This quite unconventional Australian film is well worth a look. The combination of a story centring on an opera singer that takes place in an exotic north Queensland castle-like setting makes Celeste notable before the opening frames even commence. There’s a decidedly European flavour to the proceedings, but only up to a point. You can…
A great sense of fun and a rich array of talent are on show as Muriel’s Wedding The Musical hits town. Toni Collette endeared the socially awkward Muriel Heslop to Australia in PJ Hogan’s 1994 film, Muriel’s Wedding. Collette may have left big shoes to fill, but 23-year-old Natalie Abbott has stepped into them with…
The Van Apfel Girls are Gone by Felicity McLean hooked me in with its all-too-familiar north-west of Sydney 1990s setting and the missing girls premise reminiscent of Joan Lindsay’s classic Picnic at Hanging Rock. Here’s the blurb: Tikka Molloy was eleven and one-sixth years old during the long hot summer of 1992 – the summer…
It’s been a long time since I have read George Johnston’s 1964 Miles Franklin Award-winning My Brother Jack. However, through the lens of undergraduate literary-study nostalgia, I still recognise the seminal Australian novel’s place as part of our country’s canon, despite its challenge to our comfortable assumptions of national character. Still, like many I imagine,…
Have you thought about running your own pub? Could you resist drinking the profits? What about the diverse range of regular customers you’ll engage with? In Two, the attraction of pub ownership will either be cemented or disintegrated before your very eyes! And the three words you never want to hear are “on the house”….
Chloe Hooper has, yet again, taken on difficult terrain and a complex subject matter in The Arsonist. As in The Tall Man, there are victims, family members, affected communities and people still trying to get on with their lives, Black Saturday being ten years ago this month / year in the one of the most…
Celia Pacquola seems to be everywhere at the moment. Her regular appearances on shows like Have You Been Paying Attention? and The Project mean she’s a familiar face. And you may recall how she shone in straight role in the ABC’s political satire Utopia. But if that’s not enough Pacquola for you, you need to…
This is a big ask. Miss Fisher’s Murder Mysteries was (and is) one of Australia’s most loved TV shows. So even tinkering around the edges of it is going to be fraught; let alone embarking on a sequel of sorts. But Every Cloud Productions (who made both the original and the upcoming Miss Fisher feature…
‘Single Asian Female’… it’s a clever play-on-movie-title precis for dating profile purposes. Zoe (Michelle Law) however, is so much more than just this descriptor… classical musician, sister and daughter. Like many, her fractured family oscillates between being a constant of disorder and an annoying inconvenience… and this is even without her knowledge of her mother’s…
Red Stitch’s 25th anniversary production of Michael Gow’s Sweet Phoebe turns the tables on the platitude that “a dog is a man’s best friend”. Helen (Olivia Monticciolo) and Frazer (Marcus McKenzie) are an uptight couple – both personally and professionally – who look to be going places. She’s a home designer, involved in her first…
