Ill-tempered, rude and crude, Billy Bob Thornton returns as anti-hero Willie Soke 13 years after he first donned the Christmas clobber in the independent black comedy Bad Santa for the sequel, predictably titled Bad Santa 2. Bad Santa was the story of a cynical thief who disguised himself as a department store Santa each winter…
Fans of Americana with a long enough memory, will remember The Jayhawks as one of the best bands of the mid-90’s, when albums like Hollywood Town Hall and Tomorrow the Green Grass thrived critically and commercially thanks to the strong songwriting and harmony vocals of Gary Louris and Mark Olson. “Blue” is perhaps the best…
It is December 1999. With the imminent threat of Y2K (the millennium bug) hanging over participants in this drama with comedic elements, the main focus is on cross generational relationships. Lucinda (Tahlia Moffatt) is a 24-year-old goth who walks into an op shop operated by Rose (Janine McGrath). Lucinda, who works in a café, is…
Amy Ingram has a talent for portraying insecure or downtrodden females and she uses that talent well in this rib-tickling little two-hander as Ashley. She was joined by the equally talented Thomas Larkin as the same-name, same problem character. Between them kept the audience laughing, quietly empathising or groaning at ineptitude. The action was played…
Down an Alley Filled with Cats is an Australian play written in 1987, by Warwick Moss. It is a two handed small-time conman comedy-thriller. Timothy Timmony, a Polish refugee second-hand book seller matches wits with a petty Aussie ‘crook’, Simon Matthews, in search of a 12th Century Sung Dynasty vase treasure (The Maltese Falcon?!) worth…
A cheeky gangster flick with attitude, Pixie is a bloody delight … and I do mean that literally. As the body count mounts, the star of the show, Pixie O’Brien (Olivia Cooke), bats her eyelids and schemes away. Pixie is the adopted daughter of a gangster who fell out with a bunch of gun-toting priests,…
British author Francis Spufford travels to America in 1922 for his latest novel, Cahokia Jazz, but it is not an America that readers will know. The alternative world of Cahokia Jazz is one in which smallpox did not decimate the indigenous population of the North America. As a result, when European settlers started to arrive…
How very exciting for The Australian Ballet to be presenting the world premiere of a new full-length ballet … and it is spectacular. Oscar is based on the life and writings of acclaimed Irish poet, playwright and satirist Oscar Wilde (16thOctober, 1854 – 30th November, 1990). The work of Tony Award-winning choreographer Christopher Wheeldon (known…
Inspired by real events, Persian Lessons is the story of one man’s heart-wrenching struggle to survive the Holocaust. Gilles (Nahuel Perez Biscayart) is a Belgian Jew, captured in France in 1942 while trying to make his way to Switzerland. He’s is bundled into the back of a truck along with many others. They expect to…
What a joy laden movie. This could just be the best of the four Bridget Jones films, that date back to 2001 and we have had to wait nine years since the last one. Mad About the Boy, which Jones also narrates, is filled with laughter, romance and reverence. Best of all, she (Renee Zellweger)…
