Vale Donald
Donald Sutherland (17 July 1935 to 20 June 2024) No, they haven’t assassinated Donald Trump, yet. Rather, we honour today the passing of a Donald on the other end of the political spectrum, (if that device still applies). He was sui generis – not handsome, but suited to starring roles, not a ‘character actor’, but he enlivened many otherwise humdrum films with superb vignettes. As to the latter, think of his smiling treacherous Irishman in The Eagle Has Landed (1976), his spooky firebug in Backdraft (1991), his perfect playing as Mr. X in JFK (1991), the smiling-assassin Big-Boss in Disclosure…
Continue Reading →Rhonda Burchmore – Tall Tales
Adelaide Festival Theatre, 12 June 2024 The most famous pair of legs since Betty Grable, Rhonda Burchmore took to the Cabaret Festival stage in a show that gave a full house souvenirs, stories, selfies and songs from her 42 year career (details linked in Wikipedia below), in an amusing reverie touching upon gigs and hotels from hell, celebrities with peccadillos, almost-but-not-quite meeting Michael Jackson, the idiosyncratic Betty Buckley and her vicious Macaw, and more. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rhonda_Burchmore Covering a wide range of songs from ONJ, Melissa Manchester, Eartha Kitt, Bette Midler, Michael Jackson, Amy Winehouse, etc., (song list below), Rhonda’s voice can…
Continue Reading →Challengers
Dir. Luca Guadagnino (2024) Our fabulous Guest Reviewer, Rita, gives us her thoughts on “Challengers”. Thank you, Rita, we didn’t get to see it, all we know about it is that there’s a lot of tennis, so we thank you for your input. NB We know Rita well and she is anything but shallow! See also Rita’s equally pithy review of “Fremont“. The three main characters are awful people in my view but my mind became addled and distracted by the overwhelming physical gorgeousness of Tashi (played effectively by Zendaya). Thus, I have exposed my shallow nature, but I would…
Continue Reading →Fremont
Directed by Babak Jalali (2023) Our insightful Guest Reviewer, Rita, gives us her thoughts on “Fremont”. Rita exhorted us to see it and we are really sorry that we missed it, because Rita knows what is what. So thank you Rita. Please send us more reviews of the weird and the wonderful. See also Rita’s equally succinct review of “Challengers“. I am really interested in your critique(s) on this film. I was gripped by this strange but engaging little gem. Loved the odd beauty of the following. She said, “I brought you a deer.” He replied, “I wanted a deer.” …
Continue Reading →Scatterbrain
By E. H. Visiak (1878-1972) He goes wool-gathering ‘neath the stars; He hath a screw loose: Scatterbrain. He hath a window loose that jars Open to heaven, and falls shut again.
Continue Reading →