Film Review: The Killer Inside Me

The Killer Inside Me. 108 minutes. Rated MA15+. Directed by Michael Winterbottom. Screenplay by John Curran. Based on the novel by Jim Thompson.

If ever there was a film to reignite the debate about sex and violence on film – and particularly violence against women with which this film is pornographically afflicted – then Winterbottom’s nasty, nihilistic, exploitative, dead-end of a movie is it.

It has pretensions to being a stylish, psychological thriller in the classic film noir tradition of the 1940s and ‘50s, where gangsters, thugs, detectives and femme fatales ruled the silver screen in monochromatic splendour and intrigue. The grand noir tradition was almost always powered by a masterful manipulation of light, sound, suspense and suggestion. Winterbottom, instead, has opted for splice and dice – and the result is often repulsive.

Based on Thompson’s 1952 pulp fiction novel about a small town Deputy Sheriff/serial killer ‘Lou Ford’ (a chilling performance from Casey Affleck), Curran’s screenplay is a faithful adaptation of Thompson’s typically bleak novel in which there isn’t a redeeming feature to be found in anyone, anywhere. Winterbottom has been reportedly defending his film against the outrage from people who have been deeply affected by the gruelling, long sequences of violence by saying that all he did was film the book. Ironically, if animals were treated in a film the way Jessica Alba’s big-hearted prostitute ‘Joyce’ is, the filmmakers would probably be facing criminal charges.

As a reviewer, one is always challenged to find the context – the reason and purpose in the films we go to see. Marcel Zyskind’s gorgeous cinematography is stunning and Mark Tildesley’s (28 Weeks Later, Sunshine, The Constant Gardener) production design is incredibly evocative of ‘small-town USA’ in the 1950s (the cars are fantastic!). Mags Arnold’s skilful editing ensures the film’s languid pace matches the increasingly disturbing plot developments to perfection.

But like the time I saw a dog hit by a car, this film is something I wish I had never seen. It will haunt me for a very long time, and entirely for all the wrong reasons.

This review was commissioned by the Geraldton Newspaper Group.

Theatre Review: Outlaw

Outlaw by Michael Healy. Directed by James Adler. Eagle’s Neat Theatre. Northcote Town Hall until September 3.

There’s a really interesting play to be written about the complexities of ‘Green politics’, but this inert, one-dimensional drama by Mr Healy isn’t it. It doesn’t garner any favours, either, from Mr Adler’s almost perfunctory ‘walk-on during the blackout, stand and/or sit around, walk-off during the blackout' staging which appeared determined to disengage with the play’s all too fleeting and momentary moments of imagined intrigue and reduce it to a banal, self-interested and self-reverential soap opera.

In Germany (for some inexplicable reason), there is a tyre-slasher making a real nuisance of themselves within the local community, but the cast seem to treat the whole thing like the rest of us treat a pesky fly at a BBQ. As the play drags on, the head of the environmental activist organisation ‘Greenfriends’ (get it?) Tillman (Will Ward Ambler) is increasingly suspected of being the tyre-slasher. What doesn’t increase, sadly, is our interest in why it matters. What does increase, however, is our frustration with thinly-drawn characters standing and/or sitting around wrapped up in their own self-absorbed, dreary lives while Mr Healy takes to the media with the most unrelenting, tedious and ultimately pointless amount of ‘media bashing’ since the last Joanna Murray-Smith play I saw. The irony is that the indefatigable Phil Zachariah gave the best performance as ‘Ludo’, a journalist. David Loney as ‘Andreas’, Tillman’s “Right Hand Man” literally burst onto the stage with an abundance of energy, characterisation and audibility, which only made him seem more and more out of place – as though he was acting in an entirely different production of an entirely different play. If anyone else had made even the slightest effort to rise to meet him, we might have had a performance on our hands.

The bits of design by Meri Hietala were great, albeit very literal – especially her use of tyres as an ottoman and as parts of the over-used sofa. I especially liked her knife chandelier.

Ultimately, the real dramatic irony of this performance was that only a day later, Australia had its first ‘Green’ MP in our House of Representatives (even if it was with Labor and Liberal preferences) and an increased number of seats in the Australian Senate. Now that’s fascinating. But I’m only a self-serving journalist, so what would I know?

The review was commissioned by Stage Whispers magazine at www.stagewhispers.com.au

Theatre Review: Pin Drop

Pin Drop. Created and performed by Tamara Saulwick. Arts House, North Melbourne Town Hall until Sunday August 29.

Sometimes, but only very occasionally, theatre-makers redefine what’s possible. Sometimes, the often fraught act of ‘collaboration’ evolves to result in a piece of theatre so hypnotic that you can’t actually believe what you are seeing. But rarely, in my experience, does a piece of theatre-making get so entirely under my skin that every single sense is startled into being in ways that I had never imagined possible.

With what can only be described as pure genius, Ms Saulwick and her expert team of artists and eleven additional recorded voices, has created one of the most extraordinarily involving and rewarding theatrical experiences. Every one of my senses was awoken by this intoxicating and hypnotic symphony of sound and light from the exceptional Ms Saulwick – and anyone who has any interest whatsoever in sensory perception or a stunning showcase in breath-taking technical skill should rush to the Arts House at the North Melbourne Town Hall this weekend to experience this supreme example of it.

Even with a grueling review schedule in the punishing Melbourne mid-Winter, I was compelled to walk home from North Melbourne with every one of my senses newly awakened to anything and everything that was going on around me. The sound of a creaking door in a shop across the road, distant voices, my heels on the footpath, screeching tyres and trundling, clanging trams – every familiar sound was highlighted in a totally new and unique way, such is the sensory power harvested and elucidated in this magnificent performance of immense theatrical adventurousness.

Sound Artist Peter Knight (composition, sound design and operation) is a genius. The intricate, other-worldly qualities of Mr Knight’s soundscape are astonishingly good, and in all my theatre-going experiences, I have never experienced technical artistry of such profound sensory invigoration like this. Ever. The design – credited to Bluebottle – Ben Cobham and Frog Peck – is extraordinary, deceptively simple yet masterful and remarkably perceptive. It makes me almost grieve for that way sound and light is so unjustly mis-used in the theatre (where even just turning a couple of lights on and pointing them at the stage seems to be considered ‘design’).

But it doesn’t stop there – such is the determination of Ms Saulwick for her peformance to be one of such alarming originality that even (and one might say especially) the good old theatre term ‘blackout’ takes on an entirely new dimension. Michelle Heaven’s movement is absolute and performed by Ms Saulwick with such a heightened level of skill and awareness that it is almost brutal in its sparsity, constantly surprising in its invention and never less than entirely of service to the soundscape and the almost filmic visions that unfold with pure poetic beauty.

Unforgettable. Go.

This review was commissioned by Stage Whispers magazine @ www.stagewhispers.com.au

Film Review: Salt

Salt. 100 minutes. Rated M. Directed by Phillip Noyce. Screenplay by Kurt Wimmer.

No amount of flashy but unexceptional production values can disguise the inordinate amount of silliness going on in this unrelievedly calculated, one-note political/spy thriller from Australia’s Phillip Noyce (Rabbit-Proof Fence, Patriot Games, Dead Calm).

Kurt Wimmer’s (Law Abiding Citizen) inert screenplay seems trapped in the dim, distant past with its terribly dated ‘Russian Spy Cold War Nuclear Political Assassination’ mash-up of convoluted plot-lines – and while there’s one genuine moment of intrigue early on, everything that follows is so obviously sign-posted and strangely predictable that there is hardly a thrill to be had. Great contemporary examples of this genre (Enemy of the State, The Informant, The Recruit) have plots that can turn on the head of a pin. Regrettably, this one doesn’t and ultimately you leave the cinema with the distinct impression that here is a film that believes it is cleverer than it actually is.

CIA Agent Evelyn Salt (Angelina Jolie) is on her way home from the office to celebrate her anniversary with her husband Mike (August Diehl) when her departure is interrupted by the arrival of a ‘walk-in’ – a Russian defector Vassily Orlov (Daniel Olbrychski) who has some important information he wants to share. Salt agrees to a brief interview with Orlov, who promptly declares that Salt is a Russian Spy who is going to assassinate the Russian President when he visits America for the funeral of the Vice-President. Salt must quickly discover how to prove to her CIA colleagues that this is not the case.

Ms Jolie is on auto-pilot throughout and is never as good as she was in Wanted, Mr and Mrs Smith or even her first venture into this action-packed genre – Lara Croft and the Tomb Raiders. Ms Jolie is a much better actress than this (The Changeling is just one example of her outstanding range) and Liev Schreiber’s performance as her partner/defender/foe ‘Ted Winter’ is deadly dull – appearing by the end to be only marginally more interested by the whole thing than we are. Chiwetel Ejiofor (2012) as CIA Mastermind ‘Peadbody’ tries hard to generate some interest in the proceedings, but only Mr Olbrychski and Mr Diehl manage to bring any kind of class to what turns out to be a very long, bloody, noisy, panicked, violent and instantly forgettable 100 minutes.

This review was commissioned by the Geraldton Newspaper Group and appeared in the printed edition of the Geraldton Guardian.

Theatre Review: The Boy From Oz

The Boy From Oz. Music and Lyrics by Peter Allen. Book by Nick Enright. The Production Company, State Theatre, Victorian Arts Centre, Melbourne. Returning 5 to 16 January, 2011.

Before Bette Midler performed the final song of her “Kiss My Brass” concert in Sydney in 2005, she told us that Australia had been responsible for the gift to the world of some of the best songs she had ever sung. Then, as the stage became awash with pink, Ms Midler sang Peter Allen’s Tenterfield Saddler. Ms Midler is always at her best with a thoughtful and considered ballad, and her performance of this iconic Allen tune was perfection.

And on Wednesday night, as we filed out of the State Theatre having witnessed the opening night performance of the Production Company’s The Boy From Oz, I overheard someone say “just perfect” … and how right they were. Great performances of theatre sometimes appear to take place inches above the stage, not on it – such is the unquestionable dynamic certain ensembles of performers bring to the presentation of their craft.

Blessed with an amazing script by the great Nick Enright, Nancye Hayes’s direction is all pure theatrical animal instinct and the tableaus that meld her vision of the show together are stunning. The fluidity and precision with which this enormous undertaking moves across the huge State Theatre stage is seamless, and Ms Hayes fills the stage with immensely beautiful stage pictures, painted with people, that – at times – are just breathtaking. Andrew Hallsworth’s sensational choreography is faultless and delivered with great vigour and passion by the never less than outstanding cast.

And what a cast! Christen O’Leary and Fem Belling have the unenviable task of bringing Judy Garland and Liza Minelli to life, respectively, and both manage to do so with considerable impact. Robyn Arthur was divine as Allen’s mother Marion Woolnough, and her show-stopping, tear-inducing performance of Don’t Cry Out Loud was magic. David Harris, was equally divine as Allen’s lover for 15 years Greg Connell, owning I honestly love you with a show-stopping interpretation that was so good and so beautifully performed, that it was as though the song was existing for the very first time. Fletcher O’Leary (one of the two boys who will play Young Peter throughout the season) gave the performance of a seasoned veteran, and his melding with the older Peter in the recreation of the famous Radio City Music Hall Rockettes kick-line was yet another show-stopper. Wonderful support was provided by the razzle-dazzle trio of Claire George, Samantha Morley and Sun Park who, apart from being very handy with moving the white grand-piano, also conquered the vocal demands with artful precision and flair.

Musical Director John Foreman championed the big, challenging score into one dazzling unit and his band, including members of Orchestra Victoria, was the best it is possible to be. In Music Theatre, there’s an unspoken anxiety in the relationship between the music, the work and the audience. It’s that moment when an instrument slips out of tune or off the beat. It’s that tempo that trips over itself or drags. It’s that startled cringe when the magic and slippery bond that unites great ensembles of musicians falls away. But not here. Mr Foreman and his band were in complete command, and the result was electrifying, particularly much of the tempi which showcased not only Mr Allen’s fantastic tunes, but powered the work of the entire company. From the complete Broadway tuner When I Get My Name In Lights to the intricacy of every heartbeat of Quiet Please, There’s a Lady Onstage, Mr Foreman and his band were pure trust, and more perfect than the greatest expectation.

Shaun Gurton’s impressive and marvelously versatile set design served the work at every turn and Trudy Dalgleish’s lighting of it was brilliant. Kim Bishop’s wonderful costumes brought the showmanship and the pizzazz to life beautifully, but also served to reinforce the era in which Peter Allen lived – a life of such immense passion, dedication and total commitment to the pursuit of his dreams.

Some performers are simply perfect for a particular role – and Todd McKenney brings Peter Allen to life as though they share every piece of one another’s DNA. McKenney’s is a must-see performance of music theatre fire, passion, artistry, flair and great intelligence. Quite apart from the fact that he rarely leaves the stage (and only then to change into another of Mr Allen’s signature outlandish shirts), Mr McKenney reads every beat to perfection and is so alive to every nuance of his character’s journey through this thoughtfully structured show, that at times, it becomes quite overwhelming. When the archival footage of Mr Allen playing the piano and singing Tenterfield Saddler is projected onto a large screen that descends from the fly tower, Mr McKenney sits on a step and watches him with such admiration and understanding that it becomes an incredibly powerful moment of pure pathos – the kind that is only possible in the theatre when ‘theatre people’ are doing what they do best.

And it’s hard to imagine a better example of it than this.

This review was commissioned by Stage Whispers magazine @ www.stagewhispers.com.au

Theatre Review: She's Not Performing

She’s Not Performing by Alison Mann. La Mama Theatre, Melbourne until September 5.

There’s an important new voice in Australian Theatre – and it is the voice of young playwright Alison Mann, whose first full-length play She’s Not Performing is an absolute ripper. ‘Issue-based’ theatre always has the potential to be sabotaged by its own worthiness, but not in the hands of this adventurous and marvelously talented young playwright and her dramaturg – Melbourne’s Mistress of psychosexual invention and efficiency, Maude Davey. Stripped away is all the sometimes attendant cloying and wearying victim association, and what we are left with is a script of immense perception, totally lacking in sentimentality and one that not only does complete justice to the stories of the birth mothers of adopted children whom have shared their intimate secrets with Ms Mann – but entirely alters the hackneyed old clichés associated with our condescending and entirely ignorant perceptions of their act of often supreme personal sacrifice.

If Tanya Beer is not one of Melbourne’s hottest and most inventive designers (beautifully illuminated by Darren Kowacki and Lisa Mibus’s captivating lighting design), then I have no idea who is. Ms Beer’s eventual loss to the mainstages of not only this country, but I predict others, will be a great loss to Melbourne’s independent theatre scene. Her signature and singular abilities to substantially alter our perception of spatial relationships within the theatre space is without peer on the independent scene, and her design for this play (like her visionary work for Platform Youth Theatre Company’s One is Warm …) is unerringly brilliant, responsible, evolved and in complete service to the text. Her catwalk structure for She’s Not Performing is possibly representative of the finest use of La Mama’s demanding little space I have ever seen – and to walk into the theatre and suddenly find it not only unrecognisable but appearing to be about twice as big, is no mean feat. Ms Beer never forgets the ceiling and all the wonderful creative possibilities that exist between it and the floor. And like that wonderful piece of advice a seasoned traveler gave me before I left for my first trip to Europe – “Don’t forget to look up” – this is completely involving design for theatre.

Kelly Somes’s direction, it might be argued, could not have failed, but Ms Somes’s wonderfully inventive use of the space and the skillfully guided and riveting rawness of the honesty of the performances she has harvested here mark her as a director to watch. Yes, there are a good too many comings and goings and, as usual, it’s impossible to determine exactly how much of the extraneous fizz was the result of opening night nerves – but there’s nothing to be nervous about, because the piece moves with undeniable force of honesty, skill, understanding and a profound need to be seen and heard.

Andrea Close as ‘Margarite’ gives one of the best performances of the year as the woman who gave away her child. Fearless, shameless and utterly committed to the enormous task at hand (Margarite is only offstage for a costume change), Ms Close’s performance is a must-see. It would be a mistake to discuss it in too much detail here, because the range of emotions you will feel watching Ms Close bring the complex Margarite to life should unfurl for you in the same startling, profound and hypnotic manner in which they unfurled for me. Her precise stillness, her charming and child-like optimism and abandon and her immense sadness and regret, eventually compound into a grand scene between her and 'Hamish', the father of her only child – beautifully realised by Christopher Bunworth.

Interestingly, the weakest character is young ‘Iain’, Margarite’s earnest and erstwhile suitor, played by Mike McEvoy. Whether Mr McEvoy was determined to play the subtext or whether the character really does appear on the page as a bit of a ‘wet-nappy’, is impossible to tell. It was only these scenes that revealed a hint of Ms Mann’s lack of experience and, perhaps, dominant vision that her play would be about the stories of the women, almost at the expense of the emotional needs of the men in their lives and in her play. It was fascinating that the women were beyond ‘victim’ but both the male characters were still very much anchored in their woe and pouty, disempowered misfortune. It is the same gender deficiency that spoiled Jane Campion’s The Piano for me, and quite possibly, Mr Bunworth and Mr McEvoy might need to actually be less-intimidated by Ms Close’s Margarite and more responsible for their place in her life as truths awaken in all of their hideous beauty.

Rachel Purchase is superb as ‘Annie’, and the joy of watching her scenes with Ms Close are as memorable as it gets. Again, it would be remiss of me to say too much about Ms Purchase’s challenges throughout the evening – but she rises to meet them all with star power, divine physical literacy and a genuine and affecting naivety.

I cannot recommend this short season highly enough. Rug up, and go. You’ll be sorry you missed it.

Photo by Talya Chalef.

This review was commissioned by Stage Whispers magazine @ www.stagewhispers.com.au

Film Review: Splice

Splice. 104 minutes. Rated MA15+. Directed by Vincenzo Natali. Screenplay by Vincenzo Natali, Antoinette Terry Bryant and Doug Taylor.

If there’s one reason to see this rough and ready little B-Grade shocker, it’s to play that good old ‘spot the movie it’s trying to be’. It’s a great game, and on occasions like this, a far better way of getting bang for your buck than expecting to become involved in what the filmmakers loosely define as plot.

Scientists Clive (Adrien Brody powering along in career sabotage mode) and Elsa (Sarah Polley in perfect “you expect me to do what?!” mode) are fiddling around with genetic engineering experiments. There’s lots of dialogue about isolating protein, cloning, DNA and all sorts of other random scientific waffle that takes place in front of some impressive, heavy-duty scientific equipment. Curiously, it’s actually difficult to imagine these two being able to successfully engineer a mug of Continental Cup-a-Soup between them, but suddenly we have a mutant child/creature who, before you can say “Lots of Noodles”, grows into a mutant young adult called ‘Dren’ (Delphine Chanéac with more than a little help from the special effects department).

Clive and Elsa then spend the rest of the movie educating, nurturing, imprisoning, surgically mutilating, chasing, punishing and generally torturing the poor creature until, as you might expect, she turns against them. And who can blame her? The only real surprise is that it takes her as long as it does to get some pay-back on our peculiar pair of nerdy control freaks.

Ms Chanéac’s mutant gets all the best moments and gives the best performance, which is even more bizarre given that most of her body is computer-generated. The promise shown by occasionally dodgy mutant baby creature quickly evaporates as we find ourselves in ‘abandoned country house and surrounding snow-bound forest territory’ where Natali (Cube), cinematographer Tetsuo Nagata (The Passionate Life of Edith Piaf) and editor Michele Conroy try desperately hard to ramp-up the tension and suspense, but only end up not being able to increase the body count quickly enough to maintain even a nominal amount of interest.

As for our game, I spotted Alien, Jeepers Creepers and Frankenstein – but I won’t say anymore because I don’t want to ruin your fun, especially since it’s the only fun you’ll have.

This review was commissioned by the Geraldton Newspaper Group.

Theatre Review: The Bougainville Photoplay Project

The Bougainville Photoplay Project. Devised and performed by Paul Dwyer. Directed by David Williams. Arts House, North Melbourne Town Hall until August 15.

In the award-winning 1999 documentary Facing The Demons, the family and friends of murder victim Michael Marslew meet face-to-face in a ‘restorative justice conference’ between two of the offenders responsible for Michael’s death. Produced by the Dee Cameron Company, the documentary was broadcast to widespread critical and public acclaim – going on to win the Logie for ‘Best Documentary’ and the Award for Best Television at the United Nations’ annual Media Peace Awards.

‘Restorative justice’ and ‘restorative practice’ are both more- and less-complex versions of the concept of mediation, fuelled by society’s need (and preference) for understanding, forgiveness, harmony and mutual respect and cooperation as opposed to the ‘criminal justice system’ that focuses exclusively on argument, punishment, incarceration and – hopefully – rehabilitation.

In this beautifully directed and performed lecture, Dr Dwyer explores the essence of restorative justice through his engrossing, intimate reminiscence of his father Allan’s work (and his young family’s experience of it) as a renowned orthopedic surgeon in Bougainville during the 1960s. Gradually, the performance shifts its focus to the post-colonial relationships between the people of Bougainville, the Australian Government and BCL (a subsidiary of the mining giant Rio Tinto) whose enormous open-cut copper mine resulted in social and environmental armageddon.

Through the use of archival video (including the mining company’s shocking propaganda film My Valley is Changing), slides of a young family’s visits to Bougainville, photographs, projections and a collection of the “miracle doctor’s” tools the ghost of Dr Allan Dwyer pervades the performance, which makes its capitulation into agitprop a little discomforting. The juxtaposition between the pure-hearted goodness of one (the good doctor) with the capitalistic, imperialistic and self-serving actions of the other (the evil mining corporation) fails to do the argument complete justice. There is no illumination with regards to what the advantages of this mine might have been (if in fact there even were any), and yet without it, there is a hint of political opportunism that for inquiring minds, decreases the overall effectiveness of the piece. The resulting simplistic strain of revenging and avenging the horrors of destructive industry in the bountiful region also fails to meet the complex psychological imperatives within the concept of ‘restorative practice’ – abandoning us, instead, approximately halfway up the great Silvan Tomkins’s ‘Nine Affects’ scale of the human expression of emotion (disgust, distress and shame).

Interestingly, apart from the stunning recreations of his father’s surgical procedures, Dr Dwyer really ups the stakes with a stunning performance of his dangerous nighttime trek to a local forgiveness ceremony. With the use of only a tiny flashlight and a complete command of Bougainville’s lingua franca – Tok Pisin – we experience another level of engagement entirely both with and between the performer and his story. It becomes something like an exorcism – and is at once thrilling, dangerous and exciting. It is also the only point at where the performance embodies the fundamental cultural differences and similarities that define the accepted endpoint of restorative practice in action – which is euphoria, discovered through the act of understanding, acceptance and forgiveness, not the conceptualisation and analysis of it.

Dr Dwyer’s quiet and disarming final statement is that he plans to return to Bougainville with his two sons sometime in the not too distant future. I, for one, wish him well. What it will ultimately take for our nation to follow, sadly, remains anyone’s guess.

This review was commissioned by Stage Whispers Magazine @ www.stagewhispers.com.au

DVD Review: The Last Song

The Last Song. 103 minutes. Rated PG. Directed by Julie Anne Robinson. Screenplay by Nicholas Sparks and Jeff Van Wie. Adapted from the novel by Nicholas Sparks.

When the behemoth Avatar was knocked off the top spot on US box office list, it was by a great little film called Dear John – the story of a young soldier’s (John, played by Channing Tatum) love affair with ‘Savannah’ (played by Amanda Seyfried). Dear John also heralded an international breakthrough for writer Nicholas Sparks (whose 2004 novel The Notebook had also been adapted into a successful film starring Ryan Gosling and Rachel McAdams).

The secret to Sparks’s success lies in the simple fact that he doesn’t take his predominantly younger audiences for fools – and while his books follow a faintly predictable pathway through romantic drama and all the attendant complications, there is always more than enough character development to ensure we care enough to want to know what is going to happen in the end.

Ronnie Miller (Miley Cyrus) and her brother Jonah (Bobby Coleman) go to spend the holidays with their father Steve (Greg Kinnear) at his house by the sea. The fractured family dynamics play out perfectly as Ronnie punishes her father for having separated from their mother Kim (Kelly Preston) by sulking around the place and taking him to task for his very obvious failings as a husband and father. When she meets a handsome local lad Will (Liam Hemsworth), Ronnie gradually begins to understand that love – and life – can be a great deal more complicated than she ever imagined.

Skilfully directed by Julie Anne Robinson (whose previous work consists mostly of television including episodes of Grey's Anatomy and Weeds) and beautifully edited by Nancy Richardson (Twilight, The Twilight Saga: Eclipse) who is obviously right at home in this territory, The Last Song is a charming, engaging and ultimately deeply moving story about the ties that bind us together in our search for someone who will love and understand us.

Cyrus (better known to practically everyone as the indefatigable Hannah Montana) and Melbourne-born Hemsworth (Neighbours, McLeod's Daughters, Home and Away) are excellent as the young leads, and the success of the film owes much to their onscreen charisma and complete lack of pretension. Bobby Coleman is superb as the little brother – and his pivotal scenes late in the film as the drama reaches its conclusion are beautifully handled and extremely moving.

Kinnear (As Good as It Gets, Little Miss Sunshine) delivers an under-stated performance as the ‘can’t-do-anything-right’ Dad, but his character’s journey through the film is ultimately revealed to have been beautifully controlled and painfully honest. The shot of him and Ms Cyrus on the verandah of his house as Jonah is taken home by his mother toward the end of the story is unforgettable.

The Last Song is a smart, surprising, rewarding, deeply-affecting film that will reward lovers of contemporary romantic drama – and it is well worth every minute of the time you spend in its engrossing company.

Pictured: Miley Cyrus and Liam Hemsworth in The Last Song.

The review was commissioned by the Geraldton Newspaper Group.

Theatre Review: Sappho ... In 9 Fragments

Sappho … in 9 Fragments. Written and performed by Jane Montgomery Griffiths. Staging by Marion Potts. CUB Malthouse, Melbourne until August 21.

Sometimes being in the audience at the theatre can be an enlightening, entertaining, challenging, thought-provoking, deeply moving and uplifting affair. Sometimes, if you’re lucky, it can be all of these things. Mostly, you count yourself lucky if it’s one of them. Sometimes, you can also sit there wondering what on earth is going on, and I need to confess, straight up, that from the moment it started to the moment it finished, Ms Montgomery Griffiths’ brilliantly performed ode to the poet Sappho went straight over my head. I’m sorry, but it did. I felt it all whiz past me, as I stared balefully at the stage wondering what on earth I’d missed. Had Act One started at 6pm? Was this Act Two? Why was she naked? Where do you go from the purest of human physical forms?

And like falling asleep on a train and waking up – panicked and disorientated – at an instantly unrecognisable locale, I realised that I was in the wrong place – particularly complex when you’re there to write a review. The harder I tried to concentrate, the more hazy it all became. I would grip onto a word, a phrase, a sentence … desperately trying to make sense of it all. What was it trying to say? What was I supposed to feel?

What is that great big box doing taking up almost the entire stage and restricting one of the most singularly adventurous and physically literate actresses in the country to a zillionenth of what might have been possible?

I’m hallucinating! Embellishing! Delirious with the fear of my own dumbness. The starkness of my sudden and confronting illiteracy! I’ve got no idea what she’s talking about. Oh, wait. Gaps. I am the gap. The gap. Gap. Gap between what? And what? The gap between all this wonderfully clever writing and acting and my power of even fundamental comprehension. She’s in love with someone who’s gorgeous and … oh, now she’s a nasty bossy nasty piece of work. I think. Maybe.

Biscuit tin. Now I am in a biscuit tin. I visualise a biscuit tin – one with a particularly pretty embossed tableau of some sweet, snow-bound English village like the ones you buy really cheaply at Coles at Christmas Time to have on standby for when friends drop by and have a Christmas present for you and you don’t have one for them. God!

This Sappho is everything! … and she has a beautiful coat.

I’m clever enough, I think, to know that the play is going to finish when the honey has all dripped out of the box and onto the stage. I have to keep telling myself it’s honey, because my poor little over-zealous imagination is beginning to imagine it’s something else. But nothing prepared me for the meat-tray.

I leave the theatre with my platonic plus one and we wander, destroyed and disillusioned, off into whatever remains of our ordinary little, happier lives.

It’s been five days and it’s still no clearer … but I did go to Borders and try to buy a book I’ve always wanted to read: The Death of Socrates. Or Plato. One of them. They don’t have it in stock! I’ve failed again. I will be cleverer! This intoxicating Sappho would expect nothing less. Would she?

Pictured: Jane Montgomery Griffith in Sappho. Photographed by Jeff Busby.

Theatre Review: Stephen Lynch – The Three Balloons Tour

Stephen Lynch: The 3 Balloons Tour. The Palms at Crown, Melbourne.

Diminutive YouTube phenonemon and Tony Award Nominee Stephen Lynch took all of about a minute to have the capacity crowd eating out of his hands with a hilarious video about a ‘Hands on a Hard Body’ competition. In it, Mr Lynch has been in training for ages (along with a rag-tag bunch of other competitors), to endure the wintery elements and keep his hands firmly planted on a truck. The person who keeps their hands on the truck the longest, wins the truck. Hands gloved and incredibly psyched up for what could be any number of days and nights ahead, the competition begins and everyone places their hands on the truck. Lynch’s punch-drunk enthusiasm immediately gets the better of him, and in a moment of unbridled glee, he removes his hands from the truck and waves them about in the air. And he is immediately disqualified.

It is this marvelously endearing moment of self-deprecating humour that sets the tone for all that is follow, as Lynch sets out to avenge his obvious failings with the incarnation of a (literally) devilishly sexy and blokey personae where nothing is off-limits. His imitation of Christopher Reeve (“Dear Diary”) was spectacular – just as his safety valve (the words “too soon?”) challenged us all to lighten up and question the extent to which we were truly outraged. The difference is all in the intention, and one never sensed that Mr Lynch was being cruel. He was, instead, harvesting recognisable moments of our lives and our history to bring us all to the euphoric point of just being able to have a bloody good laugh, in spite of our earnest concerns about being politically incorrect.

This was certainly not a show for the uptight PC crowd who would have been totally offended by much of what was on offer. When comedians push the envelope to the extent that Mr Lynch does, it all comes down to talent and charisma. Even though he admitted to feeling terribly jetlagged and sick (which showed in some of the slower rambling segments that barely held together), you never had the sense that here was a performer taking themselves too seriously.

There was also the added bonus of the devoted audience singing along (not bad for someone whose work we only know of from YouTube), and his song about his “special” friend (“Special Ed”) had the audience roaring out the lyrics (“ … and now his mother keeps him in the / SHED!”) Interestingly, the most vocal members of the audience were male – proving that regardless how we all feel about a song about waiting for the results of our AIDS test (which started the show), its provocative lyrics certainly found their mark. Subliminally, Mr Lynch is also making a significant comment about the importance of safe-sex – and I would posit that a large percentage of his audience would take-home a punchy and compelling message about the need for it in their lives. He should be congratulated for taking the time and the responsibility because, frankly, no-one else is.

Lynch was superbly supported by his best mate Rod Cone who, expertly, was the butt (both literally and figuratively) of Mr Lynch’s rambling odyssey to bromance and appalling humourous, blokey camaraderie. Their song about the ‘hot girl’s fat best friend’ in the pub was so spot-on that it has been the subject of much conversation ever since – as was the song about “Queer Tattoos”, which was almost as clever and tear-inducingly hilarious as it got.

The sound at The Palms at Crown was stunning, but the lighting was appalling which resulted in a nasty shadow residing under Mr Lynch’s chin all night which only succeeded in ageing him by about thirty years. Utterly unattractive.

Knife-edge satire (where Mr Lynch happily and unapologetically lives) is a punishing form of comedy, and lesser talents would have crumbled under the conceit. Not so Mr Lynch, whose singing voice, diction and timing is fantastic and who can really belt out his tunes on the guitar and the piano. His use of his guitar as a lute was just sensational. Tom Lehrer, Noel Coward, Peter Cook and Dudley Moore all forged careers with satirical observations about the cause and effect of manners, ambition, society and the travails that come with each and all of those things – and Mr Lynch is doing a marvellous job of keeping the camp fires burning. Check him out on YouTube. You may very well be mortified, but you won’t be disappointed.

This review was commissioned by Stage Whispers Magazine @ www.stagewhispers.com.au

Film Review: The Ghost Writer

The Ghost Writer. 128 minutes. Rated MA15+. Directed by Roman Polanski. Screenplay by Roman Polanski and Robert Harris. Adapted from the novel The Ghost by Robert Harris.

The rich vein of undeniable political nous that is to be found in this grim, gloomy and intense political thriller from Roman Polanski (The Pianist, Chinatown, Tess, Rosemary’s Baby, The Tenant) makes for an absorbing film – and fans of intricate politically-motivated thrillers will love every minute of it. Harris’s terrifically taunt and candid script (that at times has the tone of a confession), benefits considerably from his experience as a news and current affairs BBC journalist and Political Editor of the UK’s The Observer.

With the assistance of a ‘ghost writer’ (someone who is paid to write a book that is credited to another author), British Prime Minister Adam Lang (Pierce Brosnan) is writing his memoirs. Following the mysterious death of his is first ghost writer, an un-named young writer, ‘The Ghost’ (played by Ewan McGregor), replaces him on a wind-swept island fortress. As Lang finds himself facing accusations of war crimes for Britain’s involvement in the Iraq war, The Ghost uncovers startling truths about his client’s political obligation to the Americans which, if they were ever to become public knowledge, would bring down the British Prime Minister and his government.

Unsurprisingly, the sun doesn’t appear to shine much in Mr Polanski’s world these days – and it doesn’t make a single appearance in this film. Post-production on The Ghost Writer was reportedly completed while the director was under house-arrest in Switzerland awaiting the outcome of an extradition attempt by the United States to face sex assault accusations dating back to March, 1977.

The stark photography from Cinematographer Pawel Edelman is perfect and Editor Hervé de Luze (both Oscar nominees for The Pianist) is in nail-bitingly good form, while Production Designer Albrecht Konrad’s fortress home set is a masterpiece. Alexandre Desplat’s score (Fantastic Mr Fox, The Queen) enhances the tense mood of the film perfectly.

Kim Cattrall (Samantha from Sex and The City) is great as Lang’s loyal PA, while Olivia Williams as his wife Ruth, absolutely nails every neurotic detail of the feisty First Lady who has a great deal to lose. Only Brosnan and McGregor fail to lose themselves entirely in the plot – choosing, instead, to play it deadly straight. And in a Roman Polanksi film, that’s always an obvious mistake.

This review was commissioned by the Geraldton Newspaper Group and an edited version of it appeared in the printed edition of The Geraldton Guardian.

Theatre Review: Norm and Ahmed

Norm and Ahmed by Alex Buzo. Directed by Alex Pinder. La Mama, Melbourne, until August 15.

Anyone who wants to know anything about playwriting, directing, acting and designing has until August 15 to get themselves to La Mama and see this brilliant account of Mr Buzo’s (a national treasure, surely) faultless first play.

Written in 1969 (which today is somehow almost too confronting to accept), it was notoriously the subject of a prosecution for obscenity – not, as La Mama’s Artistic Director Liz Jones pointed out (in her wonderful and emotional postscript to the performance) for the use of the word “boong”, but for the use of the word “fucking”. It was here, at La Mama, that Norm and Ahmed was first produced – and as a gentleman in the audience pointed out before the drawing of the famous ‘La Mama Raffle’: “Have the police been notified?” Norm and Ahmed also holds the La Mama record for the most re-stagings of a play at the theatre – with this Many Moons production being the fifth.

Mr Buzo’s script is all lean, theatrical muscle and Mr Pinder’s direction of it is absolutely beautiful in its stark and pure textual complicity. Peter Finlay (Norm) and Kevin Ponniah (Ahmed) deliver two of the most accomplished, tour de force performances in recent memory, and one has no choice but to forgive them their opening night nerves in front of a capacity house – bursting at the seams – for this rare and historic occasion.

In ‘Norm’, Mr Buzo somehow miraculously – and entirely – encapsulates a complex national identity including its deep-seated anxieties about the very essence of what it means to be different. From ‘Norm’s’ razor-sharp commentary about the “perverts” in the bushes to his moving reminiscence of his late wife ‘Beryl’ and his experiences as a soldier in the war – Norm is a monstrously illuminating creation. That people like him still exist, is cause for serious contemplation – and it is in his holding up of the cracked mirror where we, reluctantly, may find something of our own prejudices reflected, that marks Mr Buzo as a truly astonishing playwright. That it’s all done and dusted in under an hour makes him a master.

The tendency to fall into caricature in the performance of these two roles is never far from likely – such is the perilous line between stereotype and archetype around which great writers of great characters for the stage dance. In Mr Finlay’s hands, however, the immensely complex ‘Norm’ is in a craftsman’s hands. At times, through a most incredible vocal and emotional range, it was never entirely clear if Norm was going to kiss Ahmed or kill him. Norm’s vulnerability, his fear, his hatred and his quintessential Australian suspicion are all beautifully realised in this stunning performance. For anyone even remotely interested in the art of acting, this is what it looks and feels like. As Ahmed, Mr Ponniah is all wide-eyed wonderment and naivety – layered with a sense of genuine eagerness to be accepted by his marvelously engaging new-found friend. Mr Ponniah’s complete command of Mr Buzo’s dialogue was superb – and the audience loved it. The shouts and cheers at the end of the performance, with curtain calls which one sensed could have gone on all night, were entirely well-deserved.

Nothing, however, can prepare you for the final moment in Norm and Ahmed – and the woman sitting three seats away from me almost leaping from her seat and screaming “No!”, was the entire measure of this electric night in the theatre. It is compulsory viewing. Go.

This review was commissioned by Stage Whispers Magazine @ www.stagewhispers.com.au

Film Review: Me and Orson Welles

Me and Orson Welles. 114 minutes. Rated PG. Directed by Richard Linklater. Screenplay by Holly Gent Palmo and Vincent Palmo Jr. Based on the novel by Robert Kaplow.

There is a marvellous synergy about Richard Linklater's sparkling little gem of an independent film that tells the story of a week in the life of teenager Richard Samuels (a perfectly captivating Zac Efron).

At the height of the Great Depression, young Richard finds himself cast in Orson Welles’s (an unerringly brilliant performance from Christian McKay) Mercury Theatre production of Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar – performances that would become known as one of the most important theatrical events in history. The undeniable synergy is that, throughout his career (including 1941’s Citizen Kane and a notorious radio broadcast of H G Wells’s The War of The Worlds that convinced New Yorkers that Martians really were invading their city), Welles waged an unrelenting battle with the influential Hollywood studios of the 1930s and ‘40s for his right to complete creative control. His passionate audaciousness and pure creative genius is brilliantly realised in this film that has been made and distributed without the support of a major Hollywood studio – even if it has taken two years to get here!

Kaplow’s novel, (based on a true story), has provided Palmo and Palmo Jnr with a marvellous story about the power it takes to pursue one’s creative dreams – and their screenplay doesn’t miss a beat. Dick Pope’s (Topsy Turvy) cinematography is superb, as is Laurence Dorman’s perfect production design (the intimate and detailed recreation of every nook and cranny of The Mercury Theatre is, in its finite detail, astonishing). Bill Crutcher (Nanny McPhee and the Big Bang), David Doran and Stuart Rose’s (both of whom worked on The Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time) art direction is beautifully-observed, while Nic Ede’s (Nanny McPhee) consummate costuming generates both a magnificent period feel but also a wonderful individuality that flawlessly serves the film’s bold, theatrical adventurousness. Linklater’s frequent collaborator, film editor Sandra Adair, establishes and maintains a sublime pace that never falters.

Zoe Kazan (as a delightfully optimistic young writer, Gretta) is a revelation, with a performance of immense range, power and conviction, while Claire Danes is perfect as Welles’s ambitious assistant, Sonja. Ben Chaplin (Dorian Gray) is equally good as Mercury cast-member ‘George Coulouris’, and his stage-fright scenes immediately prior to the nerve-shattering opening night performance (in which he is playing Mark Antony) are rivetting.

This is a film for lovers of the theatre, radio, film – a film that will amply reward the time you spend in its richly engrossing, compelling, and vastly entertaining company.