Sex, drugs and rock ‘n roll. The heartbeat of a suburb is captured in St Kilda Tales. All but two hours of movement and conversation is partly overlaid with music. Ten actors play characters looking for connection, among them friends and the disenfranchised, prostitutes and druggies. On occasion, a single conversation dominates proceedings. At other…
Four actors … who break the fourth wall, track down a Melbourne man from a seven-minute rant obtained by a transcription service and give a potted history of the internet. That, in a nutshell, is the subject matter of the cleverly orchestrated play that puts the fear of God into you. In fact, humour and paranoia are…
The Red Turtle is a dialogue-free animated film from the renowned Studio Ghibli, which has given us Howl’s Moving Castle and Spirited Away. But this is an international co production between France and Japan, and is the first non-Japanese film produced by the revered animation studios. This is a richly emotional and resonant exploration of…
Inspired by the 1933 film The Invisible Man starring Claude Rains and Gloria Stuart, and its 2020 reimagining, INVISIBLE is a sensory experience, not for the claustrophobic. That is made clear during a brief introduction, after which we are ushered into a refrigerated shipping container (that, fortunately, is not refrigerated), containing two rows of theatre…
What if space travel had evolved to such an extent that man had landed on Mars and you had inadvertently been left on the red planet with next to no chance of survival? That is the premise at the heart of this action adventure science fiction film, directed by Ridley Scott (Alien, Blade Runner, Black…
If provocative theatre and the art of confrontation are your thing, then have I got a play for you! Ulster American is wildly funny, but not for the feint-hearted. Playwright David Ireland takes aim at politics and the treatment of women. Jay Conway (Steve Bastoni) is an arrogant – but Oscar-winning – actor. The American…
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…
The satirical virtuosity in this show is in both the writing and execution. A small, talented troupe of entertainers that has been at it annually since 2000 just keeps delivering. The only pity is that because they are based in Sydney, we rarely get to see them further south. Their material is cultural and political. They skewer noteworthy figures…
Prolific historian Dan Jones has turned his deep knowledge to provide the basis of a fictional account of the start of the hundred years war in Essex Dogs. The book is the first of a planned trilogy about a group of scrappy fighters caught up in the wars between the British and the French, a…
Traditional cultural beliefs clash with modernity in the searing Norwegian drama What Will People Say (Hva Vil Folk Si). Writer and director Iram Haq’s evocative semi-autobiographical work clasps you tight as you desperately hope for a way out for a trapped teenager. As the film opens in Norway, Nisha (Maria Mozhdah) is balancing two separate…
