have registered to literally have their name in lights as part of the Sydney Festival exhibition by artist John Baldessari. This American conceptual artist has put together a production in which you are the main attraction. Every fifteen seconds, every 24 hours over the majority of the festival, those attention seeking or perhaps just art loving kids who have registered will be able to see their name pop up in lights on the side of the Australian Museum. It's not too late to register, and it's free to do so. Participants will receive an email letting them know the time their name will come up. So embrace fame, and let hundreds of glittering light globes make your name shine across Sydney.
Synthetic electro cyborg pseudo-Japanese prunge (punk/grunge) rockers. These are just a few of the plethora of descriptors used in an attempt to verbally capture dynamic Sydney band Made in Japan. And their live shows? Rollicking! They've been likened to Bloc Party and My Bloody Valentine if you need a reference point, but don't try and pigeon-hole them — they've also indulged in the occasional cross-genre collaboration with hip-hop acts Horrorshow and Spit Syndicate, albeit more in the spirit of friendship and open-mindedness than any such leaning in their own sound. Formed in 2008, vocalist/drummer James and guitarists Jono and Tom recorded an EP in 2009. They have since played with the likes of Sparkadia, Deep Sea Arcade and Blue Juice to name a few, and their much anticipated debut album is about to explode onto the music scene as we speak. So be warned, these guys are ridiculously talented and about to kick off into the stratosphere of musical renown, so here is your chance to catch them live and free during their three-week residency at OAF before you find yourself scrambling for tickets to their gigs on ebay or haggling with a scalper outside your favourite music festival.
The it. Collective is an artistic conglomerate bringing together the best of a diverse range of creative genres to produce works of relevance for consumers of street culture with an eye for the ironic. The ABSOLUT Stairwell Gallery presents The it. Collective's first campaign, Trashin' Fashion, at the Sugarmill. Tacky fashion with haute couture sensibilities is the vibe. Showings include elaborate nail art by 2010 Nail Art Awards star Olga Menshikova, false nails as costume jewellery by Peter Jones, photographs by Alex Weltlinger and Steven Mileski, 'trash bag' totes printed with trash-fashion images by graphic artist Laura Ives, and macrame masterpieces by Yin Chuah of jewellery label Yinjoux. Tunes by the Shooters Party will provide the soundtrack to this visually scintillating night, while live nail art will be delivered by Menshikova throughout the evening. Next up for The it. Collective: Backyard Outcast — a fashion film produced in their own backyard, and I hear it features a banana tree, a mirror ball and a coffin no less. What will these crazy kids think of next?
