Apart from Beatrice
Dante Society (SA), Adelaide, 7 July 2024 The afternoon was an homage to ‘The Eternal Feminine,’ and Beatrice hardly got a mention. The Honourable Jing Lee MLC (below, centre) gave a pleasant ‘welcome to all countries’ in emphasis of the upside of multiculturalism, and then we heard from a number of authors from the Ascolta Women Inc. Collective (a creative writing workshop formed in 2020 under the shadow of Covid), to launch their latest anthology, Stories from La Terra, and they read out a few excerpts. Gaspara Stampa (1523-1554) (see main image in B/W) had an unhappy love affair with…
Continue Reading →Barbarian (2022)
(Director – not to be mentioned. He is not to be encouraged.) [Zach Cregger directed, his first, possibly last, effort, although the film made good money apparently – Facts matter- ED.] “Barbarian” is not rateable on the “Babadook Scale“. It’s not that sort of horror movie. It’s the sort on which even fewer pesky script meetings are wasted. You can determine whether you have seen this film by casting yourself in the lead role and answering the following questions. You are a young woman who arrives in the rainy dead of night to find that your B & B is…
Continue Reading →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 →