Movie l Citizenfour l M
Edward Snowden, the former National Security Agency (NSA) contractor analyst, gazes humbly downwards on the poster for Citizenfour, a documentary covering the course of the leaks scandal unleashed by this unassuming geek.
But Laura Poitras’ documentary (I would highly recommend her earlier film about Iraqi elections My Country, My Country) originally began with a different ...
“Shall we receive good from God, and shall we not receive evil?” – Job 2:10
Andrei Zvyagintsev’s fourth feature film has been wrapped up in political controversy in Russia. Commentators at home and in the international media have seized upon it as an attack on Vladimir Putin’s regime, personified in the film by actor Roman Madyanov’s corrupt small-town mayor.
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If you are a fan of Australian musician Tim Rogers, front man of the ’90s band You Am I, you will love the latest offering from the Melbourne Theatre Company. Even if you have never heard the album, What Rhymes with Cars and Girls, the story around the lyrics, created by playwright Aidan Fennessy will draw you in.
Birdman arrives on Australian screens in the middle of a popular rush of support in the run up to the Oscars. Debate over its merits continue, with critics in the US celebrating director Alejandro G Inarritu’s film as a latterday tribute to the likes of Godard and Fellini, while those who dislike the film decry it as a pretentious attempt ...
What makes a Methodist Lady? Jill Sanguinetti’s memoir, School Days of a Methodist Lady: a journey through childhood, goes a considerable way to answering to this question. She introduces us to Methodist Ladies College of the late 1950s to early 1960s and her time there as a boarder.
Jill’s gift, and the prompt for writing this book, was finding, in ...
DAVE Dye’s The Anzac Legend is an extremely well-researched illustrated graphic novel that describes the initial landing at Gallipoli. At 218 pages, it represents years of work.
Since retiring from military service in 2011, Dye has worked solidly on visualising the conflict in a way that is accessible to readers familiar with Anzac stories, but with little understanding of the ...
Movie l The Water Diviner l M
Russell Crowe has chosen one of the great narratives of modern Australia to make his directorial debut.
Crowe plays Joshua Connor, a Mallee farmer who makes a graveside promise to his wife four years after the First World War. He vows to bring the remains of their three sons home to be buried ...
To be honest, I don’t know what I expected to learn by reading Love Without Limits. Perhaps I was just sucked in by the promise of a “remarkable story of true love conquering all”.
Admittedly the book had a lot going for it, being the latest offering from Australian-raised and Californian-based motivational speaker and evangelist Nick Vujicic.
Film | The Hunger Games: Mockingjay – Part 1
That’s an ugly set of punctuation marks.
Some years ago film reviewers liked to poke fun at movie titles so overlong they needed their own clauses. Star Wars: Episode II – Attack of the Clones was one notable offender. It’s a ‘who will blink first’ naming convention that reflects the dominance ...
The Dynamic one-woman shows ’s 2014 season is ending with a bang. Its three last productions for the year, Once (a joint collaboration with the Gordon Frost Organisation, reviewed last month), I’ll Eat You Last and Pennsylvania Avenue are all running throughout most of December.
Pennsylvania Avenue, a one-woman cabaret-style play by Melbourne playwright Joanna Murray-Smith is promoted as follow-on ...
I chuckled as I read the testimony of a recent convert to atheism in which he described his epiphany as a ‘Road to Damascus experience’. Sadly, the irony will have been lost on his audience. Such is the general lack of familiarity with the Bible, we even need to ask whether the irony was intentional.
Holiday season is here again. The days are getting warmer and the invitation to feel hot sand between your toes is too tempting to ignore. Then, before you know it, it is Christmas. A time of gift-giving, making merry and good food. The Australian summer is ideally designed for indolence and easy living.
The perfect season for the book lover.
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