Benediction is a complex but ultimately moving biopic about the revered Siegfried Sassoon, one of Britain’s great war time poets. Sassoon wrote about the futility of war, the loss of lives and the waste of a generation on the battlefield. He was also a homosexual who had to hide his sexuality in public. This is…
With a life span approaching that of many a dinosaur (30 years), the Jurassic saga comes to an end with Jurassic World Dominion. And as T. S. Eliot presaged, this fictional world ends not with a bang but a whimper. The franchise – having received a shot in the arm with Jurassic World in 2015…
Asghar Farhadi (A Separation – which won an Oscar for Best Foreign Language Film in 2012) is an Iranian filmmaker of extraordinary insight and skill. He writes and directs movies involving ordinary people that have moral quandaries. So it is with his latest film, A Hero. Rahim Soltani (Amir Jadidi) is a man whose wife…
Dehd have grown with each album they have released since their self-titled debut came out in 2016. The band really seemed to be hitting a musical peak with 2020’s Headphone Approved Flower Of Devotion and with all the critical acclaim the indie band experienced – way more attention! That attention led them to Fat Possum…
The Picture of Dorian Gray is an extraordinary triumph of talent and theatricality. It is the very finest of entertainment involving a handsome young man and a portrait that becomes a mirror to his soul. The play shines a spotlight on a world obsessed with youth and beauty. Dorian Gray is painted by his friend, artist Basil…
With major flooding in Northern New South Wales and Southern Queensland fresh in the minds of Australians, Dinuka McKenzie’s debut The Torrent, another entry in the ever growing Australian rural crime genre, hits with renewed relevance. The cold open is the discovery of a body, washed away by the flooding and caught in a stormwater…
A creepy, well-made horror movie, Hatching bites. Young gymnastics student Tinja appears to have the perfect Finnish family. At least her social media obsessed mother wants the outside world to believe that. It is all about perfect smiles and beautiful things. She is also one of those pushy parents who desperately wants her daughter to…
Mothering Sunday is a period drama about doomed love which comes across like an edgier variation on Upstairs Downstairs. The film is set mainly in the spring of 1924. The central character is Jane Fairchild (played by Australian actress Odessa Young), a maid working for the aristocratic Niven family. Jane is an orphan and although…
Our selection of the best new music across a range of genres from the week ending 3 June 2022. Fresh grief, like fresh love, has a way of sharpening our vision and bringing on painful clarifications. No matter how temporary we know these states to be, the vulnerability and transformation they demand can overpower the…
The Wilds, which is the centrepiece of this year’s Rising cultural and artistic festival, is a sensory sensation that I would highly commend to you. You can readily complete a circuit around the “Bowl” in less than an hour. I chose to spend more time there, dwelling around certain installations and taking in the experience of the…
