Each year ends with a bang. You’ll have the end-of-year festivities and people party themselves into the New Year. But when it’s about movies, this one created an end-of-a-film-year-bang. Frankly, I didn’t expect too much of it. But maybe my prejudice about Sandra Bullock has something to do with that. I readily admit that I’m…
It’s rare that we get to see a film from Paraguay. It’s even rarer that this deeply conservative country would produce a film about two elderly lesbians whose relationship is undergoing something of a crisis. But that’s what we get in The Heiresses from writer/director Marcelo Martinessi. Chela (played by veteran theatre actress Anna Brun…
I admit I’ve been a bit tardy catching up with Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt, the buzz US show that marks Tina Fey’s return to the television landscape following the end of 30 Rock. I’ve been so slack in fact that the show released here in Australia in late March and I’m only just getting around to…
A poignant and amusing slice of life musical, it is not hard to see why Fun Home received five Tony Awards for the original Broadway production. That included Best Musical, Best Book of a Musical and Best Original Score. Now, fortunately, Melbourne Theatre Company and Sydney Theatre Company have picked it up and done a wonderful job…
If today’s media call is anything to go by, those attending one, several or all of the Australian Pops Orchestra’s concerts over the next fortnight are in for a special treat. Maestro John Foreman AM is looking to spread joy, happiness and optimism over the festive season. He will be doing so with his magnificent…
The zombie apocalypse is alive and well in director Johannes Roberts’ horror-schlocker Resident Evil: Welcome to Raccoon City. The film starts with a young orphan girl, Claire Redfield, plagued by visions of a presence. Her slightly older brother, Chris looks after her as best he can. Both live in the Raccoon City Orphanage. They were…
Relationships can be tricky to navigate at the best of times, but when you must traverse the cultural divide and respective parents are at cross-purposes the task becomes a whole lot more difficult. That is the premise behind Alex & Eve, the feelgood, comedic romance developed, written by and starring Alex Lykos, who began the…
The faster the dancing the greater the audience excitement at seeing some of the world’s best dancers gyrate and strut their stuff in Burn the Floor, as passionate as they can be about their craft. They are hot, hot, hot! – finely tuned torsos so in sync that their spectacular routines are made to look…
A by-the-numbers revenge thriller, The Marksman centres around a Mexican cartel taking retribution against the family of a man who stole from them. That man – Uncle Carlos (Alfredo Quiroz) – knows he’s toast. With the cartel on his tail, he puts in a hurried call to his niece Rosa (Teresa Ruiz), telling her to…
Max Gillies is a living treasure who brings frustration, despair and humour to three fine pieces involving men at the tail end of their lives. In turn, they are excerpts from A Stretch of the Imagination by Jack Hibberd, Samuel Beckett’s Eh Joe and On the Harmfulness of Tobacco by Anton Chekov. In the first,…
